The Council for British Research in the Levant

Past Research Projects

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CBRL has supported the following projects:

Ain Qasiyeh Project

Affiliated Project

Dr Tobias Richter (formerly CBRL)
Project Website

Amid the nation and the conscience: dissident soldiers' groups in Israel

Travel grant
Yael Weisz-Rind (London School of Economics)

Ancient and Modern fortification in Israel/Palestine: Material culture, subjectivity and conflict

Travel grant
Juliana Ochs (University of Cambridge)

Anglican Palestinian perspectives on West Bank politics

Travel grant
Chris Moses (University of Oxford)

Arabic references on Wahhabism in AUB Library

Travel grant
Namitra Nahouza (University of Exeter)

Archaeological exploration of Aredhiou-Vouppes

Dr Louise Steel (University of Wales, Lampeter)

Intensive surface survey, topographic and geophysical survey of a small inland settlement identified as a LBA farmstead in order to assess the suitability for future archaeological research and examine evidence of agricultural exploitation of LBA Cyprus hinterland.

The Architecture of Petra

Research Award

Dr Judith McKenzie (University of Oxford)

Badia Development Project

Affiliated Project

Dr Roderick Dutton (University of Durham), the Jordanian Higher Council for Science and Technology, and the Royal Geographical Society

This is a long-term initiative (running for 10 years so far) where CBRL has supported a series of sub-projects and provided a base for visiting senior academics and postgraduate scholars.

Badia Excavations and Surveys

CBRL Project

Dr Alison Betts (University of Sydney)

Volume 1: The Harra and the Hamad: Excavations and Explorations in Eastern Jordan (1998) (Sheffield Archaeological Monographs, 9)
Volume 2: The Later Prehistory of the Badia: Excavations and Surveys in Eastern Jordan (currently in production in the Levant Supplementary Series)

Bedouin and the State of Israel: power dynamics and Bedouin identity in the Negev

Junior Research Fellowship

Kathrin Koeller (Oxford University)

Bread Stories: Palestine and Israel - an interactive documentary installation

Travel grant
Tina Gharavi (Newcastle University)

Care of collections at St. Katherine's Monastery, Mt. Sinai

Travel grant
Nikos Androutsopoulos (University of Durham)

Casting the net wide: small worlds, material culture and social networks during the Epipalaeolithic and early Neolithic of the Near East

Travel grant
Dr Fiona Coward (Royal Holloway University of London)

Children's constructions of national identity in Cyprus

Research Award

Dr Madeleine Leonard (Queen's University, Belfast)

Christian politics in Jerusalem since the first Intifada: analysis of the Palestinian theologies of liberation

Travel grant
Sam Kuruvilla (Exeter University)

Chrysostomian Armenian manuscripts in Israel and Egypt

Travel grant
Emilio Bonfiglio (Oxford University)

Citizen Hariri: Economic and Symbolic Power in Lebanon

Travel grant
Hannes Baumann (SOAS)

Classical art and literature in the early Islamic world

CBRL Scholarship Project

Tim Moore (former CBRL)

Clerical authority in Shi'ism: a study of contemporary religious transnationalism

Travel grant
Elvire Corboz (University of Oxford)

Collective action and the urban environment: Damascene textile workers, 1840s-1880s

Travel grant
Till Grallert (SOAS)

Communicating Power: social interaction in the southern Levant

Senior Visiting Research Fellowship

Dr Erin Gibson (Glasgow University)

Comparing systems of bureaucratic power in Syria and Saudi Arabia

Travel grant
Dr Steffan Hertog (Durham University)

Conceptualizing Violence: family and community perspectives, influences and interpretations

Junior Research Fellowship

Lisa Welze (Oxford University)

Constructing landscapes of home: Palestinian Refugees in Lebanon

Affiliated Project

Adam Ramadan (University College London)

Contemporary visual arts and policy implications in Jordan

Travel grant
Sonja Buchberger (Leeds Metropolitan University)

Corpus of Phoenician Inscription in Cyprus

CBRL Staff Project

Dr Robert Allen (formerly CBRL)

The production of three volumes on the inscriptions, textual commentary, glossary, onomasticon, theophoricon’ grammatical sketch of the Cypro-Pheonician dialect, palaeographic charts, bibliography and concordance.

