Nadia Maria El Cheikh
Country: 
Lebanon
Organizations: 
American University of Beirut
Professions: 
Professor
Field(s) of expertise: 
History
Areas of Impact: 
Quality Education

Personal information

Dr. Nadia Maria El Cheikh
Alfred H. Howell Chair of History, American University of Beirut

Contact information (Private)

+9613941665

Contact information (Work)

nmcheikh@aub.edu.lb
American University of Beirut

Community/Lebanon Impact

Nadia El Cheikh is a scholar of the Abbasid Caliphate and Byzantium. She earned her BA in History and Archaeology with distinction from the American University of Beirut (AUB) in 1985 and her PhD from Harvard University in 1992. That same year she joined the AUB Faculty and was promoted in 2006 to the rank of Professor. In 2007 she was the Shawwaf Visiting Professor of Arabic and Islamic Studies at the Department of Near Eastern Languages and Civilizations at Harvard University. Her publications include Byzantium Viewed by the Arabs (Harvard Middle Eastern Monographs, 2004) which was translated into Turkish Greek, and Arabic. In 2013 she co-authored a book entitled Crisis and Continuity at the Abbasid Court. Formal and Informal Politics in the Caliphate of al-Muqtadir (295-320/908-932) (Leiden: Brill). Her book Women, Islam and Abbasid Identity was published in 2015 by Harvard University Press and was translated into Arabic. At the American University of Beirut, she served as Director of the Center for Arab and Middle Eastern Studies, was Chair of the Department of History and Archaeology, Interim Associate Provost and Dean of the Faculty of Arts and Sciences. (2016-2021). In 2019, she received a  $1 million Andrew W. Mellon Foundation grant for an oral history project, The Arab Oral History Archive: Gender, Alternative Histories, and the Production of Knowledge. Nadia has co-edited four volumes and contributed to several anthologies and journals. She is a member of journal editorial boards, notably, the Journal of Abbasid Studies. In 2022 she joined New York University Abu Dhabi as Vice Provost for Cultural and Research Engagement and Professor of History and returned to AUB as the Alfred Howell Professor of History in 2024.

Education

Education: 
  • 1992: Harvard University- Ph.D. degree in History and Middle Eastern Studies.
  • 1985: American University of Beirut- B.A. with distinction in History and Archaeology.

Work history

Previous Professions: 
  • 2006 - Present: Professor (The Alfred Howell Chair as of 2024) - American University of Beirut.
  • 2016 - 2021: Dean of the Faculty of Arts and Sciences,, American University of Beirut.
  • 2015 - 2016: Interim Associate Provost,  American University of Beirut.
  • 2013 - 2015: Chair of the Department of History and Archaeology, American University of Beirut.
  • 2000 - 2009: Director of the Center for Arab and Middle Eastern Studies, American University of Beirut.
  • 2000 - 2006: Associate Professor, American University of Beirut.
  • 1992 - 2000: Assistant Professor, American University of Beirut.
  • 2022 - 2024: Vice Provost for Cultural and Research Engagement & Professor of History (with Tenure), New York University Abu Dhabi.
  • 2007: Shawwaf Visiting Professor of Arabic and Islamic Studies, Department of Near Eastern Languages and Civilizations, Harvard University.
  • 1993 - 1994: Research Officer,, Arab Women Center for Training and Research (Tunis) & International Labor Office (Geneva).
  • 1991 - 1992: Visiting Assistant Professor, Amherst College.
  • 1988 - 1991: Teaching Fellow, Harvard University.

