Celebrating Five Years of Law in the AUC

On October 21st, 2010, in Oriental Hall, at 6:00 p.m. the Department will host an event to celebrate five years since the establishment of the department of law.  The event will be the occasion to launch an annual lecture series called "The Enid Hill Lecture in Law and the Humanities."  Khaled Fahmy, who is currently the Chair of the History Department at the AUC, will give the first lecture. The title of the lecture is:  Siyasa and Shari'a: The politics of implementing Islamic law in Modern Egypt .  Prof. Fahmy has been doing archival research on courts records in 19th century Egypt at the moment of modern codifications.  His scholarship has changed a great deal of our received ideas about the Egyptian legal system in the 19th century and the relationship between Islamic law and modern codifications.  Following the lecture there will be a reception.

 

This series of lectures is named after Professor Emeritus Enid Hill to honor her service to the Department of Law and its two degree programs. During the span of her long career in the AUC, Professor Hill worked with passion and fearless determination to promote a deeper, and sociologically informed understanding of the role of law in post-colonial settings particularly in Egypt.  Since the publication of her book Mahkama! Studies in the Egyptian Legal System: Courts and Crimes, Law and Society in 1979, professor Hill worked tierelessly to create a center of graduate learning in law and society at the AUC.  In 2005 the Law Department was created and Professor Hill became its founding Chair until her retirement in 2008.

Khaled Fahmy

Short bio

 

• Professor and Chair, Department of History, American University in Cairo.
• Education:
• BA, Economic, AUC, 1985
• MA, Political Science, AUC, 1988
• DPhil, Modern History, Oxford, 1993
• His research interests lie within the social and cultural history of modern Egypt, with particular emphasis on the relationship between law, medicine and society in the 19^th century.
• Representative publications:
• Mehmed Ali (Oneworld Publications, October 2008)
• All the Pasha’s Men: Mehmed Ali, His Army and the Making of Modern Egypt (Cambridge, 1997),
• Modernity and the Body: Essays in the history of law and medicine in modern Egypt (Cairo, 2000; in Arabic)
• “An olfactory tale of two cities: Cairo in the nineteenth century” in Historians in Cairo: Essays in Honor of George Scanlon, ed. Jill Edwards. Cairo: American University in Cairo Press, 2002, pp. 155-187.
• “For Cavafy with love and squalor: notes on the history and historiography of cosmopolitan Alexandria”, in Michael Silk and A. Hirst, eds. Alexandria: Real and Imagined (London, 2004).
• Currently writing a book on the history of law and medicine in modern Egypt for University of California Press.

2010 AFRICAN MOOT COURT RESULTS

As expected the AUC Law Department's African moot court team - Masa Amir and Tye Tavaras - did well at the Competition.  They won three out of four oral rounds and received above average on the written memorials.  The final round is scheduled for this Saturday 9 October.  They did a great job.

2010 AFRICAN MOOT COURT

After months of labor, the African Moot Court team - IHRL students Masa Amir and Tye Tavaras - leave on Sunday to participate in the 19^th African Human Rights Moot Court Competition to be held at the University of Abomey-Calavi in Benin from October 4 to 9. Written memorials were submitted on August 31st; oral argument practice continues. They will be presenting their oral arguments on 5 and 6 October. Stay tuned!

(This year is the seventh time that AUC has sent delegates to the competition. In September 2005, in Johannesburg South Africa, the AUC team reached the final round of competition out of sixty teams. The African moot competition was started in 1992 by law faculty at the Centre for Human Rights at University of Pretoria, South Africa. It takes place every year in a different African country. It was held at the American University in Cairo in 2002. The Competition aims to increase awareness of human rights issues on the continent, develop research, writing, and oral argumentation skills of participants, and provide a continent-wide network for information exchange and collaboration.)

International Peace Day, September 21

Today is International Peace Day and people across the globe are celebrating the outcome of all our efforts. The day commemorates all individuals who strive for harmony, reconciliation, unity and well being for all our communities.

What does this mean for the AUC community, particularly the Law Department? That answer will depend on each individual and how you would like to answer it. But one thing for certain is that we are all in the program to promote peace in one way or another.

Read more about the celebration at http://www.un.org/en/events/peaceday/2010/whatrudoing.shtml and have a peace-filled day!!

LSA 2010

Welcome to the 2010-2011 LSA

This year promises to be a grand year full of excitement and academic achievement for all students in the Law Department.

Several incoming students are joining the fray, and second year students are tackling course work that will lead up to the culminating thesis at the end of the year. First we would like to wish all students who will be part of the AUC department the best of experiences as we look forward the year.

Second we invite you all to join in the community and on campus networking by being active in events and programs run through the department.

I hope your year turns out to be all you expected and more!

Wawa

Panel Discussion on the Palestinian / Israeli Conflict Tomorrow Evening!

