New Books in Middle Eastern Studies

In this episode, New Books Network Host Nina Bo Wagner speaks with Karen Bartlett about The Escape From Kabul: A True Story of Sisterhood and Defiance (The New Press and Duckworth, 2025). The book follows Afghan women judges who fought for justice in the courtroom, then fought to escape with their lives. Across twenty years of U.S.-backed government, Afghan women obtained legal degrees, became judges, and set out to transform their country. Their work, however, posed an existential threat to everything the Taliban believed in. When the United States withdrew in August 2021, the women judges of Afghanistan faced mortal danger. Journalist Karen Bartlett goes beyond their escape, and talks about the Afghan women judges’ backgrounds, the cases they were tie breakers on, and the importance of the international network of women judges who helped them evacuate in 2021. Bartlett critiques the abandonment of Afghanistan by the West, and warns people not to normalise or be complacent to the Taliban regime which is still strongly opposed within the country. She also calls for the international community to take accountability for women judges who are still left in limbo or trapped in Afghanistan. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoicesSupport our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/middle-eastern-studies

Landscapes of Warfare: Urartu and Assyria in the Ancient Middle East (University Press of Colorado, 2025) by Dr. Tiffany Earley-Spadoni offers an in-depth exploration of the Urartian empire, which occupied the highlands of present-day Turkey, Armenia, and Iran in the early first millennium BCE. Lesser known than its rival, the Neo-Assyrian empire, Urartu presents a unique case of imperial power distributed among mountain fortresses rather than centralized in cities. Through spatial analysis, the book demonstrates how systematic warfare, driven by imperial ambitions, shaped Urartian and Assyrian territories, creating symbolically and materially powerful landscapes. Dr. Earley-Spadoni challenges traditional views by emphasizing warfare’s role in organizing ancient landscapes, suggesting that Urartu’s strength lay in its strategic optimization of terrain through fortified regional networks. Using an interdisciplinary approach that includes GIS-enabled studies and integrates archaeological, historical, and art-historical evidence, she illustrates how warfare was a generative force in structuring space and society in the ancient Middle East. Landscapes of Warfare situates Urartu’s developments within the broader context of regional empires, providing insights into the mechanisms of warfare, governance, and cultural identity formation.  This interview was conducted by Dr. Miranda Melcher whose book focuses on post-conflict military integration, understanding treaty negotiation and implementation in civil war contexts, with qualitative analysis of the Angolan and Mozambican civil wars. You can find Miranda’s interviews on New Books with Miranda Melcher, wherever you get your podcasts. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoicesSupport our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/middle-eastern-studies

Sam Dalrymple, a historian and filmmaker, explores the impact of historical partitions in Asia, highlighting how they shaped modern nation-states. He discusses pivotal events from 1937 to 1971, focusing on the complexities of identity and the role of figures like Muhammad Ali Jinnah. The conversation delves into the hasty decolonization of India post-World War II, the conflicts in Kashmir and Balochistan, and the socio-political challenges leading to Bangladesh's emergence. Dalrymple also offers insights into his future projects and the cultural ties that persist despite borders.

The Book of Travels Ḥannā Diyāb: A Conversation with Johannes StephanThe Book of Travels is Ḥannā Diyāb’s remarkable first-person account of his travels as a young man from his hometown of Aleppo to the court of Versailles and back again, which forever linked him to one of the most popular pieces of world literature, the Thousand and One Nights.Diyāb, a Maronite Christian, served as a guide and interpreter for the French naturalist and antiquarian Paul Lucas. Between 1706 and 1716, Diyāb and Lucas traveled through Syria, Cyprus, Egypt, Tripolitania, Tunis, Italy, and France. In Paris, Ḥannā Diyāb met Antoine Galland, who added to his wildly popular translation of the Thousand and One Nights several tales related by Diyāb, including “Aladdin” and “Ali Baba and the Forty Thieves.” When Lucas failed to make good on his promise of a position for Diyāb at Louis XIV’s Royal Library, Diyāb returned to Aleppo. In his old age, he wrote this engaging account of his youthful adventures, from capture by pirates in the Mediterranean to quack medicine and near-death experiences.Translated into English for the first time, The Book of Travels introduces readers to the young Syrian responsible for some of the most beloved stories from the Thousand and One Nights. Johannes Stephan is a postdoctoral researcher in the ERC-funded project Kalīlah and Dimnah—AnonymClassic at the Freie Universität Berlin. He studied Islamic and Middle Eastern Studies in Halle an der Saale, Damascus, and Bern. Morteza Hajizadeh is a Ph.D. graduate in English from the University of Auckland in New Zealand. His research interests are Cultural Studies; Critical Theory; Environmental History; Medieval (Intellectual) History; Gothic Studies; 18th and 19th Century British Literature. YouTube channel. Twitter. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoicesSupport our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/middle-eastern-studies