Major Achievements

Publications (Books, Articles, Reports, etc.): 
  • 2024: “Sexuality in Ninth and Tenth Century Baghdad, co-authored with Karen Moukheiber, Cambridge World History of Sexualities: Sites of Knowledge and Practice, eds. Merry Wiesner-Hanks and Mathew Kuefler, vol. 3 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press), 87-107.
  • 2024: “The Battle of Uhud and the Shaping of a New Identity” In the Steps of the Sultan: Essays in Honor of Abdulrahim Abu Husayn (Beirut: American University of Beirut Press) 333-348.
  • 2022: “Bureaucrats on the Move: Messengers in Fourth/Tenth Century Iraq,” co-authored with Maaike von Berkel and Letizia Osti. In The Historian of Islam at Work: Essays in Honor of Hugh Kennedy, edited by Maaike von Berkel and Letizia Osti (Leiden, Brill, 2022), 405-431.
  • 2022: “Al-Athar al-islamiyya fi al-Qustantiniyya,” Al-Markaz: Majallat al-Dirasat and -Arabiyya, vol. 1, 111-123. 
  • 2021: “Professional Mobility and Social Capital: A Note on the muhaddithat in Kitab Tarikh Baghdad,” Professional Mobility in Islamic Societies (700-1750): New Concepts and Approaches, ed. Mohammed Merheb (Brill, Handbook of Oriental Studies), 40-51.
  • 2021: “Comparative Work on Abbasid and Byzantine History: Some Examples,”Actes du colloque Projections et Reflexions Grec Arabe 2016, ed. Helene Condylis (Athens, 2020) 79-94.
  • 2020: “Violence against Women in the Early Islamic Period,” The Cambridge World History of Violence, Volume 2, AD 500 – AD 1500, ed. Matthew Gordon, Richard Kaeuper and Harriet Zurndorfer (Cambridge University Press).
  • 2019: “Divorce: A View from Adab,” Journal of Islamic and Muslim Studies, vol. 4, No. 2, 18-32.
  • 2018: “Guarding the Harem, Protecting the State: Eunuchs
in a Fourth/Tenth-Century Abbasid Court,” Celibate and Childless, Men in Power: Ruling Eunuchs and Bishops in the Pre-Modern World, ed.  Almut Höfert et al (Routledge: London and New York), 56-78.
  • 2017: “Conversation as Performance: Adab al-Muhadatha at Court,” In the Presence of Power: Court and Performance in the pre-Modern Middle East, ed. Maurice Pomerantz (New York: New York University Press), 84-99.
  • 2017: “Sieges and Conquests of Constantinople in Arab Muslim Sources,” Byzantion’dan Constantinopolis’e Istanbul Kustamarali, ed. Turhan Kacar and Murat Arslan (Istanbul: Baski), 229-241.  
  • 2016: “Kamal al-Salibi fi al-Tarikh al-Islami fi al-Usur al-Wusta,” Kamal al-Salibi: al-Insan wa al-Mu’arrikh (1929-2011) (Beirut: Arab Center for Research and Policy Studies), 109-124.
  • 2016: Co-authored with Samar Mikati, “Women at AUB: The Beginnings, 1905-1947 (A Photo Essay), One Hundred and Fifty, ed. Nadia Maria El Cheikh, Lina Choueiri and Bilal Orfali (Beirut: American University of Beirut Press), 63-82.
  • 2015: Women, Islam, and Abbasid Identity. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.  Nominated for Louisville Grawemeyer Award in Religion.
  • 2014: “The Institutionalization of Abbasid Ceremonial,” Diverging Paths? The Shapes of Power and Institutions in Medieval Christendom and Islam, ed. John Hudson and Ana Rodriguez (Leiden and Boston: Brill), 351-370. 
  • 2013: Crisis and Continuity at the Abbasid Court. Formal and Informal Politics in the Caliphate of al-Muqtadir (295-320/908-932). Co-authored with Maaike van Berkel, and Hugh Kennedy and Letizia Osti, Leiden: Bril.
  • 2013: “An Abbasid Caliphal Family,” Approaches to the Byzantine Family, ed. Leslie Brubaker and Shaun Tougher (Surrey: Ashgate), 327-344.
