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No / References Citations Metrics Reprints & Permissions Get access Abstract This paper presents the observation of lipid residue, identified as beeswax, preserved in the ceramic matrix of a Late Chalcolithic (c. 3700–3000 BC) bevelled-rim bowl (BRB) from the site of Tepe Sofalin on the Tehran Plain. Gas chromatography-mass spectrometry (GC-MS) was used to separate and identify the lipid constituents preserved in the matrix of a BRB sherd. Lipid biomarkers were recovered including long-chain n-alkanes, n-alkenes, palmitic wax monoesters, fatty acids and n-alcohols characteristic of beeswax. In addition to two disaccharides, cholesterol and β-sitosterol as contaminants were retrieved by solvent soluble extraction from a number of different locations from the ceramic matrix of the analysed sherd.

Continued water scarcity, flooding, pollution and urbanisation, especially in developing countries, have signified the necessity of renewed exploration of the most appropriate approach to water management. This approach should aim to meet the water requirements in the changing world in a sustainable way. Reviewing the different water approaches that have emerged in the developed countries during the last decades suggests that Adaptive Water Management (AWM) could provide a sustainable route to address the existing complex problems of urban water management through the future. The purpose of this study was to determine whether AWM could be applied to Greater Tehran in order to maximise sustainability and deal with the future uncertainties. The AWM characteristics of polycentric governance, institutional flexibility, and public participation were used to assess the adaptability of the existing water management. The research findings showed that, despite the lack of adaptability in the current Greater Tehran water management, there are positive attitudes towards adaptability among water professionals and the public. The research findings emphasised that the AWM application could be promoted by more participation in various levels of institutional structure. This thesis suggests that if the concept of AWM is applied to Iran, it has the potential to have a significant influence in the current/future water management by promoting technical and institutional performances simultaneously.

This thesis explores the transformation of public spaces, with reference to power relations and the struggle for power. In this regard Tehran has been chosen as the main concern and the case of the study, while in its short history of being the political center of the country, the city has been hosting several uprisings and political tensions that are projected on the body of the city. The agencies of this power struggle will be analyzed sociologically and politically, to comprehend the way public spaces of the city and the conception of space are transformed. The spatial analysis of the case of the study in different periods of its history, in relation to socio-political elements of effect, will cause the study to evolve around a simultaneous concentration on spatial transformation and power relations. With such a framework this thesis will question the role of architecture and urban design in the transformation of space, which is dominated by the power struggle, and its balance. The primary aim here is to understand how public space becomes a political apparatus in using urban public spaces historically, in the struggle over power, and how the ruling power represents its ideology in public spaces and how in response the resisting forces of the society manifest their demand for change in public spaces and appropriate those v spaces to live in. Alongside the theoretical discussions, the case of Tehran will provide a multi dimensional source for these explorations / the discussions will mainly focus on a great public square of Tehran (Azadi Square), and the entrance of Tehran University, as the critical and symbolic nodes of public gatherings in the recent history of this city, to analyze how public spaces which are created by one authority of power might totally change in terms of function and meaning, and be transformed into a new entity with similarities and contradictions with the previous one.

The critical attention that has been given to Vita Sackville-West’s travel literature has primarily focused on the relationships between these texts and the novels of Virginia Woolf on account of the intimate relationship that existed between the two writers. I argue in this paper that Sackville-West’s travel accounts are worthy of study in and of themselves. This report explores the ways that the genre of travel literature was changing in the early twentieth century through Vita Sackville-West’s Passenger to Teheran (1926). Critics such as Marie Louise Pratt have noted that eighteenth- and nineteenth-century British travel accounts had been used as a way to transmit technical knowledge of, and authority over, the East. Sackville-West’s text throws this tradition of the genre into question through its focus on the traveler’s subjectivity. Working from Michel de Certeau’s ideas regarding railway travel and incarceration, I want to demonstrate that the traveler’s subjectivity is augmented by her position as a passenger in various modes of mobility. Ultimately I argue that the privileging of imagination and subjectivity over scientific knowledge found in Passenger to Teheran unravels the traditional epistemology of travel writing which positions the traveler as an authority figure on the East, and instead positions Sackville-West as a traveler-aesthete. This shift in the role of the travel writer reveals that while Pratt’s description characterizes some travel writing, Sackville-West’s travel project is more concerned with discovering the creative potential that travel can stimulate in the mind rather than purporting to reveal facts about the outside world. / text

