17
Mar 2025
9:00 AM to 1:00 PM
Drama Classes for Kids
Mayoor Private School, 42nd St. Al Wathba South, Abu Dhabi, UAE
In the era of The 400 lists, real-time billionaire rankings and surging cryptocurrencies, the influence of the Sassoon family continues to shape economies, innovations and even politics of some global capitals. Join us for a fascinating lecture-demonstration that will take a deep dive into the one of the remarkable business dynasties of the nineteenth century, with Author and Professor of History and Politics at Georgetown University, Joseph Sassoon. Drawing instances from his recent book, The Global Merchants: The Enterprise and Extravagance of the Sassoon Dynasty, Joseph will give a fresh perspectives on how these influential merchants of the 19th and early 20th centuries shaped the cities like Bombay, Pune, Shanghai, London and their contribution to prosper it economically, politically, socially and towards its arts, culture and architectural legacies. Joseph will then be in conversation with Historian and Founder of Bombaywalla Historical Works, Simin Patel where they will further discuss contributions, influences and affluences of prominent members of the family and their contribution in forming Bombay as a modern port city. Explore the complexity, scope, and lives of prominent Sassoon family members and their role in shaping some of the world’s greatest economies.
Joseph Sassoon is the director of the Center for Contemporary Arab Studies and Professor of History and Political Economy at Georgetown University. He holds the al-Sabah Chair in Politics and Political Economy of the Arab World. He is also a Senior Associate Member at St Antony’s College, Oxford. In 2013, his book Saddam Hussein’s Ba‘th Party: Inside an Authoritarian Regime (Cambridge University Press, 2012) won the prestigious British-Kuwait Prize for the best book on the Middle East. Sassoon completed his Ph.D at St Antony’s College, Oxford. He has published extensively on Iraq and its economy and on the Middle East. The Global Merchants is his fifth book.
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Simin Patel Historian and Blogger at Bombaywalla.org, a platform that creates awareness about Bombay’s built environment and social history. Bombaywalla operates a blog and conducts historical walks of the city’s localities and celebrated structures. Simin completed her PhD in Modern South Asian History from Balliol College, University of Oxford in 2015.
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