Panelists discuss artifact’s relevance in Iranian culture

The university is taking time  this month to focus on the Cyrus Cylinder, which is being exhibited for the first time in the United States at the Getty Villa in Pacific Palisades, Calif. until Dec. 2.

The cylinder is often called the first declaration of human rights. It is an account of Persian King Cyrus’ conquest of Babylon, inscribed in Babylonian cuneiform.

The USC Annenberg School of Communication and Journalism will hosted a panel on the Cyrus Cylinder on Oct. 30. It will focus on artifacts and institutions that have begun global dialogues.

On Oct. 13, the USC Middle East Studies Program and the Farhang Foundation, an Iranian cultural group, held a lecture in the Tutor Campus Center Grand Ballroom examining the significance of the 2,600-year-old artifact.

Unlike the Annenberg panel, which will focus on the global impact of the cylinder, panelists at this event mainly discussed the cylinder’s relevance in Iranian culture.

Speakers at the event included Elizabeth Carter, a professor at UCLA; Ryan Byrne, a professor at the University of Texas, Austin; Bruce Zuckerman, a professor in religion at USC and an expert in near Eastern texts and Tamara Eskenazi, a professor at Hebrew Union College.

Part of the significance of the cylinder is that it includes information on Cyrus’ policy of repatriation towards the Jewish peoples. Eskenazi spoke about Cyrus’ actions impact on Jewish culture.

“Instead of vanishing from history, the people of Judah returned and they rebuilt. They not only survived, they soon flourished,” Eskenazi said. “In the process, they created the one of the most influential books ever, the [Hebrew] Bible. None of this would have been possible without the help of King Cyrus.”

Others speakers discussed more recent developments concerning Iran. Byrne suggested that studying the Middle East, an area of increasing political importance, leads to an understanding of what issues shape the region’s politics today.

“I think the Cylinder is a reminder that our intellectual heritage and diplomacy are always tied up together,” he said. “We only remember our past as well as we can remain peaceful enough not to destroy objects that are the conservators of those memories.”

Zuckerman, a professor in religion at USC spoke about USC’s pioneering use of imaging technology, to better view objects like the Cyrus Cylinder at the event.

“The great frustration is ‘I want the light, I want to look at this over here.’ This hands the people who need to study these things very powerful tools of the type they’ve never had before,” Zuckerman said. “It’s a real revolution, and I’m glad to say we are USC are at the cutting edges.”

Zuckerman said that more than 44 institutions make use of InscriptiFact technology, developed at USC, in order to better document artifacts. InscriptiFact is a project that allows people to access high-resolution images of ancient inscriptions through the Internet. Zuckerman is one of the experts behind the database of images.

The event also highlighted the Middle East studies program and its Iranian studies initiative.

Dornsife officially inaugurated the initiative two years ago when it began offering Persian language classes with the financial support of the Farhang Foundation. In offering Iranian studies, USC joins the ranks of schools such as Stanford, UCLA, New York University and Columbia University.

The minor is the second phase of a three-part plan from the Middle East studies program  to eventually create an Iranian studies major.

Part of the reasoning behind the program is that USC is located in Los Angeles, home to the largest Iranian community outside of Iran.

“I believe it’s crucial for the community, for our American friends, to see us in a brighter light that is a bit different from the negative portrayal in the mass media,” Haleh Emrani, chair of the Iranian Studies Council at the Farhang Foundation, said. “To be able to do that, we should rely on education. With that we need to promote Iranian studies to provide an environment for young people to be exposed to the positive side of Iranian culture.”

Those interested in learning more about the Cyrus Cylinder can attend Annenberg’s event “Rediscovering the Cyrus Cylinder: The Making of a Cultural Icon with Timothy Potts,” Oct. 30 at noon in the Geoffrey Cowan Forum.