Ancient Mediterranean Incarceration (open access) examines spaces, practices, and ideologies of incarceration in the ancient Mediterranean basin from 300 BCE to 600 CE. Analyzing a wide range of sources—including legal texts, archaeological findings, documentary evidence, and visual materials—Matthew D. C. Larsen and Mark Letteney argue that prisons were integral to the social, political, and economic fabric of ancient societies. Ancient Mediterranean Incarceration traces a long history of carceral practices, considering ways in which the institution of prison has been fundamentally intertwined with issues of class, ethnicity, gender, and imperialism. By foregrounding the voices and experiences of the imprisoned, Larsen and Letteney demonstrate the extraordinary durability of carceral structures across time and call for a new historical consciousness around contemporary practices of incarceration. The database of data is: historyofincarceration.com New books in late antiquity is presented by Ancient Jew Review Matthew Larsen is a historian, archaeologist, and storyteller who brings the ancient world to life. A professor at the University of Copenhagen, he specializes in uncovering the real lives of the first Christians—what they built, how they lived, and what history gets wrong about them. Mark Letteney (he/him) is Assistant Professor, Carol Thomas Endowed Professor of Ancient History at the University of Washington Michael Motia teaches in Classics and Religious Studies at UMass Boston Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoicesSupport our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/middle-eastern-studies

Archives are not only sources for history but have their own histories too, which shape how historians can tell stories of the past. In Managing Paperwork in Mamluk Cairo: Archives, Waqf and Society (Edinburgh UP, 2025), Daisy Livingston explores the archival history of one of the most powerful polities of the late-medieval Middle East: the ‘Mamluk’ sultanate of Cairo. Relying on surviving original documents, Livingston focuses on archival practices connected to waqf, the pious endowments that became one of the characteristic features of late-medieval Islamic societies. By centering a close exploration of documents connected to processes of endowment and property exchange, this book sheds light on a startling culture of document accumulation that was shared by the diverse social groups involved in founding and managing endowments: sultans and emirs, qadis, legal notaries, and scribes. Emphasizing the documents’ life cycles from production, to preservation, to disposal and loss, it argues for the use of surviving documents to tell their own archival histories. Daisy Livingston is Associate Professor of Medieval Islamic History in the Department of History at Durham University. As a historian of the medieval Middle East, in particular Egypt between the tenth and sixteenth centuries, her research focuses on various aspects of documentary culture, especially histories of archiving. Jen Hoyer is Technical Services and Electronic Resources Librarian at CUNY New York City College of Technology. She is co-author of What Primary Sources Teach: Lessons for Every Classroom (2022) and The Social Movement Archive (2021), and co-editor of Armed By Design: Posters and Publications of Cuba’s Organization of Solidarity of the Peoples of Africa, Asia, and Latin America (2025). Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoicesSupport our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/middle-eastern-studies

