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Mohammad Salama
George Mason University
Occupation
Professor
Contact
Secondary Email: [email protected]
George Mason University
Department of Modern and Classical Languages/ 5100 Horizon Hall MSN 3E5
Fairfax VA 22030
United States
ABOUT
Professor of Arabic and Associate Dean for Faculty Affairs in the College of Humanities and Social Sciences at George Mason University. I previously served as Chair of the Department of Modern and Classical Languages at George Mason University and spent a number of years as Chair of the Department of Modern Languages and Literatures at San Francisco State University. My academic journey began in Cairo, where I studied classical, pre-Modern, and modern Arabic literature at ‘Ayn Shams University. I later earned my PhD in Comparative Literature from the University of Wisconsin-Madison. Born in Alexandria, Egypt, I've been fortunate to travel widely across the Middle East, Europe, and North America, experiences that have shaped my understanding of cultural and intellectual traditions. My research interests are centered on Qur'anic Studies, postcolonial Arabic literary theory, and the history and culture of the modern Arab-Islamic world. I also have a deep interest in colonial and postcolonial studies, as well as French and Egyptian cinemas. I've been honored to receive two Fulbright Scholar Awards, opportunities that allowed me to further my research and share my work in different cultural contexts. My work has appeared in a range of scholarly journals, such as der Islam, SCTIW Review, Journal of Arabic Literature, Arabic Studies Journal, Journal of Comparative Poetics, the American Historical Review, and Boundary 2. Among my recent publications is God's Other Book: The Qur'an between History and Ideology (University of California Press, 2024). Additionally, I coauthored "A Bridge Too Far? Ludovico Marracci’s Translation of the Qurʾan and the Persistence of Medieval Biblicism" (Boundary 2, 2023) with Christopher Livanos. Other less recent publications include The Qur’an and Modern Arabic Literary Criticism (Bloomsbury, 2018), and Islam and the Culture of Modern Egypt (Cambridge UP, 2018).
Discipline
Literature
Sub Areas
19th-21st Centuries
7th-13th Centuries
Arab Studies
Arabic
Cinema/Film
Classical
Comparative
Islamic Studies
Geographic Areas of Interest
Egypt
Islamic World
Mediterranean Countries
Arabian Peninsula
Europe
Specialties
Mod Arabic Lit
Classical Arabic
Quranic Studies
Languages
Arabic (native)
English (native)
French (advanced)
Education
PhD | 2005 | Comp Lit | U of Wisconsin, Madison
Abstracts
Islam and the Construction of National Identity in Ahmad Shawqi The Revolt of Islam: Imagining the ‘Umma in ‘Al? A?mad B?k?th?r’s al-Th?’r al-A?mar [The Red Revolutionary] Criticism between the Sacred and the Profane: Qur'anic Exegesis in Muhammad Ahmad Khalafallah Performing Loss: Tawfiq al-Hakim’s Ahl al-Kahf (The People of the Cave) Reclaiming Quranic Exegesis: Amīn al-Khūlī and the New Methods of Tafsīr A Revolutionary Woman Exegete: Bint al-Sh??i?’s Literary Approach to Quranic Exegesis Intimations of Divine Love: The Qur’an and the Poetics of Sufism What is 'Late Antiquity' and What Does the Qur'an Have to Do with It? The Black Warrior: 'Antara ibn Shaddad and the Pre-Islamic Roots of Qur'anic Insights on Race and Identity