Crusader Churches Corpus

Affiliated Project

Prof Denys Pringle (Cardiff University)

Former BSAJ Project, compiling a detailed corpus of all the church buildings constructed or in use in the Kingdom of Jerusalem in the 12th and 13th centuries. Vol III (Jerusalem) is now in pres with Cambridge UP and is due to appear in February 2007. Vol IV (Acre, Tyre with addenda) will go to press in spring/summer 2007 and is about to be submitted to Cambridge UP.

Dana-Faynan-Ghuwayr Early Prehistory Project

CBRL Staff Project

Prof Bill Finlayson (CBRL) and Prof Steven Mithen (University of Reading)
Project Website

Survey and trial excavations in the southern Jordan Faynan region, covering Palaeolithic to Aceramic Neolithic occupations.
Part of CBRL's Faynan Flagship Project.
Published in 2007.

Dayr Mar Elian, Syria

Affiliated Project

Dr Emma Loosely (University of Manchester)

Examination of the archaeological record of this mudbrick monastery in an oasis village on the Palmyra-Damascus trade route and positioning of this monument within the wider sacred and social landscape of the region.

Death, burial and memory in Early Prehistoric Cyprus

Travel grant
Paula Jones (University of Wales, Lampeter

The Determinants and dynamics of Lebanese foreign policy

Travel grant
Henrietta Wilkins (University of Durham)

Dhiban site conservation/reconstruction and excavations at Khirbat al-Nudayna Al-'Aliya (Tall As-Sa'idiyya cemetery)

Affiliated Project

John Green (University College London)

Dichotomies in the Syrian Media landscape

Travel grant
Juliette Harkin (Oxford University)

Dissident Bedouin poetry: The work of Ghassan Shbayl

Research Award

Prof Clive Douglas Holes (University of Oxford)

The recording, transcription, translation and annotation of a selection of poems by the dissident Bedouin poet, Ghassan Shbayl from Jordan. This project also includes a commentary on the poetic and linguistic features and socio-political significance of his work and of oral popular poetry in contemporary Jordan.

Educated wives, prestigious mothers: education and gendered identity in Syria

CBRL Scholar Project

Kate Washington (formerly CBRL)

Empires and Boundaries in Late Antiquity: comparative approaches to the question of pre-Islamic Arab identity

Travel grant
Dr Greg Fisher (Oxford University)

Ethnic conflict and memory: Remembering, forgetting and forgiving the past in Lebanon

Travel grant
Craig Larkin (University of Exeter)

Evaluation of Cerona imagery, case study in West Syria

Travel grant
Nikolaos Galiatsatos (University of Durham)

Evaluation of high and low resolution satellite imagery for aerial survey in Syria

Travel grant
Anthony Beck (University of Durham)

An examination of the social change in the Cypro-Geometric period

Travel grant
Sarah Janes (University of Glasgow)

Excavations at Sidon, Lebanon

Research Award

Dr Claude Doumet-Serhal (British Museum)
Project Website

To reconstruct Sidon's history through examination of the city's stratified layers.

Exile Communities in Jordan

Junior Research Fellowship

Naysan Rafati (Oxford University)

Experimental Archaeology at Beidha (Jordan)

CBRL Scholar project

Samantha Dennis (University of Edinburgh, formerly CBRL)

Reconstructing a series of early Neolithic structures for research and presentational purposes. Part of a larger conservation and presentation project organized by CBRL with the Department of Antiquities of Jordan.

Field Survey of Medieval Rural Settlements in Safita and ‘Arima castles, Syria

Travel grant
Balazs Major (University of Cardiff)

Figurines and Bronze Age Identity in Cyprus

Travel grant
Daisy-Kate Knox (Manchester University)

First-hand study of Levantine Bronze and Iron Age material culture and sites at museums in Damascus, Aleppo, Lattakia, Beirut and Amman

Travel grant
Rachel Fentem (University College London)

The Fones of Cypriot traditional music

Travel grant
Nicoletta Demetriou (SOAS)

Fortification of Cyprus under Lusignans, 1191-1489 AD

Travel grant
James Petre (University of Cardiff)

From water every living thing: Perceptions and use of water in the Ayybid and Mamluk Levant

Affiliated Project

Charlotte Schriwer (St Andrews University)

Water, mill technology and agriculture in Crusader-period Syria and Jordan.

