Faculty & Research
Core Faculty
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Kamran Scot Aghaie
Associate Professor
kamranaghaie@austin.utexas.edu |
475-6400 |
CAL 528E
Education: Ph.D., 1999, University of California at Los Angeles
Interests: Islamic studies, Shi'ism, modern Iranian and Middle Eastern history; secondary areas of interest: world history, historiography, religious studies, nationalism, gender studies and economic history
Olla Al-Shalchi
Assistant Professor of Instruction, Arabic Program Coordinator
olla@austin.utexas.edu |
512-475-6644 |
CAL 508
Education: PhD, Instructional Design and Technology, Old Dominion University
Riyad Alhomsi
Assistant Professor of Instruction
riyad.alhomsi@austin.utexas.edu
Education: PhD, SLAT (Second Language Acquisition & Teaching), University of Arizona
Interests: Technology integration in language teaching, Arabic as a second language, motivation and autonomy in language learning
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Samy Ayoub
Assistant Professor
sayoub@austin.utexas.edu |
CAL 407
Education: Ph.D., University of Arizona
Interests: Islamic Law, Islamic Legal Theory, Islamic Ethics, Islam and Politics, Comparative Middle Eastern Law, Islamic Commercial Law, Late Ottoman Empire, Modern Egypt
Hina Azam
Associate Professor, Islamic Studies
hina.azam@austin.utexas.edu |
512-475-8393 (will not be in office during Spring 2021) |
CAL 506
Education: Ph.D., 2007, Duke University, Department of Religion
Interests: Islamic law, ethics, theology, exegesis, hadith studies; Women/gender/sexuality in Islam; comparative religions of the Middle East; pedagogy and the teaching of Islamic Studies at the college level
Reema Barakat
Assistant Professor of Instruction
reemabarakat@utexas.edu |
CAL 7
Education: M.A., 2015, The University of Texas at Austin
Emily Drumsta
(on leave)
Assistant Professor
drumsta@austin.utexas.edu |
404 Calhoun Hall
Education: Ph.D., University of California, Berkeley
Interests: The Arabic Novel, Modernist Arabic poetry, Maghrebi Literature & Culture, Translation Studies, Comparative Literature, Gender and Translation
Karen Grumberg
Center Director, Associate Professor
Education: Ph.D.- 2004, University of California- Los Angeles
Interests: Comparative Literature; the Gothic; modern Hebrew literature; 19th- and 20th-century American literature
Ghada Housen
Lecturer
ghadamohamad@utexas.edu |
512-777-8994 |
CAL 416
Education: Master of Arts in Arabic Language Teaching, Damascus University
Jonathan Kaplan
Associate Professor
jonathan.kaplan@austin.utexas.edu |
512-471-9453 |
Calhoun (CAL) 413
Education: Ph.D. 2010, Harvard University
Interests: Hebrew Bible (with specific interest in Song of Songs, Daniel, and Jonah), Second Temple Judaism, Dead Sea Scrolls, Rabbinic Judaism, Midrash, Literary Theory, History of Biblical Interpretation, Utopian Studies
Mikiya Koyagi
Assistant Professor
mikiya.koyagi@austin.utexas.edu |
CAL 406
Education: PhD, History, 2015, The University of Texas at Austin
Interests: modern Iranian history, mobility, travel, infrastructure, transnational history, pan-Asianism, intra-Asian connections, metageography
Cheng-Wei Lin
Assistant Professor of Instruction and Co-Director of Arabic Flagship Program
cw.lin@austin.utexas.edu |
CAL 501B
Education: Ph.D., University of Michigan, Ann Arbor
Interests: Arabic Second Language Acquisition, Corpus Linguistics, Phonology, Computer-Assisted Curriculum Design and Pedagogy
Anat Maimon
Hebrew Coordinator, Lecturer of Hebrew
maimon@austin.utexas.edu |
512-475-6467 |
CAL 408
Mohammad Mohammad
Associate Professor
mamohammad@austin.utexas.edu |
512-475-6650 (no voicemail) |
CAL 415
Education: Ph.D., University of Southern California
Interests: Linguistics and the Arabic language
Stephennie Mulder
Associate Professor | Department of Art and Art History, Department of Middle Eastern Studies
smulder@austin.utexas.edu |
512-471-5851 |
DFA 2.516
Education: Ph.D., University of Pennsylvania
Interests: Islamic Art and Architecture
Avigail Noy
Assistant Professor
Education: Ph.D., Harvard
Interests: Arabic literature, Arabic Literary theory, the Arabic linguistic tradition, Islamic civilization
Jeannette Okur
Assistant Professor of Instruction, Turkish Program Coordinator
jeannette.okur@austin.utexas.edu |
512 471 1280 |
CAL 509
Education: Ph.D., Ankara University, 2007
Interests: Modern Turkish/Turkic literature, film and cultural studies, teaching culture and literature in the foreign language classroom, comparative literature, translation studies
Na'ama Pat-El
Chair, Department of Middle Eastern Studies, Associate Professor
npatel@austin.utexas.edu |
512-232-8292 |
CAL 501C
Education: Ph.D., 2008, Near Eastern Languages and Civilizations (Semitic Philology), Harvard University
Interests: Comparative Semitic Linguistics, Historical Linguistics, Syntax, Languages in Contact, Linguistic Methodology
Esther Raizen
Associate Professor, Hebrew Program Coordinator
raizen@austin.utexas.edu |
GEB 3.212
Education: Ph.D., University of Texas at Austin
Interests: Modern and classical Hebrew language, linguistics and literature; Teaching Hebrew as a foreign language; Jewish history and culture, Holocaust studies; Computer-assisted instruction and computational linguistics, assistive technology; Education administration; Student development; Women and war
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Faegheh Shirazi
Professor
fshirazi@austin.utexas.edu |
232-9416 |
CAL 502
Education: PhD, Ohio State University
Interests: Textiles and Clothing, particularly the Islamic veil (hijab), issues of women, rituals, and rites of passage as they relate to material culture in popular Islamic societies.
