Expert on Religion to discuss Middle East at VGCC on April 11

Vance-Granville Community College will host a noted scholar to talk about recent events in the Middle East on Wednesday, April 11 from 11 a.m. until noon in the Civic Center on the college’s Main Campus in Vance County. The public is invited to attend the presentation, which is offered free of charge.

The guest speaker, Dr. Anna Bigelow (pictured above), an Associate Professor of Islamic Studies in the Department of Philosophy and Religious Studies at N.C. State University, will discuss the role of religion in the series of popular uprisings called the “Arab Spring.” She will address where the current Middle Eastern turmoil is leading and what impact it might have on the United States.

Bigelow has taught at N.C. State since 2003, and won the Outstanding Junior Faculty Award from the College of Humanities and Social Sciences in 2009. She received her M.A. in Religious Studies from Columbia University and her Ph.D. in Religious Studies from the University of California Santa Barbara with a focus on South Asian Islam. Her book, “Sharing the Sacred: Practicing Pluralism in Muslim North India” (Oxford University Press, 2010) is a study of a Muslim-majority community in Indian Punjab and the shared sacred and civic spaces in that community. Bigelow’s current research, funded by the Scholars Program of the Carnegie Corporation of New York, involves further study of contested and cooperatively patronized multi-religious sacred sites in South Asia and the Middle East, focusing on the inter-religious dynamics that complicate or ameliorate these relations in plural communities around the globe. She speaks and writes frequently on religious extremism, religion and conflict, and the role of Islam in the world today.

Bigelow’s presentation is the sixth installment of an International Speakers Series sponsored by the VGCC Global Awareness Committee in partnership with the University of North Carolina’s World View program . The series is designed to enhance public awareness of pressing international issues and how they affect area residents. For more information, contact Global Awareness Committee chair Bobby Van Brunt at (252) 738-3412.