Hearing Palestine

Palestine Studies at University of Toronto

Events-Upcoming

Call for Post-Doctoral Fellowship in Palestine Studies

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The Hearing Palestine Initiative at the University of Toronto is pleased to announce a call for applications for a Post-Doctoral Fellowship in Palestine Studies, with a focus on Palestine and/or Palestinian archives. We invite outstanding scholars whose research critically engages with the historical, political, cultural, and social dimensions of Palestine or Palestinians. This fellowship offers an exciting opportunity to contribute to the growing field of Palestine Studies, encouraging innovative scholarship that expands and deepens understanding of Palestine.

Hearing Palestine (HP) is an academic initiative housed within the Institute of Islamic Studies (IIS) at the University of Toronto. The only program of its kind in Canada, Hearing Palestine explores what transpires in research and knowledge production when the voices, archives, and histories of Palestine and Palestinians are centered. This focus also asks how we expand the possibilities of research on Palestine and Palestinian history. The successful candidate will join a dynamic academic community committed to interdisciplinary research in Palestine Studies. The fellowship provides an ideal environment for advanced research on Palestine, and to foster an independent research agenda. The post-doctoral fellow will participate in and contribute to Hearing Palestine’s academic events and will have the opportunity to engage in related seminars, workshops, and lectures at the University of Toronto.

Eligibility Criteria:

  • Ph.D. in a field in the Social Sciences or Humanities with a completed PhD no earlier than December 2022
  • PhD candidates may apply if they complete their dissertation defence successfully no later than July 1, 2026
  • Demonstrated research expertise and publication record in Palestine Studies or a closely related field
  • All nationalities may apply.

Details on the Fellowship

  • Renumeration: $70,000 CAD per year
  • Duration: one year
  • Location: required residence at the University of Toronto
  • Start Date: September 1, 2026

Application Process

  • Application materials include a CV, statement of interest, research proposal (2000 words max), names and contact information of two referees (letters will not be immediately requested), and a writing sample.
  • Please submit all application materials via email to islamicstudies@utoronto.ca, using: “HP Postdoc Application” as subject of the email
  • The application deadline is April 6, 2026
  • Decisions will be conveyed to the successful candidate in early May, 2026

For any questions, please direct inquiries to islamicstudies@utoronto.ca

A PDF version of this posting can be found here.

[Jan 27, 2026] Wires of Coloniality: A Century of Telephone in Palestine

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📅 Date: Tuesday, January 27th  
⏰ Time: 3:00 PM – 5:00 PM
📍 Location: AP 246 (Anthro boardroom), 19 Ursula Franklin Street

Abstract: Although infrastructures are often built to endure for long periods, they are typically analyzed within the context of specific historical moments or governing systems. Building on the growing body of infrastructural studies that adopt a longue durée approach, this talk addresses telecommunications infrastructure in Palestine-Israel by exploring its development since its establishment during the British colonial period. Rather than framing the history of the telephone as a linear tale of modernization, this talk examines its inverse expressions – sustained lack, obstacles, erasure, willful neglect, and de-prioritization, and uncovers the different mechanisms underpinning these developments, as well as the biopolitical and necropolitical rationales behind them. Tracing the evolution of telephone infrastructure over the past century arguably reveals not only patterns of resemblance, reemergence, and continuity in power relations, but also the cumulative impact of infrastructural injustice over time.

Bio: Dr. Yara Sa’di-Ibraheem is a postdoctoral fellow in the initiative of Hearing Palestine at the University of Toronto, specializes in political geography, with research interests that include indigenous geographies and temporalities, settler colonialism, neoliberal urbanism, and infrastructure, focusing on the Middle East, particularly Palestine. Her main research explores socio-political dimensions of infrastructure in colonial settings— principally telecommunications and playgrounds—as well as neoliberal planning under settler colonialism and the spatial-temporal experiences of indigenous communities.

Register Here

Welcome to Yara Sa’di-Ibraheem, Postdoctoral Fellow

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The Hearing Palestine Initiative welcomes Dr. Sa’di-Ibraheem to a two-year postdoctoral fellowship, the first of its kind at the University of Toronto, with the support of the Faculty of Arts and Science and the Institute of Islamic Studies. 

Dr. Yara Sa’di-Ibraheem, specialises in political geography, with research interests that include indigenous geographies and temporalities, settler colonialism, neoliberal urbanism, and infrastructure, focusing on the Middle East, particularly Palestine. Her main research explores socio-political dimensions of infrastructure in colonial settings— principally telecommunications and playgrounds—as well as neoliberal planning under settler colonialism and the spatial-temporal experiences of indigenous communities.

A selected list of her publications includes:

Sa’di-Ibraheem, Y. & Wilkof S. (2025). Cabling and Un-cabling Palestine/Israel: Toward a Theory of Cumulative Infrastructural Injustice. Political Geography.

Sa’di-Ibraheem, Y. (2021). Privatizing the production of settler colonial landscapes: ‘Authenticity’ and imaginative geography in Wadi Al-Salib, Haifa. Environment and Planning C: Politics and Space, 39(4), 686-704.

Sa’di-Ibraheem, Y. (2021). Indigenous Wanderers in a Fortress Campus: Spatial Experiences of Palestinian Students at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. Holy Land and Palestine Studies. 20(2), 123-145.

Sa’di-Ibraheem, Y. (2020). Jaffa’s times: Temporalities of dispossession and the advent of natives’ reclaimed time. Time & Society, 29(2), 340-361.

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