Name : SABIR

Surname  : BADALKHAN

Country of birth  : Pakistan

Present address: Oriental University of Naples, Naples, Italy.

Ph.D. in Oral Poetry and Minstrelsy traditions in Balochistan.

Positions held:

a)           Professor (on contract basis): taught courses on “Popular cultures and oral traditions of the Islamic world”; “Popular traditions in the Arabo-Mediterranean world”; Popular Cultures and oral traditions of South Asia”, at Faculty of Islamic Studies, University of Naples, “l’Orientale”, Italy (1999-2000, 2004, 2005).

b)           Lecturer of Pakistani Languages and Literatures, University of Naples, “l’Orientale”, Italy, 1987-88, 1994 - July 31, 2008.

c)           Member of the Editorial Board of Balochistan Review, Biannual Journal of Balochistan Study Centre, University of Balochistan, Quetta.

d)            Member of the International Committee for Balochi-English Dictionary Project, University of Uppsala, Sweden - University of Oriental Studies, Naples, Italy.

e)            Member of the Editorial Board of Balochistan Studies, a research journal published by University of Naples, “l’Orientale” and IsIAO, Rome.

f)             Member and Coordinating Secretary of the International Committee for Balochistan Studies, based at the University of Oriental Studies, Naples, Italy (now almost dormant for financial reasons due to the economical crises in Italy).

g)            External member of examiners for PhD programmes, University of Balochistan, Quetta.

h)            Visiting Professor, The Ohio State University, Columbus, 2003 (taught undergraduate courses: English 270: Introduction to General Folklore; and post-graduate courses: NELC 694/Comp. St. 667.3: Islam and Popular Culture in South Asia; NELC: Urdu language and literature).

i)             Professor and Pro-Vice Chancellor, University of Balochistan, Quetta, August 2008-19 Dec. 2009.

j)             Senior Research Fellow, University of Naples, “l’Orientale”, Italy, Oct. 2010 - presently.

k)           Member of the Committee for Supervision of Language Teaching (Giunta del Centro per la Didattica Linguistica dell’Ateneo), University of Naples, “l’Orientale” (February 2011 - presently).

l)             Member of “Commissione Erasmus” (commission for foreign scholarship awards), for University of Naples, “l’Orientale”, Naples.

m)           Member of the National Agency for the Evaluation of Universities and Research Institutes (Agenzia Nazionale di Valutazione del sistema Universitario e della Ricerca), Italian Ministry of Education, of Universities and Research (Ministero dell'Istruzione, dell'Università e della Ricerca, MIUR).

n)            Member as “Specialist” of Post Graduate Courses in Linguistics, Histories and Cultures of the Mediterranean and Islamic Countries (Corso di Laurea Magistrale in “Scienze delle lingue, storia e culture del Mediterraneo e dei Paesi islamici”), University of Naples, “l’Orientale”, Naples.

o)            Member of the Advisory Board of the N.G.O., APPEAL (Action for Public Prosperity, Empowerment, Awareness and Literacy), Balochistan (2012 - ).

p)            Evaluator for Oxford University Press Pakistan for publications related to Balochistan.

q)            Evaluator for Annali, the research journal of DAAM, University of Naples, “l’Orientale”, Naples.

A)           Research contributions in European languages

1)            1994 Poesia epica e tradizioni orali balochi: I menestrelli pahlawan del Makran, Ph.D. dissertation, submitted to the Italian Ministry of Universities and Scientific and Technological Research, Rome, Italy.

2)            1996 "Incursioni dei Portoghesi sulla costa del Makran: Una testimonianza nella tradizione orale," in M. L. Cusati, (ed.), Atti del Convegno Internazionale dal tema: Il Portogallo e i mari: Un incontro tra le culture (Napoli, 15-17 dicembre 1994), published by I.U.O., Naples, pp. 281-303.

