Publications

Abbas Amanat
2016
Edited by Abbas Amanat and Fereydun Vahman (Ashkaar Publishers, 2016) This important collection consisting of 71 rare Government documents pertains to 1852-1873 AD and casts a new light on the obscure history of the Babi and Baha’i community in Iran, and relevant exiles in the provinces of the...
Frank Griffel
2016
Al-Ghazālī (d. 505/1111) is one of the most influential thinkers of Islam. There is hardly a genre of Islamic literature where he is not regarded as a major authority. Islamic Law, Sufism, ethics, philosophy, and theology are all deeply shaped by him. Yet in the past thirty years, the field of...
Kishwar Rizvi
2015
Kishwar Rizvi, drawing on the multifaceted history of the Middle East, offers a richly illustrated analysis of the role of transnational mosques in the construction of contemporary Muslim identity. As Rizvi explains, transnational mosques are structures built through the support of both government...
Travis Zadeh
2012
This book examines how early juridical and theological debates on the translatability of the Qur’an informed the development of Persian translations and commentaries of the Qur’an. While it is generally believed that Muslims in the eighth to twelfth centuries were disdainful of...
Abbas Amanat
2012
This collection of essays is about Iranian identity in its various manifestations as it encountered the challenge of modernity. It problematizes the notion of an all-inclusive and universal “Iranian-ness” while considering the place of collective memory and sense of community. It consists of five...
Valerie Hansen
2012
The Silk Road is as iconic in world history as the Colossus of Rhodes or the Suez Canal. But what was it, exactly? It conjures up a hazy image of a caravan of camels laden with silk on a dusty desert track, reaching from China to Rome. The reality was different–and far more interesting–...
Abbas Amanat
2012
Is the idea of the “Middle East” simply a geopolitical construct conceived by the West to serve particular strategic and economic interests—or can we identify geographical, historical, cultural, and political patterns to indicate some sort of internal coherence to this label? While the term has...