Geoarchaeological approaches to social space in prehistoric western Cyprus

Travel Grant
Matt Dalton (University of Cambridge)

Government policies towards Christian communities in Syria and Jordan

Senior Visiting Fellowship
Dr Fiona McCallum (St Andrew's University)

The Greek speaking community of Mina in Lebanon

Travel grant
Lasithiotaki Efsevia (University of Exeter)

Health, disease and nutrition in prehistoric Cyprus

Travel grant
Michelle Gamble (Newcastle University)

Historic and prehistoric continuity in land-use and climate in Cyprus, a palaeoliminological approach

Research Award

Dr Jane M Reed (University of Hull)

Homs Citadel, Syria

Affiliated Project

Dr Geoffrey King (SOAS)

Post-excavation study of finds from Homs excavations in 1997, 1999, 2000 and 2001. Completion of registration and study of pottery, glass and other material excavated in preparation for second interim report and final publication.

Household and Community Storage Strategies in 3rd Millennium BC Cyprus

Travel grant
Sorina Spanou (University of Edinburgh)

Identifying Ancient Land Use through the Functional Ecology of Crop Weeds

Affiliated Project

Dr Michael Charles (University of Sheffield)

The Ideology of the Muslim Brotherhood in Jordan

CBRL Scholarship Project

Anne-Liliane Jorand (formerly CBRL)

Instrumental Neutron Activation Analysis of South Jordanian Iron Age II Ceramics

CBRL Research Fellowship

Dr Charlotte Whiting (CBRL Honorary Research Fellow)
Project Website

Instrumental Neutron Activation Analysis to enhance our understanding of the nature of south Jordanian Iron Age II ceramic production, consumption and distribution.

Inter-communal violence in Mandate Palestine, c 1928-1939

Research Award

Dr Tim Wilson (Oxford University)

Investigation of Bronze Age pottery found during emergency excavation of cemetery at Kissonerga, Cyprus

Travel grant
Thomas Lucs (University of Edinburgh)

Investigation of Bronze Age pottery found in cemetery at Kissonerga, Western Cyprus

Travel grant
Lisa Marie Graham (University of Edinburgh)

Investigation of Primary Source Material in Venice related to Medieval Cyprus

Travel grant
Dr Aysu Dincer (University of Birmingham)

The Involvement of torture survivors in the rehabilitation programmes implemented by humanitarian agencies in Iraq and Lebanon

Travel grant
Marie-Helene Pare (University of Oxford)

The Iraqi refugee community in Syria: a socio-political case study

Travel grant
Silvia Colombo (SOAS)

Iron Age Ceramics in West Syria

Travel grant
Matt Whincop (University of Durham)

Islamic feminism: the beginning of a political discourse in Jordan?

Travel Grant
Sarah Weirich (SOAS)

Israelite Sanctuaries: New Theoretical Approaches

Travel grant
Timothy Smith (University of Cardiff)

Jerusalem between two Empires: The transition between Ottoman and British Rule

Travel grant
Roberto Mazza (SOAS)

Jinnis and Science: Modernising Islam in the 19th and 20th Centuries

CBRL Research Officer Project

Dr Matthew Elliott (formerly CBRL)

Jordan's political and economic struggles against a water crisis

Travel grant
Martin Keulertz (SOAS)

The King-Crane Commission of 1919: Discourse and Diplomacy on post-World War I Greater Syria

Travel grant
Andrew J Patrick (University of Manchester)

Landscape learning and the colonization of Cyprus

Travel grant
Sandra Rosendahl (formerly CBRL)

Lebanon between national narratives: monopolising the making of a Shiite Lebanon

Travel grant
Fouad Marei (Durham University)

Legend, History, Hospitality: Exploring geographical imaginations of the Levant

CBRL Research Officer Project

Dr Jessica Jacobs (Open University, formerly CBRL)

Investigation of the role of contemporary tourism practice in the construction of opinions and attitudes towards the Arab world and its people, involving interviews with tourists and people working in the tourism industry in Jordan and Syria

Mapping a cultural identity into a national discourse

Travel grant
Alessandra Cecolin (SOAS)