3)           1997 " Balochistan (the music)", in Alison Arnold (ed.), The Garland Encyclopedia of World Music. Vol. 5: South Asia: The Indian Subcontinent, Garland Publishing, Inc., New York-London, pp. 773-784. 

4)            1999 "The changing contents of Baloch women's songs in Eastern Makran", in Melville, Charles (ed.), Proceedings of the Third Conference of the Societas Iranologica Europea, held in Cambridge, September 11-15, 1995, published by Dr. Ludwig Reichert Verlag, Wiesbaden, vol. 2, pp. 207-227.

5)            1999 "A Brief note on Balochi Folktale and Folktale Studies," in Maeda, K. (ed.), The Studies of the Ethno-religious Images in Jhalawan and Las Bela Provinces in Balochistan, Wako University, Tokyo, pp. 83-88.

6)           2000  "'Ropes break at weakest points'. Some examples of Balochi Proverbs with background stories," Proverbium. Yearbook of International Proverb Scholarship,  [published annually by University of Vermont] 17:43-69.

7)            2000       “Portuguese encounters with coastal Makran Baloch during the sixteenth century”, Journal of Royal Asiatic Society of Great Britain and Ireland, series 3, vol. 10, no. 2, pp. 153-169.

8)            2001 "The Role of Audience in Balochi Sheyr Singing", in Molly Kaushal (ed.), Chanted Narratives, Indira Gandhi National Centre for the Arts, New Delhi, pp. 205-23.

9)            2001       “An Introduction to the Performance of Verbal Art in Balochistan”, Annali dell’UniOr, Naples, vols 60-61, (2000-2001), 1-4, pp. 161-196.

10)          2001       “Palula Voices on Palula History”, English translation and annotations of an epic in Persian on the history of the Palula tribe in north-eastern Pakistan, in A.M. and A.S. Cacopardo, Gates of Peristan: History, Religion and Society in the Hindu Kush, Istituto Italiano per l’Africa e l’Oriente, Rome, pp. 279-289.

11)       2002      “Makran as Corridor to the Indian Ocean World”, Euroasian Studies, [published by the Institut Francais d’Etudes sur l’Asia Centrale and the Oriental University of Naples), 1/2, pp. 237-262.

12)          2002       “A study of the Roles of Composer and Performer of a Balochi Oral Epic", in Lauri Honko (ed.), The Kalevala and the World’s Traditional Epics, Studia Fennica, Folkloristica, Finnish Literary Society, Helsinki, pp. 301-323.

13)          2003       "Language Contact in Balochistan and its impact on Balochi Personal Names", in Carina Jahani and Agnes Korn (eds), The Baloch and Their Neighbours: Ethnic and Linguistic Contact in Balochistan in Historical and Modern Times, Reichert Verlag, Wiesbaden, pp. 279-311. 

14)          2003       “Tawkali Mast: Lover, Poet and Saint of Eastern Baloch Tribes", in Bernard Hourcade (ed.), Iran: Questions et Connaissances. Cahiers de Studia Iranica, 27, Association pour l’avancement des études Iraniennes, Peeters, Paris, pp. 87-106.

15)          2003       “Balochi Oral Tradition”, Oral Tradition, 18/2:229-35.

16)       2003      “Balochistan: Oral Tradition”, South Asian Folklore: An Encyclopaedia, Routledge, New York—London, pp. 42-45.

17)       2003      “Divination, Balochi”, South Asian Folklore: An Encyclopaedia, Routledge, New York—London, pp. 162-63.

18)       2003      “Riddles, Balochi”, South Asian Folklore: An Encyclopaedia, Routledge, New York—London, pp. 512-13.

19)       2003      “Names and Naming Practices”, South Asian Folklore: An Encyclopaedia, Routledge, New York—London, pp. 430-31.

20)       2003 "A Glance at Balochi Oral Poetry: Problems and Prospects ", Balochistan Studies, 8-10:3-50 (published by the Italian Institute of African and Oriental Studies, Rome – Oriental University of Naples, Italy.