Nahid Siamdoust
Faculty
nahid.siamdoust@austin.utexas.edu
Education: Ph.D., University of Oxford
Interests: Middle Eastern cultural production and politics, Iranian national and transnational culture and media, social media and disinformation
Babak Tabarraee
Lecturer, Persian Program Coordinator
babak.tabarraee@austin.utexas.edu
Education: PhD, Middle Eastern Languages and Cultures, University of Texas at Austin
Interests: Middle Eastern Cinemas, Iranian Media, Comedy, Cult Cinema, Transnational Media Reception
Levi Thompson
Assistant Professor
levi.thompson@austin.utexas.edu |
CAL503
Education: Ph.D., UCLA
Interests: Arabic literature, Persian literature, modernism, translation, Cold War cultures, poetry, continental philosophy
Bruce Wells
Associate Professor
bruce.wells@austin.utexas.edu |
512-471-3463 |
CAL 414
Education: PhD, Near Eastern Studies, 2003, Johns Hopkins University
Interests: Law, religion, and culture in ancient Israel and Mesopotamia; pentateuchal studies; marriage and family relations in the ancient world
Affiliated Faculty
Ari Adut
Department of Sociology
ariadut@austin.utexas.edu |
232-4284 |
BUR 468
Education: Ph.D., University of Chicago
Interests: Political Sociology, Theory, Crime, Law, and Deviance
Kamran Asdar Ali
Department of Anthropology
asdar@austin.utexas.edu |
471-7531, 471-3550 |
EPS 1.116
Education: Ph.D., Johns Hopkins University
Interests: Gender, Health, Development, Labor History, Political Economy; Post-Colonialism;
Germine Awad, PhD
Department of Educational Psychology
gawad@austin.utexas.edu |
512-471-0526 |
SZB 506H
Interests: Attitude development expression: prejudice and discrimination, ethnic and racial identity, acculturation, immigration, and attitudes toward affirmative action beneficiaries.
Zoltan Barany
Department of Government
barany@austin.utexas.edu |
512.232.7231 |
BAT 3.156
Education: Ph.D., University of Virginia
Benjamin Claude Brower
Department of History
benbrower@utexas.edu |
512-475-6813 |
GAR 3.204
Education: Ph.D., 2005, Cornell University
Interests: Writing Violence in History, French Empire: The "West" and "Islam"
Jason Brownlee
Department of Government
brownlee@austin.utexas.edu |
512-232-7304 |
BAT 3.146
Education: Ph.D., Princeton University
Mounira M. Charrad
Department of Sociology
charrad@utexas.edu |
232-6311 |
CLA 3.526
Education: Ph.D., Harvard University
Interests: Gender & Women's Rights; Political Sociology; Social Theory; Colonialism; Comparative-Historical Sociology; Globalization; Middle East and North Africa, Gender and women's rights, political sociology, development, comparative historical methodology, and the Middle East and North Africa
Rasha Diab
Department of Rhetoric and Writing
rashadiab@austin.utexas.edu |
471-3280 |
Parlin 03
Education: Ph.D., Composition and Rhetoric, 2009, University of Wisconsin-Madison
David Eaton
Lyndon B Johnson School of Public Affairs
eaton@austin.utexas.edu |
512.471.8972 |
SRH 3.204
Education: PhD, Johns Hopkins University
Interests: evaluation of energy and water conservation programs, joint management by Palestinians and Israelis of shared groundwater,new methods for evaluating and preventing air pollution emissions
Mehdi Haghshenas
Department of Sociology
mehdiha@austin.utexas.edu |
232-8064 |
BUR 539
Education: Ph.D., The University of Texas at Austin
Geraldine Heng
Department of English
heng@austin.utexas.edu |
471-7480 |
PAR 213
Education: Ph.D., Cornell University
Interests: iterary, cultural, and social encounters between worlds, and webs of exchange and negotiation between communities and cultures: gender, race, sexuality, and religion
Syed Akbar Hyder
Department of Asian Studies
akbarhyder@utexas.edu |
475-6031 |
WCH 4.134
Education: PhD, Harvard University
Interests: Islam in South Asia, Urdu language and literature, Aesthetics in South Asian and the Middle East
A. Azfar Moin
Department of Religious Studies
amoin@utexas.edu |
512 232-7224 |
BUR 518
Education: PhD, University of Michigan
Interests: Sufism and Sainthood in Islam | Sacred Kingship | History of Early Modern Iran, Central Asia, and South Asia
Mary Neuburger
Department of History
burgerm@austin.utexas.edu |
512-232-4124 |
BUR 452
Education: Ph.D., 1997, University of Washington
Interests: Modern eastern Europe with a specialization in southeastern Europe. Urban culture, consumption, commodity exchange, gender and nationalism
Martha G. Newman
Department of History
