Center for Middle Eastern Studies (Harvard)

Center for Middle Eastern Studies (Harvard)
Name	Center for Middle Eastern Studies (Harvard)
Established	1951
Type	Interdepartmental research center
Parent	Harvard University
Location	Cambridge, Massachusetts
Director	(varies)

Contents

Center for Middle Eastern Studies (Harvard) is an interdisciplinary research center at Harvard University located in Cambridge, Massachusetts that focuses on historical, political, linguistic, and cultural studies of the Middle East. The center engages with scholars across Harvard Kennedy School, Harvard Divinity School, Harvard Law School, Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study, and the Department of Near Eastern Languages and Civilizations. It maintains partnerships with institutions such as the American University of Beirut, the British Museum, the Library of Congress, the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, and the Open Society Foundations.

History

The center traces its origins to Cold War era area studies initiatives linked to the Ford Foundation, the United States Department of State, and the National Endowment for the Humanities, and it was formally constituted within Harvard University amid broader expansion of regional studies programs associated with the Russell Sage Foundation and the Rockefeller Foundation. Early leadership and affiliated scholars included figures associated with Edward Said-era debates, interactions with research on the Ottoman Empire, comparative projects with the Safavid dynasty, and archival collaborations involving the British Library and the Bibliothèque nationale de France. Over decades the center has responded to major events such as the Suez Crisis, the Iranian Revolution, the Gulf War (1990–1991), the Arab Spring, and the Syrian Civil War by adapting curricula, grantmaking, and research agendas in concert with departments like the Department of History, the Department of Anthropology, and the Department of Government.

The center administers degree guidance, predoctoral fellowships, and language instruction in Arabic, Persian, Turkish, Hebrew, and Ottoman Turkish, coordinating with programs in the Faculty of Arts and Sciences, the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences, and the Harvard Language Center. It sponsors research projects on topics ranging from Ottoman administrative history and Safavid cultural production to contemporary politics in Egypt, Iran, Turkey, and Saudi Arabia, and comparative work on migration studies involving Syria and Iraq. The center supports grant-funded initiatives with partners such as the National Science Foundation, the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, and the Henry Luce Foundation, and it hosts workshops linked to the American Philosophical Society, the Middle East Studies Association, and the Association for Asian Studies.

Faculty affiliated with the center include professors from the Department of Near Eastern Languages and Civilizations, historians associated with the Department of History, legal scholars connected to the Harvard Law School, theologians from the Harvard Divinity School, and policy analysts tied to the Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs. Leadership roles have been held by scholars with departmental appointments who have worked alongside visiting fellows from institutions like SOAS University of London, the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, the Max Planck Institute for the Study of Religious and Ethnic Diversity, and the University of Chicago. The center regularly convenes seminars featuring experts on figures such as T. E. Lawrence, Reza Shah Pahlavi, Anwar Sadat, Yasser Arafat, and scholars writing on topics related to the Treaty of Lausanne, the Sykes–Picot Agreement, and the Berlin Conference.

The center publishes working papers, edited volumes, and lecture series proceedings in collaboration with presses and journals including the Harvard University Press, the Journal of Near Eastern Studies, the International Journal of Middle East Studies, the Cambridge University Press, and the Brill Publishers. Major projects have included digital humanities initiatives cataloging Ottoman archival materials, collaborative translations of classical Persian and Arabic texts, and policy briefs responding to crises involving Yemen, Lebanon, Palestine, and Libya. Grant-supported outputs frequently appear alongside edited collections referencing the Iraq War (2003–2011), scholarly debates on Orientalism, and comparative analyses involving the Mediterranean and the Indian Ocean worlds.

The center organizes public lectures, film screenings, and symposiums drawing audiences from Cambridge, Massachusetts, the Greater Boston area, and international visitors from the Middle East Studies Association and the Council on Foreign Relations. Notable visiting speakers have included diplomats from Turkey, historians from Egypt, journalists from Al Jazeera, and policymakers connected to the United Nations and the World Bank. Educational outreach extends to secondary schools via partnerships with the Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study and local museums such as the Peabody Museum of Archaeology and Ethnology and the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston.

Facilities supporting the center include seminar rooms, language labs, and digital scholarship workstations co-located with resources at the Widener Library, the Houghton Library, and the Harvard Art Museums. The center curates or facilitates access to manuscript collections, early printed books, and archival materials from repositories such as the British Library, the Vatican Library, and the National Library of Israel, as well as private collections tied to families from Istanbul, Cairo, Tehran, and Beirut.

Alumni and affiliates have gone on to roles in academia, diplomacy, journalism, and public policy, including positions at the United Nations, the U.S. State Department, the European Union, and universities such as the University of Oxford, the Yale University, the Columbia University, the Princeton University, and the University of California, Berkeley. Former students and fellows have published monographs with Princeton University Press, the University of Chicago Press, and the Oxford University Press and have served as correspondents for outlets like The New York Times, The Washington Post, and The Economist.