21)       2004  “The Tale of ‘Aladdin and the Magic Lamp’ in Balochi Oral Tradition”, Fabula, [Journal of Folktale Studies, published by De Gruyter, Germany] 45, 3-4, pp. 207-20. Reprinted in Ulrich Marzolph (ed.), The Arabian Nights in Transnational Perspective, Wayne State University Press, Detroit, 2007.

22)       2004      “‘Lord of the Iron Bow’: The Return Pattern Motif in the Fifteenth-century Baloch Epic Hero Shey Murid”, Oral Tradition (University of Missouri), 19/2: 253-298.

23)          2004       “Song as Register: Socio-Cultural Role of the Poet in Balochistan”, Annali, Oriental University of Naples, Italy, 64/1-4, pp. 99-119.

24)          2005     “The Luris: Artists and Artisans of Southwest Asia”, in M. Bernardini and N. Tornesello (eds), Scritti in Onore di Giovanni M. D’Erme: Saggi di colleghi e amici in occasione del suo compleanno, University of Naples, “L’Orientale”, Series Minor LXVII, Naples, 2 vols, vol. I, pp. 17-53.

25)          2006       "On the Med Fishermen on Coastal Makran", in Antonio Panaino and Riccardo Zipoli (eds), Proceedings of the 5^th Conference of the Societas Iranologica Europæa, held in Ravenna, October 6-11, 2003, Nimesis, Milano, 2 vols, vol. II, pp. 287-306.

26)      2006 “Bashir Ahmad Baloch (1935-2004): A BalSt Memorial”, Balochistan Studies, nos 11-12, Rome-Naples, pp. 21-29.

27)     2006     “Poetry as Voice of the People: The Case of the Baloch”, in Saeed Shafqat (ed.), New Perspectives on Pakistan, Oxford University Press, Karachi, pp. 177-204. (earlier published with a different title in the Annali, see above no. 23)

28)     2007     “On the Presence of African Musical Culture in Coastal Baluchistan”, in Helene Basu (ed.), Journeys and Dwellings: Indian Ocean Themes in South Asia, Orient Longman, India, pp. 276-87.

29)     2009  “Zikri Dilemmas: Origins, Religious Practices, and Political Constraints”, in A. Korn, C. Jahani and P. Titus (eds), The Baloch and Others: Linguistic, Historical and Socio-Political Perspectives on Pluralism in Balochistan, Reichert Verlag, Wiesbaden, pp. 293-326.

30)      2009   “Zahirok: The Musical Base of Baloch Minstrelsy”, in Richard Wolf (ed.), Theorizing the Local: Music, Practice, and Experience in South Asia and Beyond, Oxford University Press, New York, pp. 265-280.

31)          2012       Entries on “Baloch”, “Balochistan”, Bugti tribe”, “Kalat”, “Khans of Kalat”, “Makran”, “Quetta”, in Ayesha Jalal (ed.), The Oxford Companion to Pakistani History, Oxford University Press, Karachi.

Book Reviews:

1)           Aisha Ahmad and Roger Boase, Pashtun Tales from the Pakistan-Afghan Frontier, Saqi Books, 26 Westbourne Grove, London, 2003. Reviewed in Marvels and Tales: Journal of Fairy-Tale Studies, 18/2 (2004):312-17.

2)            From Africa . . . to India. Sidi Music in the Indian Ocean Diaspora, 74-minute videotape, Narrated by UCLA ethnomusicologists Amy Catlin-Jairazbhoy and Nazir Ali Jairazbhoy, released by Apsara Media for Intercultural Education, CA 91401, 2003. Reviewed in Ethnomusicology, 49/1 (2005): 174-76.

3)            Korom, Frank J., South Asian Folklore: A Handbook, Greenwood Press, Westport, Connecticut – London, 2006. Reviewed in Fabula, 48, 1/2, 2007:163-66.