• Sema ceremony in Istanbul

    Photo by Eric Politzer

  • Children in a fountain, Tel-Aviv

  • The Kaaba at Mecca

  • Jerusalem's Tower of David Museum

    Photo by Dustin Farrell

  • Jerusalem street scene

  • Mural in Kurdistan

  • Bedouins, in Jordan

  • Mediterranean Sea and surrounding area

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What is NELC?

  • It is a department devoted to the languages, literatures, cultures, and histories of the ancient, medieval, and modern Near East.
  • It is a department devoted to the study of the Hebrew Bible, its sources in the Ancient Near East, and the history of its interpretations.
  • It is a department devoted to the study of Arabic-, Turkish-, and Persian-speaking Islamic civilizations in the Near East, Africa, South Asia, and elsewhere.
  • It is a department devoted to the study of Hebrew-, Aramaic-, Judaeo-Arabic, and Yiddish-speaking Jewish civilizations in the Near East, Europe, the New World, and elsewhere.