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Hussam R. Ahmed

Assistant Professor – The Middle East; social and cultural history

• B.Sc. (The American University in Cairo), M.A. (McGill), Ph.D. (McGill)
• Email Hussam R. Ahmed

I am a social and cultural historian of the modern Middle East. My work explores how ideas and institutions shaped modern Arab societies, particularly through education, cultural production, and the press. I earned my Ph.D. in History at McGill University and held postdoctoral fellowships at KU Leuven and the University of Cambridge. Before joining �Ӱ�ԭ�� University, I taught Middle East History at the National University of Ireland, Maynooth. My research has received generous support from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada (SSHRC) and the Fonds de recherche du Québec – Société et culture (FRQSC). For outstanding teaching I was recognized as a “Teaching Hero” in 2021 by the Irish National Forum for the Enhancement of Teaching and Learning in collaboration with the Union of Students in Ireland.

My first book, The Last Nahdawi: Taha Hussein and Institution Building in Egypt (Stanford University Press) was released in 2021, and in 2023 the Arabic translation of the book was published by Kalima, the translation arm of the Department of Culture in Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates. The book examines the efforts of Taha Hussein (1889-1973), one of the most influential thinkers and statesmen of the modern Arab world, in formulating and implementing Egypt’s cultural and educational policies within a challenging colonial context. The book offers both a history of modern state formation, revealing how the Egyptian state came to hold such a strong grip over culture and education, and a compelling examination of the life and work of one of the most iconic figures in modern Arab history. By exploring achievements in culture and education, such as introducing free education, opening Egyptian universities to women, and resisting French colonial policies in North Africa, the book situates modern Egypt’s cultural influence in the Arab-Islamic world within the structural changes and political processes of the parliamentary period (1922-1952).

Reviews of The Last Nahdawi have been overwhelmingly positive in scholarly and public forums, including the Times Literary Supplement, Ahram Weekly, Akhbar al-Adab, Jadaliyya, Qantara, International Journal of Middle East Studies, and The Journal of North African Studies, among others.

My current research project examines the history of journalism and the university, focusing on the impact of cultural bureaucracies on intellectual production. Using Egypt under Gamal Abdel Nasser (1954–1970) as a case study, this research explores how state cultural policies shaped the circulation of ideas and the autonomy of knowledge institutions in the postcolonial era.

At �Ӱ�ԭ��, I teach courses on Middle Eastern history, anti-colonial movements, Arab intellectual traditions, and global South perspectives. Recent offerings include: Anti-Colonial Resistance in the Modern Middle East; History of the Modern Middle East; History of Modern Egypt, Self-Determination and Diplomacy in the Post-Ottoman Middle East; Arab Intellectual History; History of the Global South, 1850 to the Present; and Readings in Modern Arab Memoirs. I have taught other courses such as: Historiography and Handling Evidence; History of the Ottoman Empire, and Globalization.

Graduate Supervision: 

19^th and 20^th-centuries Middle East.

Selected Publications:

2020    Porous Boundaries: The “Local” and the “Foreign” in Cairo’s Vibrant Francophone Cultural Scene (1919-1939): 117-138. In Cultural Entanglement in the Pre-Independence Arab World: Arts, Thought and Literature, eds. Anthony Gorman and Sarah Irving. London: I.B. Tauris.

2018    “The Nahda in Parliament: Taha Husayn’s Career Building Knowledge Production Institutions, 1922-1952.” Arab Studies Journal 16, no. 1 (2018): 8-32.

2018    “Egyptian Cultural Expansionism: Taha Hussein Confronts the French in North Africa, 1950-1952.” Die Welt des Islams 58, no. 4 (2018): 409-441.

Selected Interviews:

2022    New Texts Out Now: “The Last Nahdawi: Taha Hussein and Institution Building in Egypt,” by Hussam R. Ahmed, Jadaliyya,

2019    Reflections on Egypt, the Middle East, and History: “Taha Hussein, Intellectual and Astute Politician,” by Hussam R. Ahmed, (in Arabic)

2018    New Texts Out Now: “The Nahda in Parliament,” by Hussam R. Ahmed, Jadaliyya,