The Annual International Conference on Shi‘i Studies is organised by the Research and Publications Department of The Islamic College, London. The conference aims to provide a broad platform for scholars working in the field of Shi‘i Studies to present their latest research and to explore diverse opinions on Shi‘i thought, practice, and heritage. This book comprises a selection of papers from the fourth conference held on 5-6 May 2018.

The Annual International Conference on Shi‘i Studies is organised by the Research and Publications Department of The Islamic College, London. The conference aims to provide a broad platform for scholars working in the field of Shi‘i Studies to present their latest research and to explore diverse opinions on Shi‘i thought, practice, and heritage. This book comprises a selection of papers from the first conference held on 9–10 May 2015. Themed ‘Shi‘i Studies: Past and Present’, the conference focused on the study of Shi‘ism from the seminary to academia.

The Annual International Conference on Shi‘i Studies is organised by the Research and Publications Department of The Islamic College, London. The conference aims to provide a broad platform for scholars working in the field of Shi‘i Studies to present their latest research and to explore diverse opinions on Shi‘i thought, practice, and heritage. This book comprises a selection of papers from the sixth conference held on 13 March 2021.

The Annual International Conference on Shi‘i Studies is organised by the Research and Publications Department of The Islamic College, London. The conference aims to provide a broad platform for scholars working in the field of Shi‘i Studies to present their latest research and explore diverse opinions on Shi‘i thought, practice, and heritage. This book comprises a selection of papers from the eighth conference held on 13 May 2023.

The Annual International Conference on Shi‘i Studies is organised by the Research and Publications Department of The Islamic College, London. The conference aims to provide a broad platform for scholars working in the field of Shi‘i Studies to present their latest research and to explore diverse opinions on Shi‘i thought, practice, and heritage. This book comprises a selection of papers from the fifth conference held on 27–8 April 2019.

The Annual International Conference on Shi‘i Studies is organised by the Research and Publications Department of The Islamic College, London. The conference aims to provide a broad platform for scholars working in the field of Shi‘i Studies to present their latest research and to explore diverse opinions on Shi‘i thought, practice, and heritage. This book comprises a selection of papers from the third conference held on 6–7 May 2017.

The Annual International Conference on Shi‘i Studies is organised by the Research and Publications Department of The Islamic College, London. The conference aims to provide a broad platform for scholars working in the field of Shi‘i Studies to present their latest research and explore diverse opinions on Shi‘i thought, practice, and heritage. This book comprises a selection of papers from the seventh conference held on 14 May 2022.

This book presents the first comprehensive introduction to methods and methodologies in the humanities and social sciences in general, and Islamic Studies in particular, from a critical rationalist point of view. The book aims to be a self-sufficient theoretical and practical guide to the topics that it introduces. It contains a large selection of fully worked out review activities and review questions plus topics for further discussion which are devised to assist readers to better understand the issues which are discussed in the book. Last but not least, all efforts have been made to make sure that most (if not all) of the reading materials which are recommended in the book are not only of the highest quality but also freely available on the internet.

This book introduces readers to the theoretical foundation and application of topic models. It provides readers with efficient means to learn about the technical principles underlying topic models. More concretely, it covers topics such as fundamental concepts, topic model structures, approximate inference algorithms, and a range of methods used to create high-quality topic models. In addition, this book illustrates the applications of topic models applied in real-world scenarios. Readers will be instructed on the means to select and apply suitable models for specific real-world tasks, providing this book with greater use for the industry. Finally, the book presents a catalog of the most important topic models from the literature over the past decades, which can be referenced and indexed by researchers and engineers in related fields. We hope this book can bridge the gap between academic research and industrial application and help topic models play an increasingly effective role in both academia and industry. This book offers a valuable reference guide for senior undergraduate students, graduate students, and researchers, covering the latest advances in topic models, and for industrial practitioners, sharing state-of-the-art solutions for topic-related applications. The book can also serve as a reference for job seekers preparing for interviews.

Due to the fast growth of the Web and the difficulties in finding desired information, efficient and effective information retrieval systems have become more important than ever, and the search engine has become an essential tool for many people. The ranker, a central component in every search engine, is responsible for the matching between processed queries and indexed documents. Because of its central role, great attention has been paid to the research and development of ranking technologies. In addition, ranking is also pivotal for many other information retrieval applications, such as collaborative filtering, definition ranking, question answering, multimedia retrieval, text summarization, and online advertisement. Leveraging machine learning technologies in the ranking process has led to innovative and more effective ranking models, and eventually to a completely new research area called “learning to rank”. Liu first gives a comprehensive review of the major approaches to learning to rank. For each approach he presents the basic framework, with example algorithms, and he discusses its advantages and disadvantages. He continues with some recent advances in learning to rank that cannot be simply categorized into the three major approaches – these include relational ranking, query-dependent ranking, transfer ranking, and semisupervised ranking. His presentation is completed by several examples that apply these technologies to solve real information retrieval problems, and by theoretical discussions on guarantees for ranking performance. This book is written for researchers and graduate students in both information retrieval and machine learning. They will find here the only comprehensive description of the state of the art in a field that has driven the recent advances in search engine development.