The AUC Law Students’ Association
Presents a Panel discussion on the Palestinian / Israeli Conflict

Chances & Challenges of a “one or a two state solution” for Palestine and Israel.

Speakers:
• Dr. Lama Abu-Odeh - Chair of the AUC Law Department
• Dr. Mike Kagan - AUC Law Department
• Dr. Omar Dajani - AUC Law Department and former member of the PLO’s Negotiations Support Unit
• Dr. Ezzedine Choukri- Fishere – AUC Political Science Department and Director of the Arab Israeli team of the International Crisis Group
• Dr. Sharif El- Musa – AUC Political Science Department

Monday 1st December 2008
AUC Law Department, Room 26
15th Floor, 9 Rostom Street
Garden City

Panel to begin at 8:15pm.

New Course, Spring 2009: "Globalization, Empire and the Law"

“Globalization, Empire, and the Law”

The Law department is offering in Spring Semester 2009 “Globalization, Empire, and the Law”. The course will explore the relationships between law, empire, and globalization, from historical and contemporary perspectives, and discuss the dynamics behind the rise and fall of imperial societies.

What makes political societies into imperial projects? How do states and nations rise to superpower and why they fail? What is the place of law in the construction and unmaking of imperial structures? Are empires a historical curiosity or does the legal organization of empire tell us anything about the current era of globalization?

The course will be a study of those and other questions through such imperial examples as Ancient Egypt and Persia, the ancient Greek World, Rome and Constantinople, the Umayyads and Abbasids, the Tang Dynasty in China, the Mongol, Spanish, Dutch, Ottoman, Russian and British Empires, ancient and less ancient African Empires, Nazi Germany and Imperial Japan, the Soviet Union, the United States of America, and last but not least emerging global powers such as the European Union and China.

The primary textbook will be Amy Chua’s Day of Empire, available at AUC bookstore.

Classes will be held each Monday from 5.00 pm to 8.00 pm, at AUC Law Department, 15th Floor, Cairo Capital Club Building, 9A Rostom Street, Garden City.

No exam. Paper required.

All are welcome to attend.

Looking back at Happy Snaps

Here are a few shots taken earlier this year in an attempt at a complete class, alumni and faculty photo... of course not everyone could be captured, but it's a start!

Suggestions regarding AUC's new campus

Have your voice heard re: AUC's New Campus!

The newly-formed AUC Foreign Students' Association has started distributing surveys in order to solicit feedback from students regarding the new campus move. Please pick up your survey from Room 25 (the Law Students' Association office) as soon as possible. This is the perfect forum for law students' (and students in the Forced Migration and Refugee Studies) program to express any grievances we may have regarding difficulties with the campus move, including with transportation, inclusion in activities, and requisite administrative activities.

Although feedback has been requested through this forum from foreign students in particular, Egyptian students are equally affected. Please pick up a survey regardless of your nationality, as we can use the information gathered to fully articulate all law students' concerns to the administration.

Please note that we are using all available forums to address our concerns. The survey is in addition to the petition being drafted by the Law Students' Association for submission to the administration.

Students may also want to check out the latest issue of the AUC Caravan, the student-run campus newspaper, which addresses issues related to the new campus move.

Jessup Moot Court Tryouts This Friday

Come Try Out for the Jessup Moot Court Team!

This Friday, September 26, 2008
4pm, Law Department

Tomorrow will be the Jessup International Moot Court information session. This is a great opportunity for people interested in international law. Employers value this experience very highly. Generally the team includes a maximum of 5 people; if more than 5 show up Professor Skouteris will go through a selection process.

All who are interested must attend: This meeting is mandatory for all students interested in competing. Even if you don't know for sure that you want to be on the team, please come to the meeting to get all the information.

What: Jessup Moot Court session, see below for more information about Jessup.

When: Friday, September 26 (tomorrow)

Time: 16:00 or 4:00pm

Where: At the law school - Professor Skouteris will unlock the building

JESSUP

Now in its 50th year, the Philip C. Jessup International Law Moot Court Competition is the world's largest moot court competition, with participants from over 500 law schools in more than 80 countries. The competition is a simulation of a fictional dispute between countries before the International Court of Justice, the judicial organ of the United Nations. A team from each participating school is required to prepare oral and written pleadings arguing both the applicant and respondent positions of the case.

Thousands of law students from around the world will work all year long on this season's Jessup Problem, which will address the power and authority of the International Court of Justice and other important international law issues. Most students must first compete in national and regional competitions (mostly held in January-March) to earn the right to advance to the world championship Shearman & Sterling International Rounds held every spring in Washington, D.C. The 2009 Shearman & Sterling International Rounds, which will mark the 50th Anniversary of the Jessup Competition, will be held March 22-28, 2009.