What are the prospects for democracy in Syria? Is this the right question to ask? What do we need to better understand about Syria’s new leader, its civil society, and the challenges it faces in a new era for Syria? Join Rana Khoury, Daniel Neep, and Emily Scott for this special joint episode of the Localization in World Politics and People, Power, Politics podcasts. Rana B. Khoury is assistant professor of political science at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign. Her work explores conflict processes, civil action, and humanitarianism, particularly in the Middle East and Syria. Her book, Civilizing Contention: International Aid in Syria’s War, is forthcoming from Cornell University Press and available for pre-order here. Daniel Neep is nonresident fellow at the Crown Center for Middle East Studies at Brandeis University. He is interested in conflict and state-building, as well as processes of political, institutional, and social transformation in the Middle East, in Syria, Lebanon, and Jordan. His book A History of Modern Syria is forthcoming with Penguin Books and is available for pre-order here. Check out their contributions to the Journal of Democracy Special Section, Syria After Assad, can be found here! Emily K. M. Scott is Associate Professor at the University of Birmingham and co-host of the Localization in World Politics Podcast. Her most recent publication, “Negotiating for Autonomy: How Humanitarian INGOs Resisted Donors During the Syrian Refugee Response” can be found here. The People, Power, Politics podcast brings you the latest insights into the factors that are shaping and re-shaping our political world. It is brought to you by the Centre for Elections, Democracy, Accountability and Representation (CEDAR) based at the University of Birmingham, United Kingdom. Join us to better understand the factors that promote and undermine democratic government around the world and follow us on Twitter at @CEDAR_Bham! Click here for a transcript of this episode Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoicesSupport our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/middle-eastern-studies

"If we were different people, to write down these words might be to leave them behind us. But words are our artifacts, and I am seeding a trail for the journey, home." What does the daughter of a Nakba survivor inherit? It is not property or tangible heirlooms, nor the streets and neighbourhoods of a father’s childhood and the deep roots of family who have lived in one place, Jerusalem, for generation upon generation. Fixing her gaze on moments, places and objects – from the streets of Bethlehem to the Palestinian neighbourhoods of the New Jerusalem – Micaela Sahhar assembles a story of Palestinian diaspora. Find Me at the Jaffa Gate: An Encyclopaedia of a Palestinian Family (Newsouth, 2025) is a book about the gaps and blank spaces that cannot be easily recounted, but which insists on the vibrant reality of chance, fragments and memory to reclaim a place called home. Roberto Mazza is currently a visiting scholar at the Buffett Institute for Global Affairs at Northwestern University. He is the host of the Jerusalem Unplugged Podcast and to discuss and propose a book for interview can be reached at robbymazza@gmail.com. Blusky and IG: @robbyref Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoicesSupport our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/middle-eastern-studies

Omid Safi, a Professor of Islamic Studies at Duke University, dives into the world of love in Islamic mystical poetry, particularly through the lens of Rumi and Sufism. He discusses the balance of fidelity and accessibility in translating Sufi poetry, and how mentorship shaped his journey from medicine to academia. Safi explores the concept of 'radical love' or 'ishq,' emphasizing its transformative power in spiritual development. He also highlights contemporary Sufi figures and the role of love in community engagement, creating a rich tapestry of understanding for both scholars and enthusiasts.

It is not Egypt's 2011 revolution that opened a space for women's and feminist activism, but—as Biography of a Revolution: The Feminist Roots of Human Rights in Egypt (U of California Press, 2025) shows—the long history of women's activism that created the intellectual and political background for revolution. By centering the experiences and ideas of multiple generations of women activists and intellectuals, Lucia Sorbera traces the feminist genealogies of Egypt's nationalist, student, Marxist, labor, human rights, and democratic social movements. Biography of a Revolution gathers a series of interrelated intimate and relational stories, charting in vivid detail the entanglements between women's aspirations across a century of politics and friendships. This historical analysis innovatively deploys decolonial and indigenous feminist epistemologies, bringing women's, gender, and feminist history into the center of Egypt's political, social, and intellectual history. More than a decade after the 2013 military coup, women's intellectual and political activism remains crucial to keeping the embers of revolution aglow. Lucia Sorbera is Associate Professor and Chair of Arabic Language and Cultures at the University of Sydney. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoicesSupport our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/middle-eastern-studies