newman@austin.utexas.edu |
512-475-8660 |
GAR 3.408
Education: Ph.D., 1988, Stanford University
Interests: Monastic miracle collections and monastic attitudes toward women and the poor
Thomas G Palaima
Department of Classics
tpalaima@austin.utexas.edu |
512-471-5742 or 512-471-8837 |
WAG 14AA WAG 123B
Education: Ph.D. 1980, University of Wisconsin-Madison
Interests: Aegean scripts & prehistory, Greek language, war & violence studies, public intellectual writing, music as social criticism, Dylanology
Athanasio Papalexandrou
Department of Art and Art History
papalex@austin.utexas.edu |
512-471-5021 |
ART 3.404
Education: Ph.D., Princeton University
Interests: Early Greek Visual Culture, Interconnections between Greece & Near East, Art & Archaeology of Cyprus, Greek Sanctuaries. Art as a Means ofCommunication in Preliterate Societies
Sonia Seeman
Sarah and Ernest Butler School of Music
stseeman@austin.utexas.edu |
512-471-2854 |
MBE 3.204
Education: Ph.D., UCLA
Interests: Middle Eastern music & expressive culture; Roma ("Gypsy") & minority communities; former Ottoman territories of Southeastern Europe,cosmopolitanism; nationalism; gender
Denise A. Spellberg
Department of History
spellberg@austin.utexas.edu |
512-475-7202 |
GAR 3.208
Education: Ph.D., 1989, Columbia University
Interests: intellectual history of the medieval Islamic world, from Spain to Iran; Islam in American and European history; gender and religion in history
Jeremi Suri
Lyndon B Johnson School of Public Affairs
suri@austin.utexas.edu |
512-475-7242 |
GAR 2.122/ SRH 3.378
Education: Ph.D. in History, 2001, Yale University
Interests: The formation and spread of nation-states; the emergence of modern international relations; the connections between foreign policy and domestic politics; the rise of knowledge institutions as global actors.
Cynthia Talbot
Department of History
ctalbot@austin.utexas.edu |
475-7229 |
GAR 3.406
Education: PhD, University of Wisconsin-Madison
Interests: Social and cultural history of medieval and early modern India (ca. 1000-1750); historiography and historical memories, Hindu-Muslim relations.
L. Michael White
Department of Religious Studies
lmwhite@utexas.edu |
512-232-1438 |
BUR 502-12
Education: Ph.D., Yale University
Interests: Religions of the Ancient Mediterranean & Middle East, New Testament and Christian Origins, Graeco-Roman Religions
Emeritus
Mahmoud Al-Batal
Professor Emeritus
Education: Ph.D. - 1985, Michigan - Ann Arbor
Interests: Teaching Arabic as a Foreign Language
Aaron Bar-Adon
Professor Emeritus
Education: Ph.D., Hebrew University
Interests: Sociolinguistics and language acquisition; Hebrew and Arabic language, literature, and linguistics
Mohammad Ghanoonparvar
Professor Emeritus
Education: PhD, University of Texas at Austin
Interests: 20th century Persian literature; comparative literary history and criticism; methodology and practice of literary translation
Robert Holz
Department of Geography and the Environment
Education: Ph.D., 1963, Geography, Michigan State University
John Huehnergard
Professor Emeritus
Education: Ph.D. 1979, Near Eastern Languages and Civilizations (Semitic Philology), Harvard University
Interests: Semitic languages and linguistics, historical linguistics, writing systems, and ancient Near Eastern history
Harold Liebowitz
Professor Emeritus
Education: Ph.D., University of Pennsylvania
Interests: Archaeology & art history of Israel in the Biblical & Greco-Roman periods; art & archaeology of the Ancient Near East, daily life in Ancient Israel; material culture & literature (Mishnah & Talmud)
Ian Manners
Department of Geography and the Environment
Education: Ph.D., Oxford University
Interests: Conservation and resource management, urban cultural geography, and historical cartography
Abraham Marcus
Department of History
Education: Ph.D., 1979, Columbia University
Interests: Social and cultural history of the early modern and modern Middle East; cities and urban life; Islamic law and legal practice; music and society
Abraham Zilkha
Professor Emeritus
Education: Ph.D., University of Texas at Austin
Interests: Hebrew linguistics, lexicography, Israel and the Middle East
Retired
Kristen Brustad
Associate Professor
Education: Ph.D., 1991, Near Eastern Languages and Civilizations, Harvard
Interests: My research interests include, but are not limited to: Arabic dialects, syntax, language ideology and Arabic literary and linguistic history
