Following last year’s successful inaugural event, the second edition of the Abu Dhabi Manuscript Conference is set to take place from 17-18 February at Manarat Al Saadiyat, organised by the Department of Culture and Tourism – Abu Dhabi (DCT Abu Dhabi). The 2020 conference will highlight issues faced in the area of manuscript preservation and discuss how to best implement potential solutions.

Over two days, the conference will see renowned manuscript preservation experts, academics and specialists from the Arab world come together in multiple sessions to discuss issues they have faced when documenting heritage, geographical, literary, historical, scientific and linguistic texts.

The discussions will also provide a deeper insight into the significance of historical texts and the invaluable impact that preserving ancient knowledge from the Arab world has had. These discussions will also address the challenges faced by those publishing the texts.

“DCT Abu Dhabi is committed to preserving our shared heritage, and one significant aspect of this is the precious knowledge contained in Arabic texts”, said Abdullah Majed Al Ali, Acting Executive Director of the National Library Sector, DCT Abu Dhabi. “The Abu Dhabi Manuscripts Conference and Seminar, now returning for the second year, is a valued addition to Abu Dhabi’s roster of academic and hertitage-focused events.

“Sessions featuring leading academics and specialists will offer invaluable expertise and insight, proposing practical solutions to the issues faced by those in the field of manuscript preservation. These experts will showcase the added value of these texts in the documentation of knowledge and science within the Arab world.”

On the first day, three sessions will be held under the umbrella topic of ‘General Issues in Documenting Heritage Texts’.

The first session of the conference will welcome speakers from Saudi Arabia, Jordan, and Egypt to discuss a variety of topics such as: ‘Issues of Distorting and Altering Documented Texts’, with Dr. Hamad Nasser Al Dakhil; ‘Perplexity of Titles and Plurality of Narratives in the Documented Text’, with Mr. Saleh Al Jassar; ‘Documenter’s Boundaries for Interference in a Documented Text’, with Dr. Anwar Abu Suwailem; and ‘Issues of Documenting Anonymous Manuscripts’, with Mr. Yousif Al Sinnari.

‘Issues of Documenting Geographical Texts’ will be discussed in the second session, as speakers from Kuwait, Egypt, Yemen and Jordan cover four areas: ‘Issues of Documenting Geographical Maps’, with Dr. Abdulla Al Ghunaim; ‘Geographical Texts Between Reality and Fantasy’, with Dr. Amr Abdulaziz Munir; ‘Issues of Duplication Resulting from Distortion, Alteration and Translation in Arabic Lexicons: Dictionary of Countries as an Example’, with Mr. Abdulla Al Suraihi; and ‘Documented Geographical Texts Between the Missing Original and Transferred Texts’, with Dr. Al Mahdi Eid Al Rawadhia.

The final session of Day One concludes with ‘Issues of Documenting Literary Texts’, in which four topics will be dissected by experts from Saudi Arabia and Jordan: ‘Issues of Documenting Unattributed Evidence…The Book of Proverbs by Hamza Al Isfahani as an Example’, with Dr. Ahmad Al Dhabib; ‘Authenticity of the Literary Text in Light of the Conflicting Accounts of Historical Sources’, with Mr. Ibrahim Al Haqil; ‘Issues of the Single and Multiple Narratives of Old Poetry Books’, with Dr. Omar Al Fajawah; and ‘Issues of Documenting the Mufaddaliyyat and Asma’iyyat’, with Dr. Mohammed Ibrahim Hur.

The second day of the conference will start with a session titled ‘Issues of Documenting Historical Texts’, with four key points highlighted by academics from the UAE, Algeria, Jordan, and Egypt. These topics include ‘The Issue of Historical Narratives between Hadith Experts and Historians’, with Dr. Bashar Awwad Ma’arouf; ‘Documenting the Books of Apostasy and Conquests…Al Waqidi’s Works as an Example’, with Dr. Issam Uqla; ‘Books of Imperfections Between Documentation and Doubt…Kitab Al Mathleb by Ibn Al Kalbi as an Example’, with Mr. Ahmad Mohammed Obaid; and ‘Issues of Name Standardisation in Books of Genealogy, Biography and Narrators’, with Dr. Mahmoud Mahran Al Zu’bi.

A second session, ‘Issues of Documenting Scientific Texts’, will address four topics, namely: ‘Documenting Cryptic and Coded Scientific Texts’, with Dr. Mohammed Jad Kamel; ‘Documenting Pictograms and Portraits of Instruments and Machinery’, with Dr. Ammar Al Talibi; ‘Issues of Interpreting Scientific Terms in Heritage Books in the Absence of Relevant Lexicons’, with Dr. Lutf Allah Qari; and ‘Documenting the Translated Scientific Text’, with Dr. Maher Abdulqader Ali.

The final session of the conference will look at ‘Issues of Documenting Linguistic Texts’, covering the topics ‘Documenting Authentic Transferred Texts in the Books of Annotations, Responses, Notifications and Commentaries’, with Dr. Ayyad Al Thubaiti; ‘Refining Documented Linguistic Texts from Margins Mixed with the Main Body of a Text’, with Dr. Ali Tawfiq Al Hamad; ‘Documenting Linguistic and Grammatical Texts in Literary Sources’, with Dr. Abdulla Al Falah; and ‘Documenting Linguistic Texts in Light of its Earlier Origins and Later Lexicons…Tahtheeb AL-Lugha (Language Discipline) and Taj Al Arus (Crown of the Bride)’, with Dr. Sulaiman Al Ayed.