Maronite Diaspora and the 'Promised Land'

Travel grant
Alexander Henley (University of Durham)

Metals and the political economy in the late 4th through the mid-3rd millennia BC

Travel grant
Leigh Stork (University of Edinburgh)

Migrant worker identities and interactions in Israel

Travel grant
Dr Michelle Jackson (Oxford University)

Muslim Communities in the Crusader States: A Historical and Archaeological Study

Travel grant
Roderick Millard (University of Cardiff)

Naccharini Cave Excavations (Lebanon)

Affiliated Project

Dr Andrew Garrard (University College London)

Nationalist Headgear in inter-war Egypt, Iraq, Syria and Palestine; Dancing in Arabia: Ibn Saud, Wahhabism and the World Depression 1930-31; A music ‘revolution’ in Turkey

CBRL Research Officer Project

Dr Matthew Elliott (formerly CBRL)

Neolithic communal architecture and the emergence of corporate groups

Travel grant
Alexis McBride (University of Liverpool)

Networks Disrupted: a study of 'walling' on contiguous communities in Israel/Palestine and Cyprus

Research Award

Dr Glenn Bowman (University of Kent)

New Beginnings? Education development in the informal Palestinian refugee camps of Southern Lebanon

Travel grant
Maria Al-Adib (University of Manchester)

The NGO-ization of Activism: donors, NGOs and social movements in Jordan and Lebanon

Junior Research Fellowship

Hanan Toukan (SOAS)

The origins of agriculture: A biocultural analysis of diet, health, and behaviour in the Neolithic Levant

Travel grant
Matthew Gasperetti (University of Cambridge)

Origins of the Islamic marketplace and its role in socio-economic exchange in the Middle East

Travel grant
Ian Roderick Simpson (Stanford University)

Ottoman Hajj Forts in Jordan (2002-2005)

Affiliated Project

Dr Andrew Petersen (UAE University, Honorary Fellow, University of Cardiff)

Team members: Pierre Brun (UCL), Ahmad Shurma (Dept of Antiquities of Jordan) and Ifan Edwards (Cambrian Archaeological Projects)

Palaeolithic artifacts and river terrace sequences in Syria

Travel grant
Andrew Shaw (University of Durham)

Palaeographical and archaeological analysis of the undeciphered syllabary of Bronze Age Cyprus, Cypro-Minoan

Travel grant
Silvia Ferrara (University College London)

Patterns of negation in Palestinian Arabic

Travel grant
Christopher Lucas (Cambridge University)

Peace and children's identities: the experience of organized peacebuilding with young Palestinians and Israelis

Research Award

Dr Jason Hart (University of Oxford)

Potential records of climate change from wetlands in the Levant

Senior Visiting Fellowship

Dr Richard Payne (University of Manchester)

The production of religious authority in the 1950s Damascus

Travel grant
Hilary Kalmbach (Oxford University)

Psemitismenos Trelloukas and polity origins in Maroni Valley, Cyprus

Research Award

Prof Sturt Manning (University of Toronto)

Pyla Geophysical Survey

Travel grant
Michael Brown (University of Edinburgh)

Reconstructing Social Agency through use-wear analysis in the Natufian of the Levant

CBRL Scholar project

Tobias Richter (Copenhagen University and University of Cambridge, formerly CBRL)

Reforming Syria: how viable is the on-going political and economic reform process?

Travel grant
Chaouki Boutharouite (SOAS)

Religion and biotechnology in Lebanon

Research Award

Dr Jeanette Edwards (Manchester University)

Religious interchange between Christian and Islamic heterodoxies in the Levant

CBRL Staff Project

Dr Yuri Stoyanov (formerly CBRL)

Religious symbolism in Israeli politics: Strategies and counterstrategies of the secular left and the religious right

Travel grant
Mark Hudson (SOAS)

Re-narrating homeland: the case of Palestinian refugees in Jordan during the years of II Intifada

Travel grant
Luigi Achilli (SOAS)

Ritual Practices in Mortuary and Domestic Contexts in Prehistoric East Mediterranean

Travel grant
Vasilki Koutrafouri (University of Edinburgh)

The role of archaeology in tourism development in the Levant -- policy networks and practices: the case of Jordan

Research Award

Dr Mike Robinson (Leeds Metropolitan University)

Roman Settlement and land use in the Faynan

Travel grant
Hannah Friedman (University of Leicester)

Scouting in Mandate Palestine

Travel grant
John Harte (SOAS)

Security and the Other: an ethnography of households under military occupation

Junior Research Fellowship

Irene Calis (London School of Economics)

Settlement and Development in the Basalt Region of Homs, Syria

Dr Paul Newson (University of Durham)

A spin-off from the larger Durham survey project in the Homs region that is now funded by the BA and is an affiliated project.

