Occupation
Assistant Professor
Contact
ABOUT
My area of expertise is the relationship between China and Iran, with a background in modern Iranian history, modern Chinese history, and the Cold War. More broadly, I am interested in the relationship between leftist politics and political Islam, the spread of ideas across regions, and connections between Asia and the Middle East. Recent scholarship on Sino-Iranian relations tends to focus primarily on national security issues and relations post-1979 and is less focused on historical contact and the impact of ideology. My dissertation is a historical survey of Sino-Iranian relations from the early 1900s to the Islamic Republic's foundation, with a focus on the impact of Maoist politics on the Iranian left. My research shows that both Iranian and Chinese intellectuals were aware of and inspired by one another's political movements, culminating in a series of robust, unofficial connections between Iranian Communist organizations and the Chinese Communist Party. Maoism, for a brief moment, became the dominant ideological position of leftist Iranian student activists in Europe and the United States and left an unmistakable mark on the rhetoric, ideology, and tactics of opposition groups of all stripes, both inside Iran and abroad.
Discipline
History
Sub Areas
19th-21st Centuries
Foreign Relations
Iranian Studies
Middle East/Near East Studies
Transnationalism
World History
Geographic Areas of Interest
Iran
China
Specialties
Global Cold War History
Sino-Persian Relations
Maoism In Iran And The History Of The Iranian Left
Languages
Chinese (advanced)
Persian (advanced)
Education
PhD
| 2020
| History
| University of Pennsylvania
MA
| 2013
| East Asian Languages and Cultures
| University of Pennsylvania
BA
| 2010
| Anthropology, Asian Studies
| Rice University
Abstracts
China and the Iranian Left: Transnational Networks of Social, Cultural, and Ideological Exchange, 1949-1979
Socialist Solidarity and Anti-Communism in Sino-Iranian Relations, 1949-1959
Heritage Diplomacy and Patriotic Internationalism: Afghan Historian Ahmad Ali Kohzad’s 1958 Visit to China