  • 2012: “The Abbasid and Byzantine Courts,” The Oxford History of Historical Writing, vol.2, 600-1400, ed. Sarah Foot and Chase Robinson (London: Oxford University Press), 517-538. 
  • 2012: “Ibn Khaldun, a Late Historian of Byzantium,” Knotenpunkt  Byzanz: Wissensformen und kulturelle Wechselbeziehungen, ed. Andreas Speer and Philip Steinkruger (Miscellanea Mediaevalia no. 36) (Berlin and Boston: De Gruyter), 534-548.  
  • 2011: “The Conversion of Constantine the Great: A Reading of Arabic-Muslim Sources,” Journal of Turkish Studies In Memoria Angeliki Laiou 36, 69-83.
  • 2011:  “The Tenth Century Byzantine Revival: The Muslim Literary Reaction,” Byzantium in Early Islamic Syria, ed. Nadia Maria El Cheikh and Shaun O Sullivan (Beirut), 147-160.
  • 2011: “To Be a Prince in the Fourth/Tenth Century Abbasid Court,” Royal Courts in Dynastic States and Empires: A Global Perspective, ed. Jeroen Duindam, Tulay Artan, and Metin Kunt (Leiden: Brill), 199-216.
  • 2011: “Court and Courtiers: A Preliminary Investigation of Abbasid Terminology,” Court Cultures in the Muslim World: Seventh to Nineteenth Centuries, ed. Albrecht Fuess and Jan-Peter Hartung (New York: Routledge), 80-90.
  • 2010: “The Gendering of ‘Death’ in Kitab al-‘Iqd al-Farid”, al-Qantara vol.31,  411-436.
  • 2010: “The Court of al-Muqtadir: Its Space and Its Occupants,” Abbasid Studies II: Occasional Paper of the School of ‘Abbasid Studies, Leuven 28 June-1 July, 2004, ed. John Nawas (Orientalia Lovaniensia Analecta, no. 177).
  • 2010: “Caliphal Harems, Household Harems:  Baghdad in the Fourth/Tenth Century,” Harem Histories: Envisioning Places and Living Spaces, ed. Marilyn Booth (Durham and London: Duke University Press).
  • 2010: “Ammuriyya,” and “Byzantium” Encyclopedia of Islam, third edition (Brill, Leiden).       
  • 2007: “Observations on Women's Education in Medieval Islamic Societies,” Enfance et jeunesse dans le monde musulman, ed. Francois Georgeon and Klaus Kreiser (Paris: Maisonneuve et Larose), 57-72.
  • 2007: “Adab Literature: 9th to 13th Century,” Encyclopedia of Women & Islamic Cultures, vol. 6.
  • 2006: Co-author with Farid S. Haddad and Sami Haddad, “The Decrees Sent by the Mamalik to the Orthodox Patriarchs of Jerusalem (713/1313-911/1506): Further Light on the Orthodox Community in Jerusalem during the Mamluk Period,” in Al-Bustan, ed. Farid S. Haddad (Paradise valley, AZ: The Sami Haddad Memorial Library), 375-454.
  • 2005: “Re-visiting the Abbasid Harems,” Journal of Middle East Women's Studies, vol.1 #3, 1-19.
  • 2005: “Servants at the Gate: Eunuchs at the Court of al-Muqtadir,” The Journal of the Social and Economic History of the Orient vol. 48, 234-252.
  • 2004: “Byzantine Leaders in Arabic-Muslim Texts,” Elites Old and New in the Byzantine and Early Islamic Near East, ed. John Haldon and Lawrence I. Conrad (Princeton: Darwin Press, Inc.), 109-131.
  • 2004: “Gender and Politics: The Harem of al-Muqtadir,” in Gender in the Early Medieval World: East and West, 300-900, ed. L. Brubaker and Julia Smith (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press), 147-161.
  • 2004: Byzantium Viewed by the Arabs. Cambridge MA: Harvard Middle Eastern Monographs.
  • 2004: “Empires: Byzantine,” Encyclopedia of Islam and the Muslim World (New York: Macmillan Reference USA), vol. 1, 210-211.
  • 2003: “The Qahramana in the Abbasid Court: Position and Functions,” Studia Islamica, vol. 97, 41-55. 