The Master's thesis Iranian opposition and blogging - the phenomenon of Citizen journalism in a non-free society is focused on analysis of blogging as an opposition's communication tool within the nondemocratic regimes, contemporary Iran in particular. The research question is How can be the opposition's communication performed by blogging and what are the limitations and possibilities of such communication. The primary hypothesis is that the blogs are not used for direct manangement of opposition's actions, but rather as an alternative space for free expression. Four opposition's blogs written in english are analysed by means of qualitative analysis. The main criteria for selection of blogs were that the blog should be actualised on regular basis, based in Iran or at least written by a native Iranian, and clearly be in favour of the opposition's ideology. Content published between march 2009 and march 2010 was selected for analysis, for it was the period of disputed presidential election and following citizen's unrest in Iran. The issues of media's effects are not discussed in the thesis. Aside of the analysis, certain theoretical models of communication and their potential use within Iran's blogosphere are discussed. The analysis finally confirms that the bloggers have a potential to become...

Basée sur la méthode d’observation ethnographique suivant une approche emic, cette étude a pour objet l’humanisation de l’espace et l’invention des formes de solidarité à travers les pratiques minimes de la vie quotidienne. Cette recherche a commencé sur le terrain d’Islamâbâd, un quartier auto-construit qui fut d’abord un bidonville, situé en banlieue de Téhéran, habité par une population précaire issue de l’exode rural. Une étude compréhensive a porté sur tous les aspects de la vie de ce quartier. Puis le parcours personnel de la chercheuse l’a conduite à un nouveau terrain, le quartier parisien de Saint Blaise, marqué par de grands ensembles de logements et une population, souvent immigrée, vivant des minimas sociaux. On s’est alors demandé ce qu’il en était de la solidarité et de l’appropriation de l’espace dans la capitale française d’aujourd’hui. Cette recherche a ainsi pris la forme d’une étude comparative des pratiques quotidiennes d’interaction dans deux systèmes étatiques et sociaux aussi différents que l’Iran et la France. Les résultats montrent que les usages de la solidarité, exemplairement la relation don/contre-don, et les efforts d’appropriation de l’espace, sont caractéristiques de ces deux sociétés, en dépit de toutes leurs différences sensibles / Based on the methods of ethnographic observation and according to an emic approach, this study is meant to understand the humanization of space and the invention of the forms of solidarity through the tiny practices of the everyday life. This research started on the field of Islamâbâd, a self constructed community which was initially a shantytown, located in suburbs of Teheran, inhabited by a precarious population resulting from the rural migration. This is a whole study related to all of the aspects of the life of this community. Then the personal experience of the researcher led her to a new field: the Parisian community of Saint Blaise, marked by great public and social housing with an often immigrant population living of the social minimums. One of the questions was about the signification of the solidarity and appropriation of space in the actual situation of French capital. This research thus took the form of a comparative study of the everyday practices of interaction in two official and social systems as different as Iran and France. The results show that the uses of solidarity, particularly the relation “don/contre-don”, and the efforts of appropriation of space, are characteristic of these two societies in spite of all their obvious differences

