close
Research

For the love of cotton

One of the key characteristics of Meroitic textiles resides at their very heart: before the threads and weaving techniques, it is their raw material – cotton fibres – that defines them as a unique textile tradition. Among the hundreds of textiles that I have been studying so far, up to 80% are solely made of cotton.  As a young researcher first working on textiles, I did not pay much attention to that fact. As it was
read more
Research

Current Research in Textile Archaeology along the Nile

Seminar at Centre for Textile Research, University of Copenhagen Monday 21st of January 2019 Together with the Centre for Textile Research, the Textile Archaeology in Egypt and Sudan research group will organize a one-day conference focusing on current research in textile archaeology along the Nile Valley. Fourteen scholars - many of them young researchers - will share their current work on textile finds discovered in Egypt and Sudan and dated from the Prehistoric to the
read more
Musings

Getting started as a Marie Curie postdoc – Life edition

…Or “A non-exhaustive list of needs when moving to/within Europe”. You will need: The international move kit (family in tow optional): A good knowledge of the local visa and residence procedures, All of your administrative papers (and some), A cushion of savings and/or a couple of credit cards, A translating app, A very understanding partner, A child not adverse to change, A positive mind set (stubbornness might help too), A good outdoor wardrobe for all
read more
Research

Dressed in Amun’s blue

Fourth research stay: Penn Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology, Philadelphia. A leitmotiv of Meroitic textiles, the color blue is omnipresent in virtually all decor: stripes, embroideries, tapestry…etc. Sometimes, it even covers the entire expense of the fabric. Interestingly, it is very rarely associated with another color and is a constant companion to the use of cotton. So much so that it seems that Meroitic textiles are best defined by a camaïeu of white and blue
read more
Modern Lens

A week in my grand-mother’s tobe

Shortly after I started TexMeroe, I saw on Twitter the beautiful picture of a young Sudanese woman wearing a traditional white tobe and posing for the camera in her university’s garden. Fresh from reading Khartoum at Night, I had recently discovered the primordial role of the tobe for the emancipation of women throughout Sudan’s modern history. So her image really resonated with me. I got in touch with her – oh marvel of social media!
read more
Research

Tell me what you wear…

Tell me what you wear…. And I will tell you who you are? Third research stay, Royal Ontario Museum, Toronto, Canada In our world of infinite fashion choices, judging a person solely on the one outfit we see him or her wear first would be simplistic. But can we deny the strength of our projected appearance, on others as well as on ourselves? In September 2015, in a much-commented gesture, the Chinese prime minister Xi
read more
Research

In Reisner’s footsteps

Second research stay: Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, USA Any student of Egyptology would love to get lost in the MFA’s corridors and storage rooms, discovering the many faces of ancient Egyptians, statues and tomb reliefs unearthed by George A. Reisner at Giza. But Reisner didn’t only deploy his herculean prowess in Egypt: among his many archaeological endeavors, he also excavated some of the major sites of Sudanese and Nubian history, such as Kerma, Djebel
read more
Modern Lens

Sudanese Clothing Through the Modern Lens

Wearing clothes answers social imperatives, many more than bodily needs in fact. As humans, we of course need to protect our bodies from the environment and from view, but how we do it is what socially matters. This is why clothing is an ever-present subject in the political debate of every country, and why this apparently simple need sustains one of the biggest economic market worldwide. The way we present ourselves to others conveys our
read more
Modern Lens

Forty White Tobes

The first day I came to the Copenhagen University, I happened upon a book seemingly waiting for me on a shelf of the Academic bookstore. Entitles “Khartoum at Night, Fashion and Body Politics in Imperial Sudan”, the essay is written by Mary Grace Brown, assistant professor of History at the University of Kansas. It retraces the history of women’s life in Norther Sudan from 1899 to 1956, focussing on the sharp evolutions of their bodily
read more
Musings

Getting Started as a Marie Curie Postdoc

Organisation central at my desk, CTR [photo E.Y.]
Here it is: you have signed your contract, (hopefully) found a decent place to live, got the keys to the office and bought a new coffee mug with your new digs’ logo. Now it is time to get the ball rolling and work! You know the intricacies of your project by heart, well ordered as they are in your grant application. You most probably have spent months on each aspects of your project, dreamed about
read more
1 2
Page 1 of 2