#  Feb 16: Public Lecture: Jeannie Miller (Univ of Toronto) 

 



####  calendar\_today Date and Time 

 **February 16, 2016** 

 04:00PM - 05:30PM EST 

####  pin\_drop Location 

 **6 Divinity Ave., #201**  



 

 



 

The Department of Near Eastern Languages and Civilizations presents:

**Dr. Jeannie Miller**

Assistant Professor, Department of Near and Middle Eastern Civilizations  
 University of Toronto

 "**Exceptions and Wonders: Rhetoric and al-Jahiz's Natural Science"**

 Tuesday, February 16, 4:00 p.m.

6 Divinity Avenue, room 201

The ninth-century polymath al-Jahiz has, in his cultural afterlife, acquired two personae: the impish and sophistic author employing the rhetorical genre of “debating the merits” of various objects, and the passionate theologian who pursued natural science as a component of theology. Integrating these elements of al-Jahiz’s output, this talk will examine the argumentative and performative strategies within the rhetorical debates he narrates in *Kitāb al-Ḥayawān* (Book of Animals). I will ask how he thought rhetoric produced knowledge of natural science, and why exceptional, shocking, and extreme creatures figure so prominently.



 

 



 

 

 Share on:- [     Facebook ](#)
- [     Twitter ](#)
- [     Linkedin ](#)
 


 Save: [ Add to calendar calendar\_today ](https://nelc.fas.harvard.edu/node/635996/event-feed.ics)  Copy link link