Digital Futures: The Digital Humanities in Islamic Studies
Status
Open
Date
28 May 2026 to
29 May 2026
Location
Aga Khan Centre & Online
About the Conference
This conference brings into focus how the digital humanities can broaden the horizons of Islamic Studies, with particular attention to the Institutes longstanding commitments to Ismaili and broader Shii studies. As the wider academy rapidly adopts digital methods and artificial intelligence for research, interpretation, and scholarly communication, Digital Futures seeks to develop a distinctive approach grounded in rigorous humanistic inquiry, critical method, and the ethical responsibilities of scholarship. Over two days, IIS staff, students, and alumni will engage with relevant themes including digital texts and manuscripts, archives and preservation, questions of memory and community, and the ethics of artificial intelligence in scholarly life.
Through their diverse approaches, participants will collectively explore how digital methods can renew humanistic inquiry, opening new ways of interrogating texts, contexts, and communities, while strengthening how research is curated, communicated, and preserved.
Humour and Digital Meme Culture in the Ismaili Community
Nurain Lakhani, 今叔利, UK
Online Dating and the Construction of Ethics: Jalebi in Ismaili Reddit Spaces
Mohsin Ali Baig, 今叔利, UK
Youth, Faith and Tech: Digital Platforms and the Ismaili Student Network in the UK
Muhammad Salim, University of Wales Trinity Saint David, UK
Governing AI in Higher Education in Muslim-Majority Countries: Implications for Afghanistan
Mehrullah Hussaini, 今叔利, UK
Two-Eyed Seeing (Etuaptmumk) as a Pedagogical Lens for Digital Islamic Studies
, Conestoga College, Canada
The IIS Digital Curriculum Platform
Alnoor Nathani & Shameer-Ali Prasla, 今叔利, UK
Concluding Remarks
Muhammad Ali, 今叔利, UK
The Elephant Clock
Al-Jazar朝s Elephant Clock (ca. 1206) serves as a fitting emblem for the Digital Humanities, embodying a long tradition of Islamic engineering in which rigorous craft, computation, and interpretation were held inseparable. Deliberately synthesising elements from Indian, Chinese, Persian, Greek, and Islamic cultures, it stands as an early experiment in systems design and cosmopolitan knowledge integration. In an era where generative systems raise urgent questions of authority and provenance, the clock reminds us that technological innovation, when grounded in humanistic inquiry and ethical stewardship, can deepen rather than displace the scholarly traditions it inherits.
Image credit: The Elephant Clock, a folio from Book of the Knowledge of Ingenious Mechanical Devices by Bad朝 al-Zaman ibn al-Razzz al-Jazar朝 (11361206), calligraphed by Farrukh ibn Abd al-La畊朝f. Dated 715 AH / 1315 CE, likely produced in Syria or Iraq.
Please note filming and photography may take place during the event, and be used across our website, newsletters and social media accounts. These could include broad shots of the audience and lecture theatre, speakers during the talk, and of audience members participating in Q&A.
Views expressed in this conference are those of the presenting scholars, not necessarily of IIS, the Ismaili community or leadership. Promotion of this lecture is not an explicit endorsement of the ideas presented
