Members

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Professor in Global Thought and Comparative Philosophies

Professor Arshin Adib-Moghaddam

Artificial Intelligence (AI) and human security; art, poetry, emotions as languages for global peace; political/social psychology; the global politics of power and resistance; global thought and comparative philosophies; Iran, East-West relations, West Asia and North Africa.

Lecturer in Middle Eastern and Iranian Studies

Dr Seyed Ali Alavi

MA Iranian Studies, Critical Perspective on Palestine Studies, Re-mapping Area Studies, Decolonising Otherness.

Cultural, economic and political dynamics underpinning China's relations with the Middle East, with a special emphasis on nations such as Iran and the Arab States in West Asia.

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Senior Lecturer in Persian Studies (Education)

Narguess Farzad

Persian language and literature. Organiser of SOAS-Cambridge Undergraduate workshops

Reader in the History of Architecture & Archaeology of the Islamic Middle East

Dr Simon O'Meara

Islamic architecture and urbanism; sociological dimensions of the art and architecture of North Africa, especially Morocco; architectural and visual theory; Islamic studies.

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Senior Lecturer in Anthropology

Dr Orkideh Behrouzan

medical anthropology; anthropology of medicine, psychiatry, science, and technology; STS; mental health, trauma, social ruptures, memory, and subjectivity; refugees and displacement; Iran; the Middle East; epidemics and pandemics; COVID19; HIV/AIDS

Emeritus Reader

Dr Gabriele vom Bruck

Middle East with emphasis on the Arabian Peninsular (especially Yemen): elites, biography, memory, religion and politics

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Professor of the History of Islamic Art

Professor Anna Contadini

Arab and early Persian painting and the arts of the Islamic book in general, including the production of manuscripts of the Qur'an; art and material culture of the Islamic world; Fatimid art and architecture; the arts of Islamic Spain; artistic contacts between the Islamic World and Europe; aspects of contemporary Islamic art.

Dr Heather Elgood, MBE

Dr Heather Elgood is the Course Director of the Diploma in Asian Art. She is a specialist in Persian, Jain, Sultanate and Mughal manuscript painting as well as the ritual arts of Hinduism.

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Professor William Gervase Clarence-Smith

History of Islam, sexuality, diasporas, slavery, stimulants, rubber, livestock and textiles, with special reference to Maritime South East Asia

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Professor of Arabic

Professor Hugh N Kennedy

Early Islamic History from 600 to 1100, Arabic historiography, Islamic archaeology, historical geography of the Middle East, castle building in the Middle East, history of al-Andalus (Muslim Spain and Portugal)

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Professor in Diplomacy and Strategy

Professor Dan Plesch

Professor Plesch is Professor of Diplomacy and Strategy at SOAS University of London and is a 'door tenant' at the legal chambers of 9 Bedford Row, in London.

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Zartoshty Brothers Professor of Zoroastrianism

Professor Almut Hintze

Professor Hintze takes an interest in all aspects of Zoroastrianism, the religion of pre-Islamic Iran.

Affiliate Staff

Dr Erica Hunter

Emeritus Professor of Iranian and Central Asian Studies

Professor Nicholas Sims-Williams

Iranian and Central Asian philology; Christian and Manichaean texts from Central Asia.

Emeritus Reader in Zoroastrianism.

Dr Sarah Stewart

Dr Sarah Stewart is Honorary Senior Fellow for the Shapoorji Pallonji Institute of Zoroastrian Studies. Research interests include Zoroastriansm, orality and the oral transmission of texts, Zoroastrian living tradition in Iran and India.