La présente thèse se propose d'évaluer le rôle de l'identité urbaine dans les évolutions des approches de la rénovation urbaine en Iran et à Téhéran contemporain. La Partie I examine les fondements théoriques dont l'identité et l'identité du lieu, ainsi que leur rôle dans l'histoire de la civilisation iranienne. Le chapitre 1 présente une analyse des pensées des philosophes irano-musulmans pour déterminer un cadre pour le concept de l'identité. Le chapitre 3 se servira de ce cadre conceptuel pour obtenir les critères d'évaluation de l'identité de la ville. La Partie II est consacrée aux expériences de la rénovation urbaine dans le monde et présentera une image générale de l'évolution historique des tendances identitaires. La Partie III examine les politiques identitaires, les programmes, la législation et les plans de rénovations urbaines pendant l'histoire contemporaine de l'Iran. Le but est de présenter les courants d'idées identitaires dans le domaine de la rénovation urbaine. La Partie IV se concentre sur l'étude de trois grands projets de rénovation à Téhéran, pour évaluer les évolutions des approches de rénovation, du point de vue de l'attention portée à la question de l'identité. La thèse présentée est la suivante : l'identité urbaine a toujours été l'un des défis principaux des projets de rénovation urbaine en Iran et à Téhéran, et a joué un rôle déterminant dans les changements des approches. Pour accéder à une identité urbaine convenable à Téhéran, de nombreuses approches ont été expérimentées ; du recours aux méthodes modernistes se focalisant sur les aspects physiques, à l'approche de la théorie du paysage, se fondant sur la construction du lieu. / This thesis evaluates the role of identity in changing urban renovation approaches in contemporary Iran and Tehran. The first part as theoretical bases deals with the concepts of identity, place identity and its importance in the civilization history of Iran. In the first chapter, the framework of the concept of identity in the culture of Iran is developed by the content analysis of the main Iranian-­Islamic philosophers' view. In the third chapter, the criteria of evaluating place identity and its functions are investigated by using this framework and analyzing theoreticians' views. In the second part, the experiences of urban renovation in the world are studied and dominant approaches are introduced. In the third part, while identifying identity policies, development programs, regulations and urban plans are evaluated in three main periods of the contemporary history of Iran. The result of this part is identifying currents claiming identity in the urban renovation of Iran comparing the change of their tendencies towards its universal evolution. In the fourth part, renovation approaches in Tehran and the change of their tendencies towards urban identity are evaluated by focusing on three case studies of the main renovation projects in Tehran. Finally, the conclusion was drawn that urban identity has been suggested as one of the main challenges of urban renovation in Iran and Tehran and has had a determining rote in changing renovation approaches. Various approaches are examined to achieve the desirable urban identity in Tehran that their evolution is started from frame-oriented modernistic methods and is ended in landscape approach based on place making.

This thesis deals with the diplomatic and consular privileges and immunities - first theoretically and then with the application by the International Court of Justice in the "Case concerning diplomatic and consular stuff in Tehran." The thesis emphasises the importance of an observation of these privileges and immunities by the international community and its relevance within the public international law. The thesis is divided into the introduction, 5 main chapters and the conclusion. First chapter is focused on the diplomatic and consular privileges and immunities in general. It deals with basic concepts as well as with a list of diplomatic and consular privileges. The Part about immunities according to Vienna convention on Diplomatic and Consular relations is included here too. This chapter also focuses on obligations of the diplomatic and consular stuff in relation to the receiving state. Second chapter states obligations of the receiving state in relation to the diplomatic mission, consular post and their stuff and also certain rights that the receiving state is authorized to demand. Third chapter is divided into 2 main parts - a historical one, which describes modern history of Iran since the beginning of 20th century and focuses on the development of Iran - USA relations. Second part of the...

This thesis examines the interpretive tradition of Mullā Ṣadrā in the context of the schools of Tehran and Qum. Mullā Ṣadrā’s transcendental philosophy (al-ḥikmah al-mutaʿālīyah or ḥikmat) avails itself to a number of readings; however, this thesis focuses on the philosophical and mystical (ʿirfānī) readings in terms of their development, transmission and their impact on how ḥikmat is understood in the modern Iranian seminary (ḥawza). The way in which a text is read in the ḥawza has great implications for the development of ideas, as the ḥawza uses a text based system to train students in a particular field. While both readings were studied by the majority of transcendental philosophers (ḥukamāʾ) in the school of Tehran, the school of Qum saw a greater separation between the readings and I show that for a number of reasons, including the introduction of seminal texts written by ʿAllāmah Ṭabāṭabāʾī, a preference developed for a more philosophical reading of transcendental philosophy. I examine evidence for the different preferences of the ḥukamāʾ for either a more philosophical or ʿirfānī reading of ḥikmat through an examination of their writings on the subjects of existence (wujūd), guardianship (walāyah) and resurrection (maʿād) which act as case studies. The theoretical implications of both approaches are examined in each chapter as well as their interdependence. The schools of Tehran and Qum built on Mullā Ṣadrā’s framework and provided new interpretations of important issues. Apart from the intricate discussions on the core aspects of ḥikmat, Muḥammad Riżā Qumshihī’s masterful examination of the Seal of the Saints and ʿAlī Mudarris Zunūzī’s philosophy of bodily resurrection are examples of a thriving interpretive tradition in Iran and constitute significant developments of important philosophical and ʿirfānī concepts from the ideas of their predecessors.