Minister of Education and Higher Education H E Lolwah bint Rashid Al Khater with officials and winners at the awards ceremony.
Doha, Qatar: Minister of Education and Higher Education H E Lolwah bint Rashid Al Khater and Dr. Azmi Bishara, Director-General of the Arab Center and Chair of the Board of Trustees of the Doha Institute for Graduate Studies, crowned the winners of the Arab Prize for the Advancement of Research in the Social Sciences and Humanities yesterday.
The ceremony was held on the sidelines of the conclusion of the 10th session of the Social Sciences and Humanities Conference, organised by the Arab Center for Research and Policy Studies, in the presence of members of the prize committee and a select group of Arab researchers.
During a ceremony held on this occasion, President of the Doha Institute for Graduate Studies Dr. Abdelwahab El Affendi, who is also the Chair of the Prize Committee, announced the winners of this edition.
The prize was awarded to each of the following: Mahjouba Kaoukou for her research on social media and electronic surveillance, Nadim Mansouri for his research on asabiyyah and social practices in the digital society, and Youssef Zaddam for his research on the ethics and politics in social media.
It is worth noting that this prize is a competitive award launched by the Arab Center in 2011 to encourage Arab researchers to conduct innovative scientific research on issues and challenges concerning the development trajectory of Arab societies in the field of social sciences and humanities.
The Center has consistently opened the door to competition for this prize to Arab researchers, following the 2017 integration of the nomination process with the submissions to the conference as approved by the conference committee. Over the past years, the prize has honoured the efforts of 54 male and female researchers from across the Arab world who have made valuable and distinguished contributions.
The prize is awarded in the field of social sciences and humanities once every two years, with a maximum of three winners selected from the papers submitted to the Social Sciences and Humanities Conference. Each winner receives an award composed of three elements: a certificate of achievement, a financial incentive award worth $10,000, and a research grant worth $40,000 to support the development of the winning study as a first option or the proposal of another research project. At the conclusion, Dr. Bishara announced the topic of the eleventh session of the conference and the Arab Prize, which will focus on Social Sciences and Humanities and Artificial Intelligence in the Arab World, inviting researchers to contribute to this edition. Call for papers and the reference paper will be announced soon on the Arab Center's website.
