Core Faculty
Ali Asani (On Leave)
aliasani@fas.harvard.eduMurray A. Albertson Professor of Middle Eastern Studies and Professor of Indo-Muslim and Islamic Religion and Cultures
Born in Nairobi, Kenya, Ali Asani is Murray A. Albertson Professor of Middle Eastern Studies and Professor of Indo-Muslim and Islamic Religion and Cultures. He has served as the Director of the Prince Alwaleed bin Talal Islamic Studies Program at Harvard...
Nicholas Boylston (On Leave)
boylston@fas.harvard.eduAssistant Professor of Near Eastern Languages and Civilizations
Nicholas Boylston is a scholar of classical Persian literature and Persianate Islam. His research focuses on themes of diversity and unity in the writings of Sufis, philosophers and litterateurs from the Persianate world. He is currently completing a book...
Andrew Danielson (On Leave)
adanielson@fas.harvard.eduAssistant Professor of Near Eastern Languages and Civilizations
Andrew Danielson is a Levantine Archaeologist specializing in the first millennium BCE southern Levant. His work examines changes to sociopolitical organization and complexity, cross-cultural interaction, and identity negotiation. His work also engages...
Céline Debourse
cdebourse@fas.harvard.eduAssistant Professor of Near Eastern Languages and Civilizations
Céline Debourse is an Assyriologist specializing in the languages, history, and religion of Babylonia during the first millennium BCE. Her work draws on a broad spectrum of methods and disciplines, from rigorous philological analysis, through historical...
Khaled El-Rouayheb
kel@fas.harvard.eduJames Richard Jewett Professor of Islamic Intellectual History
Co-Director of Undergraduate Studies
Khaled El-Rouayheb’s research interests include: the intellectual and cultural history of the Arabic-Islamic world in the Mamluk and early-Ottoman periods (1200-1800); the history of Arabic logic; Islamic theology and philosophy. He holds a BA in...
Jay M. Harris
jharris@fas.harvard.eduHarry Austryn Wolfson Professor of Jewish Studies
Harris has been on the Faculty since 1989. He specializes in Modern Jewish Intellectual and Cultural History, teaching courses on modern Jewish religion, law, thought, and culture, primarily in Europe. He also teaches two Gen Ed courses in the Ethics and...
Peter Der Manuelian
peter_manuelian@harvard.eduBarbara Bell Professor of Egyptology; Director of the Harvard Museum of the Ancient Near East
Peter Der Manuelian is the Barbara Bell Professor of Egyptology and holds a joint appointment in the Anthropology Department and the Department of Near Eastern Languages and Civilizations. He is also director of the Harvard Museum of the Ancient Near East...
Christina Maranci
cmaranci@fas.harvard.eduMashtots Professor of Armenian Studies
Chair of the Department
Christina Maranci is Mashtots Professor of Armenian Studies at Harvard University, a Harvard College Professor, Chair of the Department of Near Eastern Languages and Civilizations, and holds a joint appointment in the History of Art and Architecture. She...
Jessica Marglin
jmarglin@fas.harvard.eduJacob E. Safra Professor of Jewish History and Sephardic Civilization
Co-Director of Undergraduate Studies
Jessica Marglin’s research examines the history of Jews in North Africa and the Mediterranean in the modern period, with a particular emphasis on law. She draws on sources in Arabic, Hebrew, Judeo-Arabic, and multiple European languages. Her first book...
Adam Mestyan (On Leave)
mestyan@fas.harvard.eduFord Foundation Professor of Middle Eastern Studies
Research interests : Modern Middle Eastern History (Ottoman and Post-Ottoman); Social and Cultural History; Historical Anthropology; Empire/Law Adam Mestyan is a historian of the modern Middle East and the Ford Foundation Professor of Middle Eastern...
Julia Rhyder
juliarhyder@fas.harvard.eduJohn L. Loeb Associate Professor of the Humanities
Associate Professor of Near Eastern Languages and Civilizations
Julia Rhyder is a specialist of the Hebrew Bible with a particular interest in ritual texts and the history of the Israelite cult. She is the author of Centralizing the Cult: The Holiness Legislation in Leviticus 17–26 (Mohr Siebeck, 2019), which was...
David Stern (On Leave)
dstern@fas.harvard.eduHarry Starr Professor of Classical and Modern Jewish and Hebrew Literature and Professor of Comparative Literature
Research Fields: Classical and Modern Hebrew Literature; History of Biblical Interpretation, Jewish and Christian; Intersection of contemporary literary theory and hermeneutics with ancient and medieval exegesis; ancient and medieval Judaism; History of...