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Emeritus Professor

Professor Doris Behrens-Abouseif

Architecture of Cairo, the art and archaeology of Turkey, Iran and the Near East

Professor Helen Giunashvili

Helen Giunashvili is a researcher at G. Tsereteli Institute of Oriental Studies, Ilia State University in Tbilisi and is also affiliated to the Graduate School of the Methodology of the Humanities in Paris. She was educated first at I. Javakhishvili State University, Faculty of Oriental Studies and after, at the St. Petersburg Institute of Oriental Studies, Russian Academy of Sciences, where she took the postgraduate course and did her Doctoral thesis on the subject “Personal Verbal Forms in Western Middle Iranian” (1993). Her researches mostly deal with cultural-linguistic interrelations of pre-Islamic Iran and Georgia. She is the author of more over 50 scientific publications.
Research interests: Historical grammar of Western Middle Iranian languages; Iranian-Georgian cultural-linguistic interference: Parthian and Middle Persian lexis in Old Georgian; Structural-typological relation of Middle Persian with Old Georgian; Parthian and Middle Persian onomastics (proper names, ethnical names, geographic terminology) in Old Georgian; Scythian-Alanic onomastics in Kartvelian; Old Aramaic epigraphy of Georgia, linguistic-paleographic analysis; XVI-XVIII cc Persian and Georgian-Persian historical documents, their linguistic characteristics; Persian elements in the language of the Iranian Georgians (Fereidanian dialect).

Associate Member

Dr Mishana Hoss

Dr Mishana Hoss is an International Relations scholar and Senior Research Fellow at the Centre for Eudaimonia and Human Flourishing at the University of Oxford, and an academic affiliate of the Bonavero Institute of Human Rights.

Professorial Research Associate

Dr Ziba Mir-Hosseini

Islam and feminism; Islamic family law, politics of gender and family law in Iran and Morocco

Associate Member

Dr Yui Kanda

Dr. Yui Kanda is an Assistant Professor at the Research Institute for Languages and Cultures of Asia and Africa at Tokyo University of Foreign Studies.

Research Associate

Dr Renate Söhnen-Thieme

Sanskrit language and literature; classical Indian religions; folklore and music of Baltistan

Emeritus Professor

Professor Richard Tapper

Lecturer, Reader and Professor in SOAS 1967-2004; fieldwork in Iran, Afghanistan, Turkey; published on pastoral nomadism, ethnic and tribal minorities and the state, material cultures, culinary cultures, anthropology of Islam, Iranian Cinema.

Research Associate

Dr Massoumeh Torfeh

Massoumeh Torfeh, has been appointed UN Director of Strategic Communication and Spokesperson for Afghanistan and is a former senior producer in BBC World Service, specializes on the politics and media of Iran, Afghanistan and Central Asia.

Emeritus Professor of Musicology of the Middle East

Professor Owen Wright

Music of the Islamic Middle East; historical musicology

Research Associate

Dr Saeed Zeydabadi-Nejad

Media in the Middle East with particular focus on Iran; diasporas and transnational media; islamophobia; shi’i Islam in the West; third Cinema; big data and digital methods.

Members

Co-Directors

Professor Arshin Adib-Moghaddam

Dr Seyed Ali Alavi

Advisory committee

Narguess Farzad

Dr Simon O'Meara

Department of Anthropology and Sociology

Dr Orkideh Behrouzan

Dr Gabriele vom Bruck

Department of History of Art and Archaeology

Professor Anna Contadini

Dr Heather Elgood, MBE

Department of History

Professor William Gervase Clarence-Smith

Department of Linguistics

Near and Middle East Section

Professor Hugh N Kennedy

Department of Politics and International Studies

Professor Dan Plesch

Department of Religions and Philosophies

Professor Almut Hintze

Dr Erica Hunter

Professor Nicholas Sims-Williams

Dr Sarah Stewart

Associate members

Professor Doris Behrens-Abouseif

Professor Helen Giunashvili

Dr Mishana Hoss

Dr Ziba Mir-Hosseini

Dr Yui Kanda

Dr Renate Söhnen-Thieme

Professor Richard Tapper

Dr Massoumeh Torfeh

Professor Owen Wright

Dr Saeed Zeydabadi-Nejad

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