People in Middle Eastern studies

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On this page:  

University Teaching Officers

Dr Paul Anderson    

  • HRH Prince Alwaleed Bin Talal University Associate Professor in Middle Eastern Studies, Assistant Director, HRH Prince Alwaleed Bin Talal Centre of Islamic Studies
  • Email: psa27@cam.ac.uk   

Research interests

Intersections of commerce, morality and politics in the Middle East and its diasporas; economic liberalisation in authoritarian contexts; Syrian Jews and Armenians, minoritisation and citizenship in Syria; trade networks connecting China and the Middle East; skills and subjectivities underpinning projects of transregional connectivity; temporalities of urgency and crisis. 

Research supervision

Dr Anderson is open to receiving enquiries from prospective MPhil and PhD students who have a training in social anthropology and who want to work on projects that contribute to current debates in anthropology, particularly on themes related to his research interests.

Dr Assef Ashraf

Research interests

Iranian and Persianate history from the medieval to the modern periods; Persian historiography; Iranian and Persianate political culture; comparative empires of the Eastern Islamic lands; intellectual history and the history of political thought; history, memory, and the politics of knowledge.

Research supervision

Dr Ashraf welcomes inquiries from prospective Master’s and PhD students who are interested in the history of Iran and the Persianate world, from the medieval to modern periods, broadly defined.

Professor Amira K Bennison

Research interests

Professor Bennison’s research focuses geographically on the medieval Islamic western Mediterranean, especially what is now Morocco. Her interests lie in political legitimation, material culture and urbanism with a chronological focus on the eleventh to fourteenth centuries, the era of the Almoravid, Almohad and Marinid empires.   

Research supervision

Professor Bennison welcomes postgraduate applications from students interested in working on the political, cultural and social history of the medieval Islamic west (Iberia and the Maghrib), medieval and early modern urbanism and Islamic material culture in the Islamic west and the wider Islamic world. 

Professor Bennison will be on sabbatical leave in 2026-27 and not taking new students for that academic year. 

Mrs Farida El Keiy

Mrs El Keiy teaches undergraduate Arabic and does not normally offer postgraduate supervision. 

Mr Aishwarj Kumar 

Research interests

Aishwarj Kumar teaches undergraduate Hindi in the Faculty of Asian and Middle Eastern Studies, University of Cambridge. He also teaches Hindi and Urdu to MPhil students at the Centre of South Asian Studies at the University of Cambridge. He holds an MPhil degree in History from the University of Delhi. 

Mr Kumar does not normally offer postgraduate supervision. 

Dr Mahbod Ghaffari 

  • University Associate Professor in Persian Language, Linguistics and Culture
  • Email: mg695@cam.ac.uk  

Dr Ghaffari teaches undergraduate Persian and does not normally offer postgraduate supervision. 

Professor Saloumeh Gholami  

Research interests

Professor Gholami is a scholar in the field of minority languages in the Middle East, with a special focus on Iran. She is a leading authority on language documentation and preservation and revitalization of endangered languages and cultures. Her research has focused on both written and oral heritage of minority communities such as Jews, Ahl-e Haqq, and particularly the Zoroastrians.

Research supervision

Professor Gholami welcomes enquiries from MPhil students interested in Zoroastrian studies, Iranian languages, endangered language documentation, language and identity.

Dr Aaron D. Hornkohl   

Research interests

Dr Hornkohl teaches undergraduate Hebrew. He has research interests in Ancient Hebrew philology and linguistics, Ancient Hebrew periodization, exegesis.   

Research supervision

Dr Hornkohl welcomes graduate students interested in ancient Hebrew philology and linguistics, biblical and extra-biblical of various sources, traditions, and periods. 

Dr Benjamin Kantor   

  • University Assistant Professor in Hebrew and the Jews of the Mediaeval Middle East
  • Email: bk407@cam.ac.uk  

Research interests

Biblical Hebrew; Medieval (and Late Antique) Hebrew Reading/Vocalisation Traditions; Medieval Hebrew and Arabic Grammarians; Judaeo-Arabic; Medieval Arabic Bible Translation; Comparative Semitic Philology and Linguistics; Greek of Judaea-Palestine; Jewish Translations of the Bible into Greek (for example, LXX, Aquila).  

Research supervision

Dr Kantor welcomes inquiries from prospective MPhil and PhD students who are interested in the areas of pre-modern Hebrew philology and linguistics, Judaeo-Arabic, Semitic languages and comparative Semitic linguistics, Jewish translations of the Bible (into Judaeo-Arabic, Greek, etc.), and other related areas. 

Dr Saussan Khalil 

Dr Khalil teaches undergraduate Arabic and does not normally offer postgraduate supervision. 

Professor Aaron Koller   

Research interests  

Classical Rabbinic literature (Mishnah, Midrash, Talmud); Medieval Jewish biblical interpretation; manuscript studies; Hebrew Bible – philology, history, archaeology; pre-modern Hebrew of all periods; comparative Semitic linguistics; history and dialectology of Aramaic; Dead Sea Scrolls; Targumim; Early biblical interpretation; Piyyut (early Hebrew and Aramaic poetry). 

Research supervision

Professor Koller is happy to supervise students in the subjects in which he has interest and expertise.

Professor Andrew Marsham   

Research interests

Islamic History; Late Antique and Early Medieval History of the Mediterranean and the Middle East; Political Culture in Early Islam; Empire and State Formation in Early Islam; Comparative and Transregional History; Arabic Historiography; Late Antique and Medieval Historiography; Environmental History. 