  • 2003: “Mourning and the Role of the Na’iha,” Identidades Marginales, ed. Cristina de la Puente (Madrid: Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Cientificas), 395-412.
  • 2002: “In Search for the Ideal Spouse,” Journal of the Economic and Social History of the Orient, vol. 45, 179-196. 
  • Translated into Arabic: “Bahthan an sharik al-hayat al-mithali,” Tiba 3(2003), 77-99.
  • 2002: “Byzantines: Exegetical Explanations,”  “Immunity,” and “Iraq”.
  • Encyclopedia of the Qur’an, ed. Jane Dammen McAuliffe (Leiden: Brill), vol.1, 266-269 and vol. 2, 504-505 and 559-561.
  • 2002: “Women’s History: A Study of al-Tanukhi,” Writing the Feminine: Women in Arab Sources, ed. Manuela Marin and Randi Deguilhem  (London and New York: I. B. Tauris), 129-148.
  • 2001: “Byzantium through the Islamic Prism: Twelfth-Thirteenth Centuries,” The Crusades from the Perspective of Byzantium and the Muslim World, ed. Angeliki Laiou and Roy Parviz Mottahedeh (Washington: Dumbarton Oaks), pp. 53-69. Translated into Spanish by Damian Rodriguez del Carlo: “Bizancio a través del prisma islamico de los siglos XII y XIII.” [En Memoria de Angel Eduardo Rodriguez, 1940-2004].
  • 1999: “Muhammad and Heraclius: A Study in Legitimacy,” Studia Islamica, vol. 89, 5-21.
  • 1999: “The Contribution of Christian Arab Historians to Muslim Historiography on Byzantium,” Bulletin of the Royal Institute for Inter-Faith Studies vol. 1, 45-60.
  • 1999:  “Constantinople Through Arab Eyes: A Mythology,” Myths, Historical Archetypes and Symbolic Figures in Arabic Literature: Towards a New Hermeneutic Approach, ed. Angelica Neuwirth et al (Orient Institute: Beirut), 521-537.
  • 1998: “Surat al-Rum: A Study of the Exegetical Literature,” Journal of the American Oriental Society, vol. 118, 356-364.
  • 1998: “The 1998 Civil Marriage Proposal in Lebanon: The Reaction of the Muslim Communities,” The Yearbook of Islamic and Middle Eastern Law 5(1998-1999), 147-161.  Translated into Arabic: “Rudud al-fi’l ala mashru’ qanun al-ahwal al-shakhsiyya al-madani fi lubnan,” in Abhath mu’tamar mi’at am ala tahrir al-mar’a, ed. Jabir Asfur (Cairo, 1999), vol. 2, 267-273.
  • 1997: “Describing the Other to Get at the Self: Byzantine Women in Arabic Sources (8th-11th Centuries),” Journal of the Economic and Social History of the Orient, vol. 40, 239-250.  Translated into Arabic: “al-Sila bayna al-akhar wa al-dhat: al-mar’a al-byzantiyya fi al-masadir al-islamiyya,” in Zaman al-nisa’ wa al-dhakira al-badila, ed. Huda al-Sadda et al (Cairo, 1998), 81-88.
  • 1996: “An Ambivalent Image: Byzantium Viewed by the Arabs,” Cairo Papers in Social Science, vol. 19, 122-135.
  • 1995: Co-contributor to Arab Women Bibliography: A Study Conducted in Eight Countries, published by the Center of Arab Women for Training and Research (Tunis, two volumes).
  • 1994: “Rum in Arabic Literature,” Encyclopedia of Islam, New Edition, (Leiden, Brill), vol. VIII, 601-602.
Exhibitions, lectures & performances: 
  • “Reading Women and Gender in Early Islam,” Cluster of Excellence Eurasian Transformations, University of Vienna, November 2024.
  • Delegate to the AlUla World Archaeological Symposium. AlUla, 2024
  • “Etiquette at the Abbasid Court”, conference on Meeting Etiquette in the Middle East: Continuity and Change, Università degli Studi di Messina, May, 2024.
