Dr. Nora K. Schmid
Vertretungsprofessorin
Islamic Studies
Address
Office
Office hours
Tuesday 11:00 - 13:00 or by appointment
Contact
Nora Katharina Schmid is Acting Professor of Islamic Studies (History and Culture of the Pre-Modern Middle East) at the University of Hamburg. She has studied Arabic and French languages and literatures at Freie Universität Berlin and at the Institut National des Langues et Civilisations Orientales in Paris (PhD Freie Universität Berlin, 2018). She has previously held research positions in the Corpus Coranicum project (Berlin-Brandenburg Academy of Sciences and Humanities, 2007–2012), in the Collaborative Research Center 980 “Episteme in Motion” (Freie Universität Berlin, 2012–2018), and in the ERC project “Qur’anic Commentary: An Integrative Paradigm” (QuCIP) at the University of Oxford (since 2019, currently affiliated). In 2016, she was a Global Humanities Junior Fellow at Harvard University.
Research Interests
- Qur’anic Studies (notably the Qur’an as a late antique text)
- Pre-modern Islamic religious and intellectual culture and history (e.g., asceticism)
- Pre-modern Arabic literature and rhetoric (notably poetry and sermons)
- The intellectual and literary traditions of pre-Islamic Arabia
- Islamic law
Academic Positions
Oct 2022– Universität Hamburg, Asien-Afrika-Institut: Acting Professor of Islamic Studies (History and Culture of the Pre-Modern Middle East)
2019– University of Oxford, Faculty of Oriental Studies: Postdoctoral Researcher in the ERC project “Qur’anic Commentary: An Integrative Paradigm” (on special leave between Oct 2022 and March 2024)
2012–2018 Freie Universität Berlin, Collaborative Research Center 980 “Episteme in Motion”: Predoctoral and Postdoctoral Researcher in the project “From Logos to Kalām: Figurations and Transformations of Knowledge in Near Eastern Late Antiquity”
2007–2012 Berlin-Brandenburg Academy of Sciences and Humanities, Corpus Coranicum: Assistant Researcher and Researcher
2007 Freie Universität Berlin, Department of Romance Literatures: Assistant Researcher
Publications
Downloads of some of the following publications are available on my academia.edu page.
Books:
- Current project: Exhortation and Law in Early Islam
- The Ascetic Qur’an and its Kharijite Readers, forthcoming in 2023 (in peer review with Brill).
Edited volumes:
- Nora Schmidt, Nora K. Schmid, Angelika Neuwirth (eds.). Denkraum Spätantike: Reflexionen von Antiken im Umfeld des Koran. Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz, 2016.
Articles and book chapters:
- “‘A Scripture to Enlighten Them’: Light Imagery, Exhortation, and Ethical Guidance in the Qur’an.” In The Edinburgh Companion to Qur’anic Literary Studies, ed. Shawkat M. Toorawa (Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press).
- “Moses in Egypt.” In Biblical Traditions in the Qur’an, ed. Nicolai Sinai, Marianna Klar, Gabriel S. Reynolds, and Holger Zellentin. Princeton: Princeton University Press, forthcoming.
- “Interrogative Rhetoric and Deliberative Discourse in the Medinan Suras.” In Unlocking the Medinan Qur’an, ed. Nicolai Sinai, pp. 164–198. Leiden: Brill, 2022.
- “From Ethico-Religious Exhortation to Legal Paraenesis: Functions of Qur’anic Waʿẓ.” Islamic Law and Society 28/4 (2021), pp. 317–351.
- “Louis Cheikho and the Christianization of Pre-Islamic and Early Islamic Ascetic Poetry.” Philological Encounters 6/3–4 (2021), pp. 339–373.
- “Oaths in the Qur’an: A Structural Marker Under the Impact of Knowledge Change.” In Structural Dividers in the Qur’an, ed. Marianna Klar, pp. 143–180. Abingdon: Routledge, 2020.
- “Trajekte spätantiker Askese: Übungswissen in der frühislamischen Mahnpredigt am Beispiel von al-Ḥasan al-Baṣrī (21–110 AH/ 642–728).” In Übungswissen in Religion und Philosophie: Produktion, Weitergabe, Wandel, ed. Almut-Barbara Renger and Alexandra Stellmacher, pp. 183–204. Berlin: Lit, 2018.
- “Der zweifache spätantike Kontext altarabischer Sehersprüche.” In Denkraum Spätantike: Reflexionen von Antiken im Umfeld des Koran, ed. Nora Schmidt, Nora K. Schmid, and Angelika Neuwirth, pp. 209–233. Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz, 2016.
- “Lot’s Wife: Late Antique Paradigms of Sense and the Qurʾān.” In Qurʾānic Studies Today, ed. Angelika Neuwirth and Michael A. Sells, pp. 52–81. Abingdon: Routledge, 2016.
- “Abū l-ʿAtāhiya and the Versification of Disenchantment.” In The Place to Go: Contexts of Learning in Baghdād, 750–1000 C.E., ed. Jens Scheiner and Damien Janos, pp. 131–166. Princeton: Darwin Press, 2014.
- Esra Gözeler et al. “Corpus Coranicum Projesi: Kur'an'ı Geç Antik Döneme Ait Bir Metin Olarak Okumak.” Ankara Üniversitesi İlahiyat Fakültesi Dergisi 53/2 (2012): pp. 219–253.
- “Quantitative Text Analysis and its Application to the Qurʾan: Some Preliminary Considerations.” In The Qurʾān in Context: Historical and Literary Investigations into the Qurʾānic Milieu, ed. Angelika Neuwirth, Nicolai Sinai, and Michael Marx, pp. 441–460. Leiden: Brill, 2010.