Ali Asgar Alibhai, a history professor at Texas, is set to give a talk on the McNichols Campus titled, “Water and the Pious Prince: Understanding Medieval Islamic Political Discourse through Hydraulic Architecture.”
Alibhai, who is an assistant professor of Art History at Texas, will present inside the exhibition space of the Loranger Architecture Building at 5:30 p.m. Thursday, Oct. 13.
His talk focuses on hydraulic engineering and architecture from the medieval Islamic Aghlabid and Fatimid dynasties of Tunisia. It examines environmental history and its connection to both political thought and material culture. These necessary urban constructions were not only built for pragmatic reasons, but their attached historical data demonstrate a deeply political and religious framework.
Many regions of the Islamic world existed — and still do — in some of the most arid regions of the habitable world with minimal rainfall.