CIMEL benefits from the unique location
London
London offers as a centre for the business, academic and diplomatic communities. It bridges the West and the Muslim world, expecially in its Middle Eastern, South Asian and South East Asian dimension.
London hosts leading international publishers as well as major newspapers and magazines which are printed in Arabic and other Asian and African languages, and CIMEL benefits from access to this multi-lingual community as part of the School of Oriental and African Studies which has a long-standing reputation as a centre of teaching and research excellence in these language areas. With the University of London general and specialized libraries and the British Library, one of the most densely endowed areas of scholarship in the world can be found within a radius of half-a-mile from SOAS. The City law firms, Inns of Court and the courts are also nearby.
SOAS
The School of Oriental and African Studies received its Royal Charter and became a College of the University of London in 1916. In 1943 it moved to its present premises in Bloomsbury which were greatly extended with the completion of the New Building in 1973. It is situated in central London just off Russell Square, close to the British Museum and Library. SOAS is now the leading international centre of Asian and African Studies, and its academic staff of about 200 is the largest concentration of scholars concerned with the whole of Asia and Africa in the world. In addition to departments of the languages, literatures and cultures of Africa and Asia, there are departments of anthropology, history, law, phonetics and linguistics, art and archeology, religious studies as well as centres with focus on specific geographical regions and disciplines such as the environment, boundaries, North-South relations, etc.
From the SOAS Mission Statement:
The Mission of the School is to be a centre of excellence in research and teaching relating to Asia and Africa, as expressed through a range of academic disciplines in the humanities and social sciences, and their interaction. The long term aims of the School are:
To maintain and enhance the School's position as the leading European Centre for the study of Africa and Asia.
To achieve excellence in research and teaching in all activities of the School.
To be a leading centre for postgraduate research and training.
To offer high quality non-degree training in SOAS languages and regional expertise.
SOAS Law Department
At SOAS, CIMEL works within the Law Department, whose scholarship in Islamic and Middle Eastern Law is unrivalled in the Western world, as it was built over fifty years with the tenures of Professors S. Vesey-Fitzgerald, Sir Norman Anderson, and Noel Coulson. The Law Department was founded in 1947. Since 1975, it has been offering an LLB degree course and two-subject BA degree courses, including the possibility of a thorough training in both law and an Asian or African language. The Law Department moved at the end of 1993 to its present location in a listed building located at 47 Russell Square, in association with the Foundation for International Environmental Law and Development. The Law Reports of the Commonwealth, the Journal of African Law and the Review of European Community and International Environmental Law are edited within the Department. In addition, the Department participates in the University of London LLM programme together with the Institute of Advanced Legal Studies and four other London law schools.
The head of the department is Dr. Martin Lau.
From the Programme of Islamic and Middle Eastern Law Teaching at SOAS:
Undergraduate (LLB/BA/Diplomas/Certificates):
Law (Islamic law, Human rights, comparative constitutional law, South Asian laws , South East Asian laws)
History, Anthropology, Languages, Archeology, Music, Art and art history, Politics, Economics.
Postgraduate (LLM in Islamic Law, MA in regions or subjects):
Islamic Law, Islamic Law of Succession, Arab Comparative Commercial Law, Legal Essay