  • “The Court of Women in Baghdad and Constantinople: Al-Khayzuran and Irene,” conference on Shifting Paradigms: Women, Rhetoric, and Power, c. 700 – c. 1300 CE, London, February, 2024.
  • “Peregrinations of a Historian on the Mediterranean Shores,” Columbia University, The Maan Madina yearly lecture, March 2023.
  • “Byzantine Female Captives in the Frontier Wars,” Dumbarton Oaks Symposium: On Being Conquered in Byzantium, April, 2021.
  • “The Emergence of Islam in its Pre-Islamic and Byzantine Contexts,” Centre for Research in the Arts, the Humanities and the Social Sciences, Cambridge University, December, 2020.
  • “Observations on the muhaddithat in Kitab Tarikh Baghdad,” Workshop on Professional Mobility in Islamic Lands, SOAS, London, March 2019.
  • Gender Studies: An AUB Story, Workshop on Status of Gender Studies in the Middle East and North Africa, Amman, October, 2019. 
  • Expanding the Model: Doing History in a Turbulent World, International AGYA Conference on the Place of Humanities in Research, Education and Society, Berlin, November, 2019.
  • “The Court of Women in Baghdad and Constantinople,” Byzantium, the Arabs, and the Rise of Islam Colloquium in Memory of Irfan Shahîd (1926–2016), Georgetown University and Dumbarton Oaks Research Library and Collection, October 13, 2017.
  • “Remembering (re-reading) the Battle of Uhud,” Conference on Comparative Study of the Historiographies of the Rise of Christianity, Rabbinic Judaism and Islam, Nantes, May, 2017.
  • “Book presentation of Women, Islam and Abbasid Identity,” Institute of Advanced Studies, Nantes, May, 2017.
  • “Doing Comparative Work on Abbasid and Byzantine History: Some Examples,” in Conference on Greek and Arabic in the Middle Ages, University of Athens, June 2016.
  • “Book presentation of Women, Islam and Abbasid Identity,” Orient Institut, Beirut, April 2016.
  • “The Emergence of Islam in its Pre-Islamic and Byzantine Contexts,” Agha Khan University, ISMC, Istanbul, March, 2016.
  •  “Staging Grief: Female Lamenters in Early Islam,” conference on Gender and Status Competition in Premodern Societies, Umea Group for Premodern Studies at Umea University, Sweeden, November 2015.  [Tele Conference].
  • “Writing ‘Byzantium Viewed by the Arabs’,” Athens, October 2014.
  • “Ibn Khaldun on Byzantium,” Museum of Islamic Art, Athens, October, 2014.
  • “Guarding the Harem, Protecting the State: The Roles of Eunuchs in a Fourth/Tenth Century Abbasid Court,” University of Zurich, August 2013.
  • “Conversation as Performance: Adab al-Muhadatha at Court,” NYU Abu Dhabi, February, 2012.
  • “The Institutionalization of Abbasid Ceremonial,” Workshop II on Diverging Paths, the Shapes of Power and institutions in the Medieval Christian and Islamic World Madrid, July, 2011.
  • “The Other Woman Within: The Heretical Qaramita,” in conference on Les communautés religieuses dans le Bilad al-Sham, Université Saint Joseph, Beirut, November, 2010.
  • “Ibn Khaldun, a Late Historian of Byzantium,” in conference on Intersection Byzantium, Thomas Institute, University of Cologne, September, 2010.
  • “Ceremonial at the Abbasid and Byzantine Courts,” in Workshop I on Diverging Paths, the Shapes of Power and institutions in the Medieval Christian and Islamic World, Madrid, June, 2010.
  • “The Abbasid and Byzantine Courts: Sources and Comparative Institutional Models,” University of California, Berkeley, April, 2009.
  • “Byzantine Women: A Reading of Abbasid Texts,” University of Cyprus, Nicosia, November, 2008.