Settlement on the Syrian Littoral 11th-13th Centuries

Travel grant
Balazs Major (University of Cardiff)

Sexuality, Shame and Honour – Attitudes towards ‘same-sex relationships’ between women in Jordan and Lebanon

CBRL Scholar Project

Hazel Simons (formerly CBRL)

This project looks at the attitudes towards same-sex relations between women from a human rights perspective. It looks at theories of the construction of gender and sexuality within society in Jordan and Lebanon, in relation to attitudes towards, and problems faced by women within same-sex relations. It will examine social, religious and political factors which help determine how these relationships are perceived in general, and use interviews to get more personal, specific views from a number of different individuals. It is hoped that interviews will also be conducted with women within same-sex relations.

Shia Islamic ecumenism at the pan-Islamic conference held in Jerusalem in 1931

Travel grant
Henry Newman (London School of Economics)

The Silent Voice: Palestinian non-violent resistance and Israeli peace activism

Travel grant
Annekarijn De Jong (SOAS)

Socio-Political Complexity and Inter-Regional Connections in the 5th-4th Millenia Syro-Mesopotamia

Travel grant
Philip Karsgaard (University of Edinburgh)

South Jordan Iron Age II Survey and Excavation Project

CBRL Research Fellowship

Dr Charlotte Whiting (CBRL Honorary Research Fellow)
Project Website

Excavation of Khirbet el-Dabba and survey of the surrounding area between Showbak and Wadi Musa to reassess previous models of Iron Age society on the South Jordanian plateau.

The Southwest Cyprus Maritime Landscape Project

Travel grant
Duncan S Howitt-Marshall (University of Cambridge)

The status of Arabic amongst Israeli Jews

Junior Visiting Fellowship

Yoni Mendel (Cambridge University)

Survey of 13th-Century Crusader cemetery at ‘Atlit

Travel grant
Jennifer Thompson (University of Cardiff)

Syrian Migrant Workers in Lebanon since 1990

Research Award

Dr John Chalcraft (London School of Economics)

Research on the micropolitics of Syrian’s migration to Lebanon since 1990 with a focus on the production and reproduction of social networks between workers and employers

Syrian women’s attitudes to their experience of education

CBRL Scholarship Project

Kate Washington (formerly CBRL)

This project examines changing perceptions of gender roles within Syrian society by focusing on the educational experiences of Damascene women across two generations. My methodology is based on interviews with 20 women from Damascus who finished their education in the late 1960s and their daughters who finished in the late 1990s.

The role of Bethlehem policewomen in local conflict resolution

Affiliated Project

Jenny Steel (University of Cambridge)

UN Convention on the rights of the Child: UNRWA and service provision for stateless Palestinian refugees

Travel grant
Fay Mahdi (SOAS)

Usamah Ibn Munqidh and the Emergence of the ‘Coastal Frank’

CBRL Scholarship Project

John Harte (formerly CBRL)

Christian-Muslim relations in 12th-century Northern Syria

The Victim's Tale in Syria: imprisonment, victimisation and national identity

Travel grant
Sune Haugbolle (University of Oxford)

Violent constructions: state formation and the meaning of force in Syria 1920-1958

Travel grant
Daniel Neep (University of Oxford)

Wadi Faynan Survey, Jordan

CBRL Project

Prof Graeme Barker (University of Cambridge), Prof David Mattingly and Prof David Gilbertson (University of Leicester)
Project Website

Study of the environmental and landscape context of later prehistory and historical periods in Faynan, as part of CBRL's Faynan Flagship Project flagship project. Published in 2008.

Western Cyprus in the Middle Bronze Age

Travel grant
Lisa Graham (University of Edinburgh)

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