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Institute of Advanced Studies (IAS)

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The Centre draws together scholars from a wide range of departments and disciplines, including Archeology, History, Geography, Hebrew and Jewish Studies, Law, and the Bartlett.

Market in Tehran, credit Farzad Mohsenvand via Unsplash
Director ´¥ÌýAssociated staff ´¥ÌýPhD students | Visiting Fellows

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Director

The MERC Director isÌýSeth Anziska (Hebrew and Jewish Studies). His research interests areÌýModern Middle Eastern history, Israeli and Palestinian society and culture, Lebanon, Jewish-Arab encounters in Europe and the Levant, archival practices, visual culture in the contemporary Middle East.Ìý

Associated staff

  • Mark Altaweel (Institute of Archaeology):ÌýAncient Near East Archaeology, Cultural Heritage, Environment and Society in the Near East, Data Science in Archaeology, Mesopotamian History, Connections between the ancient and modern Near East/Middle East.
  • (Urban Lab): Political practices and clientelism, the intersection of conflict and politics with humanitarian aid and energy, and the production of ethnographic research in turbulent times.ÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌý
  • Ìý(IOE - Culture, Communication & Media): The political, cultural and socioeconomic impact of colonialism on children in Palestine and the UK
  • (Institute for Global Prosperity, Bartlett): Urbanism, displacement, infrastructure, Israel/Palestine, Lebanon.
  • Gabriela Bazzo (Geography): Works on theÌýSouthern Responses to Displacement from Syria project
  • Beverley Butler (Institute of Archaeology):ÌýCultural Heritage, Memory Studies, Heritage and Health.
  • Estella CarpiÌý(Geography,ÌýMigration Research Unit): Human displacement, identity politics, humanitarianism, migrations, welfare.
  • Ìý(Thomas Coram Research Unit): asylum-seekers from North Africa,ÌýAnthropology of Islam, Local Articulations of Revolution, Sufism, Ritual Secrecy, Tribal Dynamics, State Surveillance.
  • Alinda DamsmaÌý(Hebrew and Jewish Studies):ÌýSemitic languages, especially Hebrew and Aramaic, and Ancient Near Eastern Studies.
  • Corisande Fenwick (Institute of Archaeology):ÌýLate Antique and Islamic archaeology, history and heritage of North Africa and Middle East.Ìý
  • Elena Fiddian-QasmiyehÌý(Geography): Forced migration and conflict-induced displacement; gender, generation and religion; statelessness in the Middle East and North Africa.
  • (History):ÌýResearch Fellow- Leverhulme ECF: Documentary Afterlives
  • Mark Geller (Hebrew and Jewish Studies):ÌýAncient Near Eastern languages and texts.
  • Ìý(History of Art)ÌýMedieval art and architecture of Africa; Ethiopic, Syriac, Armenian, and Copto-Arabic illuminated manuscripts
  • (IOE - Curriculum, Pedagogy & Assessment) Teacher professional development, children's wellbeing and social justice - experience inÌýprimarily Egypt, but also Lebanon, Jordan, Palestine, Qatar.
  • Christopher Harker (Institute for Global Prosperity): Spatial practices of debt and finance in Palestine.
  • YaÄŸmur Heffron (History):ÌýArchaeology of Bronze Age Anatolia, archaeology and social history of religion in the ancient Middle East, integrating texts and archaeology, archaeological labour relations in Turkey.
  • (Arts & Sciences):ÌýPalestinian refugee history and politics, displacement and bordering, Lebanon, modern Middle Eastern history, UN and UNRWA, internationalism, colonialism and postcolonialism, archival suppression.
  • (Hebrew andÌýJewish Studies):ÌýHebrew, Yiddish, Jewish languages and linguistics.Ìý
  • Neill Lochery (Hebrew and Jewish Studies):ÌýArab-Israeli conflict, Middle East Politics, Israeli Politics, ÌýMediterranean history and politics (Portugal).
  • Ruth MandelÌý(Anthropology):ÌýTransnational migration, ethnicity and identity Turkey, Greece, Germany, Kazakhstan; Post-socialist societies in transition,Ìý Media and International development; Memory and memorialisation in post-Holocaust Europe.