  • “The Abbasid Court: A Study of the Early Fourth/Tenth Century,” conference on Court Cultures in the Muslim World: Politics and Patronage (7th– 19th Centuries), July, 2007, Gotha, Germany.
  • “Gendering Death in Kitab al-Iqd al-farid,” Director’s Lecture Series, Center for Middle Eastern Studies, Harvard University, April, 2007.  An earlier version was presented at the University of Pennsylvania, March, 2007.
  • “Bahthan an sharikh al-hayat al-mithali: qira’a fi  ‘Uyun al-Akhbar wa al-‘Iqd al-farid,” Harvard University, April, 2007.
  • “Re-visiting the Abbasid Harem,” in Workshop on Gender and Islamicate History, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, September, 2005.
  • “Writing Byzantium Viewed by the Arabs: Problems, Methodologies, Conclusions,” Université St. Joseph, Beirut, January, 2005.
  • Arabs, Byzantines, and Franks: Shifting Representations,” Conference on Le Bilad al-Sham face aux mondes extérieurs, Table Ronde a l’IFPO/IFEAD, Damascus, February, 2005.
  • “Doing Middle Eastern History: A Local Perspective?” Harvard University, October, 2004.
  • The Abbasid Harem in Tenth Century Baghdad,” New York University, Global Affair’s International Visitors Program, New York, March, 2004.
  • “Gendered and Sexualized Knowledge Production: The Uses of Adab,” Gendered Bodies, Transnational Politics: Modernities Reconsidered, Cairo, December, 2003.
  • “Ibn Khaldun on Byzantium and the Franks,” Perspectives on Ibn Khaldun and His Times, Harvard University, May, 2002.
  • “Research on Lebanese Women: Trends and Methods,” Institute for Gender and Women’s Studies, The American University in Cairo, April, 2002.
  • “Mourning and the Role of the Na’iha,” conference on Marginality in Medieval Islamic Culture, Madrid, October, 2001.
  • “Women/Gender in Medieval Islamic Societies: Trends and Directions,” Women and Gender in the Middle East: A Multidisciplinary Assessment of the State of Theory and Research, Bellagio, Italy, August, 2001.
  • “Adab Texts : On Women and Marriage,”  Oxford University, June, 2000.
  • “Rudud al-fi’l ala mashru’ qanun al-ahwal al-shakhsiyya al-madani fi lubnan,” Mu’tamar mi’at am ala tahrir al-mar’a, Cairo, October, 1999.
  • “The Women's Movement in Lebanon,” Middleburry College, July, 1998.
  • “The Contribution of Christian Arab Historians to Muslim Historiography on Byzantium”, Royal Institute for Inter-Faith Studies, Amman, August, 1997
  • “Byzantium through the Islamic Prism: 12th-13th Centuries,” Dumbarton Oaks, Washington D.C., May, 1997.
  • “Constantinople through Arab Eyes: A Mythology,” Orient Institute, Beirut, June, 1996.
Collaborations and Partnerships: 
  • “Women, Sexuality, and the Making of Heretics: The Example of the Qaramita,” School of Abbasid Studies, Istanbul, August, 2014.
  • “Hind bint ‘Utba: Defining “Other Times,”  School of Abbasid Studies , Exeter, July, 2012.
  • “A Caliph and his Family,” International Medieval Congress Leeds, UK, July, 2009.
  • “To Be a Prince in the Fourth/Tenth Century Abbasid Court,” School of ‘Abbasid Studies, Cambridge University, Cambridge, July, 2008.
  • “The Tenth Century Byzantine Revival: the Muslim Reaction,” at conference on Byzantium in Early Islamic Syria, American University of Beirut, June, 2007.
  • “Guardians, Masters of Ceremonials, and Political Actors: Chamberlains in the Fourth/Tenth Century Abbasid Court,” School of ‘Abbasid Studies, St. Andrews University, Scotland, July, 2006.