Research supervision

Professor Marsham welcomes inquiries from prospective Masters or PhD students who are interested in the history of the Middle East from Late Antiquity to the Medieval periods.

Mr Sherif Mohammed 

Mr Mohammed is a seasoned educator with a passion for teaching Arabic language and culture. He teaches undergraduate Arabic and does not normally offer postgraduate supervision.  

Dr Elizabeth Monier   

Research interests

Contemporary politics and history of the Middle East; Egypt and Arab Gulf States; Identity politics; Middle Eastern Christians; Regional power and the global order; Arab diplomacy; Citizenship and state-building; Negotiation, mediation and soft power.   

Dr Monier is unable to accept any new postgraduate students at this time.

Professor James Montgomery FBA  

Research interests

History of ideas in classical Islam; classical Arabic literature; literary translation. 

Research supervision

Professor Montgomery is interested in supervising students with similar research interests.  

Dr Charis Olszok   

  • University Associate Professor in Modern Arabic Literature and Culture
  • Email: co383@cam.ac.uk  

Research interests

Modern and Contemporary Arabic Literature; Comparative Literature; Animal and Eco-critical Studies.   

Research supervision

Dr Olszok welcomes enquiries from MPhil and PhD students who wish to work in fields of Arabic literature in which she has expertise.  

Professor Yaron Peleg   

Research interests

Modern Hebrew literature and its history; Israeli cinema, Israeli culture and identity; the formation of Jewish nationalism and its socio-cultural legacy.

Research supervision

Professor Peleg welcomes enquiries from prospective MPhil and PhD students whose projects align with these areas.  

Professor Christina Phillips   

  • His Majesty Sultan Qaboos Bin Sa’id Professor of Modern Arabic Studies
  • Email: clp71@cam.ac.uk  

Research interests

Modern Arabic literature and the environmental humanities with a current focus on Palestine. 

Research supervision

Professor Phillips welcomes MPhil and PhD students working on contemporary Arab culture and literature, environmental humanities of the Middle East, Arabic translation studies, and Palestinian literature, culture and identity.  

Professor Christine van Ruymbeke   

Research interests

Medieval and Pre-Modern (i.e. “Classical”) Literature in the Persianate world with a focus on non-mystical prose and verse narratives. Science & poetry (medicine, pharmacology), politics and poetry (mirror for princes), rewriting and translating, Persian literature in medieval, renaissance and pre-modern European literature, codicology, calligraphy and Persian paintings. 

Research supervision

Professor van Ruymbeke welcomes approaches from potential graduate students with research interests relevant to hers or in topics of modern and contemporary Persian literature or cinema. She will be on sabbatical leave in 2025-26 and 2026-27. She will therefore not be able to accept any postgraduate students for supervision during that period. (Please apply in 2026 for October 2027). 

Professor Vincenzo Vergiani 

Research interests

History of linguistic ideas and grammatical traditions of pre-modern India, Dharmaśāstra, Indian codicology.  

Professor Vergiani is no longer accepting postgraduate students.

 

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Postdocs and Affiliated Researchers

Dr Vean Al-Saka

Research interests

Descriptive, theoretical, comparative and historical linguistics, with a focus on morphology, syntax, morphosyntax, agreement and nominal licensing. She works on the Semitic languages, especially Aramaic and Arabic. Her interests include the documentation and analysis of endangered Neo-Aramaic dialects and the preservation of the cultural heritage of Iraqi Christian communities.

Dr Ani Avetisyan

Research interests

Dr Avetisyan research focuses on Judaeo-Arabic medical and scientific manuscripts from the Cairo Genizah. She studies how these texts reflect the movement of knowledge across linguistic, religious, and social boundaries in the medieval Middle East.

Dr Yair Berlin

  • British Academy Newton International Postdoctoral Fellow, Research Associate Sidney Sussex College
  • Email: yb325@cam.ac.uk 

Research interests

Cultural and historical study of emotions, religious emotions, nationalism, fear, happiness, Jewish textuality, Zionism and Israel studies.

Dr Jonathan Duquette

  • Assistant Research Professor, Sanskrit/South Asian Studies
  • Kaveri Delta Project (AHRC), Principal Investigator
  • Bye-Fellow in South Asian Religions and Philosophies, Selwyn College
  • Email: jd861@cam.ac.uk 

Research interests

Sanskrit intellectual history, history of ideas in early modern India, expert literature and culture. He works on a range of Indic knowledge-systems, including Nyāya and Vedānta, and is currently leading an international project on the intellectual history of Sanskrit scholarship under Maratha Tanjavur rule, funded by the AHRC.

Dr Masoud Mohammadirad

Dr Mehdy Shaddel, FRAS

Research interests

Near Eastern studies, early and mediaeval Islamic history, Late Antiquity, Arabic and Persian historiography, economic history, papyrology, epigraphy, numismatics, quranic studies, Arabic literature, comparative empires and state formation, apocalypticism and eschatology.

Dr Alimujiang Tusun

  • British Academy Postdoctoral Research Fellow, Senior Postdoctoral Researcher, Trinity College
  • Email: at648@cam.ac.uk 

Research interests

The relationship between language and cognition with a focus on how basic experiential domains such as ‘motion’ and ‘change of state’ are encoded and processed in different languages (e.g., Mandarin, English, Turkic) by children and adults speaking one or more languages; the philological and linguistic study of under-represented Turkic languages.