2008 Nominating Committee Biographies

Candidates
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Nade Al-Ali
Director of Centre for Gender Studies, SOAS, University of London, UK PhD SOAS 1998; MA AUC, Cairo, 1994; BA, University of Arizona, 1989. Publications include: Iraqi Women: Untold Stories from 1948 to the Present (Zed Books, 2007); New Approaches to Migration (ed. Routledge, 2002); Secularism, Gender and the State in the Middle East (Cambridge University Press, 2000); and numerous book chapters and journal articles. Forthcoming book, co-authored with Nicola Pratt, What kind of Liberation? Women, Gender and Political Transition in Iraq (University of California Press). Founding member of Act Together: Women’s Action for Iraq (www.acttogether.org).

Mahmoud Al-Batal
Associate Professor of Arabic & Director of the Center for Arabic Study Abroad (CASA), University of Texas, Austin; Associate Director of the National Middle East Language Resource Center (NMELRC). MA and PhD in Arabic Linguistics, University of Michigan. Director of the Emory Language Center 2000-2004, and Director of the Arabic School at Middlebury College 1991-98. Coauthor of Al-Kitaab Arabic textbook series (with Kristen Brustad and Abbas Al-Tonsi); recent articles: “Arabic and National Language Education Policy,” “Facing the Crisis: Teaching and Learning Arabic in the US in the Post September 11th Era,” “Playing with Words: Teaching Vocabulary in the Arabic Language Curriculum.”

Camron Amin
Associate Professor of Middle East History and Associate Dean of the College of Arts, Sciences, and Letters, University of Michigan-Dearborn. PhD, The University of Chicago. Main current research interest: history of the Iranian press and media. Publications: The Making of the Modern Iranian Woman: Gender, State Policy, and Popular Culture, 1865-1946; co-editor, The Modern Middle East: A Sourcebook for History. Articles  in Iranian Studies, IJMES, Comparative Studies in South Asia, Africa and the Middle East, and JMEWS.

Emily Gottreich
Adjunct Associate Professor in History and Middle Eastern Studies, UC Berkeley; Vice Chair, Center for Middle Eastern Studies, UC Berkeley; Vice President, American Institute for Maghrib Studies (AIMS) (Member of AIMS Executive Board 2004-07). PhD in History and Middle Eastern Studies, Harvard University. Publications: The Mellah of Marrakesh: Jewish and Muslim Space in Morocco’s Red City (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2007); ed., with Daniel Schroeter, Rethinking Jewish Culture and Society in Northern Africa (forthcoming); articles in IJMES and Jewish Social Studies. Current research project: Historicizing the Concept of ‘Arab Jews’.

Jens-Peter Hanssen
Assistant Professor of Middle East History, University of Toronto. D.Phil. and M.Phil., Oxford University; BA, Durham University, UK. Research positions: American University of Beirut (1997-99) and University of Aix/Marseille (2001); lecturer, University of Erlangen (2002). Publications: Fin de Seicle Beirut (Oxford, 2005); co-ed., Empire in the City: Arab Provincial Capitals in the Late Ottoman Empire (Beirut, 2002); co-ed., “The Sixth War: Israel’s Invasion of Lebanon”, MIT-EJMES (Summer 2006); “Modern Muslim Cities”, New Cambridge History of Islam (forthcoming); “Baghdad Documentary”, June 03 (YouTube.com). MIT-EJMES editorial board. Screener for SSRC, manuscript evaluator for OUP.

David G. Hirsch
Librarian for Middle Eastern and Islamic Studies, Distinguished and Adjunct Assistant Professor, University of California-Los Angeles. MA, University of Chicago, 1990; BA, University of Pennsylvania, 1980. Previous Position: President, Middle East Librarians Association. Fellowships and Grants: CASA I and II; AIYS, AIMS, Librarians Association of the University of California. Publications: From Parchment to Pixels: Middle Eastern Collection Development in American Libraries. Chapter in Building Area Studies Collections, Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz, 2007; “Visit to the Gazi Husrev Beg Library in Sarajevo, June 7-18, 2004”, in Anali Gazi Husrev-begove Biblioteke, XXIII-XXIV, 2004/2005, p. 353-358; Articles in MELA Notes.