  • “The Court of al-Muqtadir: Its Space and its Occupants,” School of ‘Abbasid Studies, Katholieke Universiteit, Leuven, Belgium, July, 2004.
  • “Servants at the Gate: Eunuchs at the Court of al-Muqtadir,” Middle East Studies Association Conference, Washington, November, 2002.
  • “The Qahramana in the Abbasid Court: Position and Functions,” Middle East Studies Association Conference, San Fransisco, November, 2001. 
  • “Women and Politics: the Harem of Umm al-Muqtadir,” Middle East Studies Association Conference, Orlando, November. 2000.
  • “Ibn ‘Abd Rabbih: A Women's Profile,” CBR, American University of Beirut, 1999.
  • “Byzantine Leaders in Arabic-Muslim Texts,” Late Antiquity and Early Islam Workshop (VIth), Univ. of Birmingham, April, 1999.
  • “The 1998 Civil Marriage Proposal in Lebanon: The Reaction of the Muslim Communities,” conference on The Islamic Marriage, Harvard Law School, Cambridge, January, 1999.
  • “Women's Education in Medieval Times: A Reappraisal,” European Science Foundation's Education and the Individual in Islamic Societies, Salamanca, October, 1998.
  • “Al-mar'a al-byzantiyya fi al-masadir al-islamiyya,” at conference on Reading History from the Women's Point of View, Cairo, November, 1996.
  • “Imagining Byzantium: Methodological and Conceptual Problems,” American University of Beirut, November, 1995.
  • “Rum in Qur'an Exegesis,” Middle East Studies Association Conference, Washington, December, 1995.
  • “Describing the Other to Get at the Self: Byzantine Women in Arabic Literature,” Middle East Studies Association Conference, Arizona, November, 1994.
  • “Byzantium Viewed by the Arabs,” Lebanese American University, Public Lecture Series, May, 1993.
  • “Reflections of Contrasting Times: Arab Views of Two Byzantine Emperors,” Five-College Near East Seminar, Smith College, October, 1991.
  • “Social Life and Customs of the Middle East,” Summer Workshops of Harvard Teaching Resource Center, July 11, 1990.
Fellowships: 
  • The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation: $1000, 000 Grant for The Arab Oral History Archive: Gender, Alternative Histories, and the Production of Knowledge, 2019.
  • The Mellon Summer Research Fellowship: Summer, 1995; Summer, 1996; and Summer, 1999 - American University of Beirut.
  • Faculty Development Grant: 1994, 1998, 2000, 2001, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2008, 2009, 2012, 2014, 2017, 2019 - American University of Beirut.
Others: 
  • Columbia University: Maan Z. Madina Visiting Scholar, March, 2023.
  • University of Texas (Austin): International Office Faculty Fellow, 2013-2014 (Declined).
  • University of California, Los Angeles: Visiting Scholar with the Center for Near Eastern Studies, November 2004.
  • New York University, Global Affair’s International Visitors Program Grant (The Center for the Study of Gender and Sexuality), March 21-April 3, 2004.
  • University of California, Los Angeles: Visiting Scholar with the Center for the Study of Women, July, 2003.
  • Harvard University: Visiting Scholar at Center for Middle Eastern Studies, July-August, 1998.
  • Harvard University: Harvard Scholarship, 1986-1992.
  • American University of Beirut: Dean's Honor's list all semesters and scholarships for academic achievement, 1983-5.

Accomplishments

Awards: 
  • Zayed Book Award: Member of the Scientific Committee, 2022.

Competences & Skills

Field(s) of Expertise: 
  • Academic Leadership
  • History
Languages: 
  • Arabic
  • English