1972 Presidential Address Middle East Studies Association Annual Meeting

Abstract

Five years ago, on the occasion of the first annual meeting of this Association at the University of Chicago, the Presidential address was delivered by our departed and lamented colleague, Gustave von Grunebaum. It was a distinguished occasion, but to tell the truth, it was also a somewhat trying one. For an hour or two before dinner, the cocktails had flowed freely; we were then served an enormous meal, enough to put some of us to sleep on the spot; the room was rather crowded and terribly overheated, and as the dinner plates were pushed away, the air grew thick with cigar smoke. As we struggled to regain our sobriety or at least to stay awake, perspiring and gasping for breath, Professor von Grunebaum arose in our midst and delivered a characteristically learned, intricate, and rather lenghthy discourse on the Islamic concept of sin. It was, of course, a brilliant performance, and it endowed the Middle East Studies Association with the necessary academic credibility to get off to a successful start. Upon reflection, I felt that it was also well suited to the locale of the city of Chicago, and as I pointed out to Gustave afterward, all in all it had been the very model of a Chicago convention: lots of booze before dinner, and lots of sin afterward.