Education

• Ph.D. Department of Middle Eastern, South Asian, and African Studies, Columbia University
• J.D. in International Law, Human Rights, and Litigation, American University
• B.A. in History, Emory University

Research Interests

Middle East Studies, Theories and Histories of Nationalism, Minorities in the Middle East, Political Theology, Visual and Cultural Materiality of Sh'ism, Laws of Islamic Warfare, and Revolutions

Bio

Neda Bolourchi is Associate Director of the Center for Middle Eastern Studies and Post-Doctoral Assistant Professor of Middle Eastern Studies at Rutgers University-New Brunswick. Her research examines the transformative discourse on Iran as sacred during the twentieth century across the political and religious spectra. She is deeply engaged in archival theory and methodology as she works on a book manuscript as well as an oral history project, based on her dissertation (Columbia University 2017). Her research travels include years in Iran, Syria, and Armenia. Her research has been supported by several Andrew W. Mellon Foundation fellowships, among others.

Her peer reviewed work on religion, politics, legal systems, and the modern Middle East has appeared in edited volumes as well as the Journal of the American Academy of Religion, the Iranian Studies Journal, and Religion and Contemporary Politics. Forthcoming are research articles on Iranian-Jewish participation in the Iran-Iraq War as well as Quranic versus contemporary concepts of feda' and fedayeen.

In addition, her work as appeared in a variety of Jane's publications, Congressional Quarterly's Political Handbook of the World, Praeger Security International, and the Atlantic Council's Iran Source. She has provided analysis to the BBC, al-Jazeera, al-Arabiya, and Indus News, among others.

Recent works include the following:

“Seeing Red, Hearing the Revolution” in Losing Our Minds, Coming to Our Senses (2021) Leiden University Press

"Are All of Afghanistan's Women Potential Refugees?" University of Chicago Law School, Entitled podcast, 2021 August 27

"Forecasting Raisi's Reign in Iran" New Lines Institute podcast, 2021 June 30