RCPS Newsletter
Faculty
Meet our Faculty and Staff
 |
Fatemeh Keshavarz Fatemeh Keshavarz, born and raised in the city of Shiraz, completed her studies in Shiraz University, and University of London. She taught at Washington University in St. Louis for over twenty years where she chaired the Dept. of Asian and Near Eastern Languages and Literatures from 2004 to 2011. In 2012, Keshavarz joined the University of Maryland as the Roshan Institute Chair in Persian Language and Literature, and Director of the Roshan Institute Center for Persian Studies. Keshavarz is author of award winning books including Reading Mystical Lyric: the Case of Jalal al-Din Rumi (USC Press,1998), Recite in the Name of the Red Rose (USC Press, 2006) and a book of literary analysis and social commentary titled Jasmine and Stars: Reading more than Lolita in Tehran (UNC Press, 2007). She has also published other books and numerous journal articles. Keshavarz is a published poet in Persian and English and an activist for peace and justice. She was invited to speak at the UN General Assembly on the significance of cultural education. Her NPR show “The ecstatic faith of Rumi” brought her the Peabody Award in 2008. In the same year, she received the “Herschel Walker Peace and Justice Award.” |
 |
Ahmet T. Karamustafa Ahmet T. Karamustafa is Professor of History at the University of Maryland, and the Academic Development Officer at the Roshan Center for Persian Studies. His expertise is in social and intellectual history of medieval and early modern Islam in the Middle East and Southwest Asia as well as in theory and method in the study of religion. His monographs include God’s Unruly Friends (Univ. of Utah Press, 1994) a book on ascetic movements in medieval Islam and Sufism: The Formative Period a comprehensive historical overview of early Islamic mysticism published simultaneously by Edinburgh Univ. Press & Univ. of California Press, 2007. He served as an editor for, and wrote several articles in, Cartography in the Traditional Islamic and South Asian Societies (Univ. of Chicago Press, 1992). His current book projects include The Flowering of Sufism as well as Vernacular Islam: Everyday Religious Life in Medieval Iran and Anatolia (11th-15th Centuries). Professor Karamustafa has held several administrative positions including the directorship of the Religious Studies Program at Washington University in St. Louis. He was the co-chair of the Study of Islam Section at the American Academy of Religion, 2008 -2011. |
 |
Ahmad Karimi-Hakkak For 19 years Ahmad Karimi-Hakkak was professor of Persian language and literature and Iranian culture and civilization at the University of Washington. He has studied in Iran and the United States, receiving his Ph.D. in comparative literature from Rutgers University in 1979, and has taught English and comparative literature and translation studies, as well as classical and modern Persian literature at the University of Tehran, Rutgers University, Columbia University, and the University of Texas. Professor Karimi-Hakkak is the author of 19 books and over 100 major scholarly articles. He has contributed articles on Iran and Persian literature to many reference works, including The Encyclopedia Britannica, The Encyclopaedia Iranica, and The Encyclopedia of Translation Studies. His works have been translated into French, Dutch, Spanish, Russian, Greek, Arabic, Japanese, and Persian. He has won numerous awards and honors, and has served as president of the International Society for Iranian Studies and several other professional academic organizations. Ahmad Karimi-Hakkak is married and has two sons, Kusha Karimi and Kia Karimi. |
 |
Ali Abasi Ali R. Abasi is an assistant professor of Persian as an additional language and his primary research interest is second language writing. Some of his most recent publications have appeared in the Journal of Second Language Writing, Journal of Language and Politics, English for Specific Purposes, and Journal of English for Academic Purposes. |
 |
Naz Beyranvand Naz Beyranvand is the Executive Assistant and Coordinator for the Roshan Center for Persian Studies. She earned her Masters of Professional Studies in Persian at the University of Maryland in 2012, the same institution in which she had earned her Bachelors of Arts degree as a double major in Broadcast Journalism and Persian Studies. Naz was among the first class to graduate from the Persian Flagship program and an active member in the Iranian Student Foundation for 4 years. She is fluent in English, Persian and Spanish. |
 |
Safoura Nourbakhsh Safoura Nourbakhsh was born and raised in Iran, Tehran. After receiving her BA and MA in English Literature from San Francisco State University, she returned to Iran in 1992 and taught English literature courses at Allameh University from 1997-2003. Her interest in feminist theory and women’s right also prompted her involvement with Zanan magazine as a writer and an occasional consultant. Her Persian translation of Virginia Woolf’s A Room of It’s Own (2004, Niloofar Publishing) is the first published translation of the book.
Safoura started her PhD degree in women’s studies at University of Maryland in the Fall of 2005. While working on her PhD she also became the managing editor of Sufi (a biannual journal of mystical philosophy and practice). Later she helped plan design, and execute Zannegaar (an online journal of women’s studies) and acted as it’s project manager and editor for the first four issues. |
3215 Jiménez Hall College Park, MD 20742
persianstudies@umd.edu