  • Eva Miller (History):Ìýancient Middle East, the modern West, and the relationship between the two
  • (Institute of Education):ÌýEducation in Emergencies, Refugee Education, Human Rights Education.Ìý
  • Julie Norman (Political Science):Ìýconflict, conflict resolution, human rights, security, social movements, protests, nonviolence/civil resistance, political violence, gendered violence, prisons/detention, refugees,ÌýIsrael/Palestine, Lebanon, Syria, Iraq.
  • (Judicial Institute, Faculty of Laws):ÌýÌýsocio-legal studies of the Middle-East, especially the role and significance of Middle East judiciaries.Ìý
  • Maria Rubins (School of Slavonic and East European Studies):Ìýmodernism, exile and diaspora, national and postnational cultural identities, the interaction between literature and other arts, bilingual and transnational writing, Russian-language literature in Israel, Israeli literature and culture.
  • Eleanor RobsonÌý(History):ÌýHistory of ancient and modern Iraq; the politics of heritage, culture and higher education in Iraq.
  • Fatemeh Sadeghi (Institute for Global Prosperity):Ìýcognitive historical procedures enabling individuals/groups to define their identities by collective fantasies, focusing mainly on Islam and Iran
  • (Institute for Sustainable Heritage):ÌýArchaeology and cultural heritage in (post-)conflict countries,Ìýworking in Iraq on research & conservation projects for c. 4yrs, andÌýco-director of Living Mesopatamia CIC.
  • Sertaç Sehlikoglu (Institute for Global Prosperity):ÌýSelf-making, political and ethical imagination, intimacy, gender in the Middle East.
  • Ìý(Institute for Global Prosperity):ÌýEnergy transitions, rethinking economics, post-oil futures, political economy.
  • Rachael Sparks (Institute of Archaeology):ÌýArchaeology of the Bronze and Iron Age Levant; cultural interactions between Egypt and the Southern Levant; materiality of texts; history of archaeological research in 20th century Israel, Palestine and Jordan; archaeological ethics.
  • (Hebrew and Jewish Studies): The ancient, late antique and early medieval Near East, with a special interest in Jewish history, the history of science, and Hebrew and Aramaic literatures.
  • Ali CoÅŸkun Tunçer (History):ÌýEconomic History of the Middle East with a focus on the Ottoman Empire and Modern Turkey.
  • Tom WesternÌý(Geography): Sound, citizenship, activisms, anticolonialisms, creativities, migrations, and borders.
  • Haim Yacobi (Bartlett Development Planning Unit):Ìý(Post)colonial architecture, planning and development in Israel\Palestine, the Middle East and Africa.
  • (Geography): Intersections of refugee studies, critical humanitarianism and gender, with an area focus on Turkey.

PhD students

  • (IOE):ÌýRefugee Education through the lens of Social Justice. Acculturation and Pedagogical Love
  • Ìý(Hebrew and Jewish Studies):ÌýThe Case of Palestinians in Tel Aviv
  • (Anthropology):ÌýYouTube production, film industry, production cultures, nation branding, globalization, and neoliberalism.Ìý
  • (History): Social biography of one of the first Ottoman-Americans and the way in which he used mass media in the United States to further his political goals in the Otoman Empire between 1835 and 1895.
  • Hanadi Samhan (Bartlett Development Planning Unit):ÌýThe politics of the Vertical in the camps of Palestinian Refugee camps in Lebanon
  • Ìý(Hebrew and Jewish Studies):ÌýA Historical Study of Palestinian Archaeological Agency within the Contested SpaceÌý

MERC Visiting Research Fellows

Kusha Sefat (Visiting Research Fellow, Ïã¸ÛÁùºÏ²ÊÖÐÌØÍø Middle East Research Centre andÌýAssistant Professor in Sociology at the University of Tehran):Ìýbrings Science and Technology Studies and, interrelatedly, the new materialism to bear on historical, political, and cultural sociology, with an emphasis on the Global South.