Arang Keshavarzian
Assistant Professor of Government, Connecticut College. PhD, Dept. of Politics, Princeton University. Publications include: Bazaar and State in Iran: the Politics of the Tehran Marketplace (Cambridge UP, 2007); chapters in Authoritarianism in the Middle East: Regimes and Resistance (Lynne Reinner, 2005) and Publics, Politics and Participation (SSRC, forthcoming), and articles in Politics & Society (co-authored with Anthony Gill) and the Journal of Church and State. Member of Middle East Report (MERIP)’s editorial committee and a research affiliate at Yale University’s Council on Middle East Studies. Current research: political economy of transnationalism in the Persian Gulf.

Bruce Maddy-Weitzman
Marcia Israel Fellow in Maghrib Studies, The Moshe Dayan Center for Middle Eastern and African Studies, Tel Aviv University. PhD, Tel Aviv University. Current research: the modern Berber culture movement and the challenge to North African states. Publications include: The Crystallization of the Arab State System, 1945-1954 (Syracuse, 1993); Palestinian and Israeli Intellectuals in the Shadow of Oslo and Intifadat al-Aqsa (Tel Aviv, 2002); co-editor, The Maghrib in the New Century: Identity, Religion and Politics (Gainesville, FL, 2007); co-editor, The Camp David Summit–What Went Wrong? (Brighton, 2005); editor Middle East Contemporary Survey, Volumes 18-24, 1994-2000.

Roberta Micallef
Assistant Professor of Turkish, Boston University. PhD and MA, The University of Texas in Austin. Currently working on an edited volume on Muslim travel narratives. Research areas include Turkic Central Asia and Turkey, with particularly interest in questions of gender and identity. She recently contributed a chapter about Turkish women political prisoners to a volume entitled, Prisons and Policing, forthcoming, Columbia University Press. Reviews in IJMES, JMEWS and the AATT Bulletin. Secretary of the American Association of Teachers for Turkic. She is working on an internet based teaching tool for teachers of Turkish.

Jennifer C. Olmsted
Associate Professor of Economics, Drew University. PhD University of California, Davis. Olmsted’s research focuses primarily on the Palestinian economy. Has written about women’s employment and well-being, and critically examined the discipline of economics. Her publications have appeared in various book volumes, as well as in journals such as Feminist Economics, the Journal of Middle East Women’s Studies and World Development. Serving on the International Journal of Middle East Studies and Palestinian American Research Center boards. For six years she served as the editor of Middle East Women’s Studies Review (MEWS Review).

Robert Olson
Professor of Middle East History and Politics, University of Kentucky. PhD and MA, Indiana University. Recent books: The Goat and the Butcher: Nationalism and State Formation in Kurdistan-Iraq (2005); translated into Turkish 2008; Turkey-Iran Relations, 1979-2004: Revolution, Ideology, War, Coups and Geopolitics (2004); translated into Turkish (2005); Turkey’s Relations with Iran, Syria, Israel, and Russia, 1991-2000 (2001); translated into Turkish and French (2005); The Kurdish Question and Turkish-Iranian Relations: From World War I to 1998 (1998); translated into Arabic and Persian (2001); The Emergence of Kurdish Nationalism: 1880-1925 (1989); translated into Turkish (1992), Persian (2001); Kurdish (2002) and Arabic (2008). Author of 90 research articles.

Farhang Rouhani
Associate Professor of Geography, University of Mary Washington. PhD and MA, University of Arizona. Research on new media consumption and citizenship in Iran, teaching about 9-11, and the geographies of queer Muslim identities. Has been published in Urban Geography, Iranian Studies, Arab World Geographer, and the edited volume, Geographies of Sexualities. His current research revolves around the politics of immigration, cosmopolitanism, and the flow of cultural commodities between Iran and the United States. Pedagogically, he is critically committed to expanding Middle East studies in a liberal arts college setting.