Sixth Biennial Conference of Iranian Studies

Listed alphabetically by surname

Eskandar Abadi was trained at the Faculty of Law and Political Science of the University of Tehran.  In the 1980s he continued his studies in Linguistics and Political Studies at the Universities of Frankfurt and Marburg. In 1997 he obtained a PhD in General and Germanic Linguistics with a thesis on auctoriality and narrative perspective in Thomas Mann's novel Der Zauberberg. His publications include a monograph on the Wolfgang Bergsdorf's concept of power and language (Marburg 1985) and a revised version of his doctoral thesis with the title Erzaehlerprofil und Erzaehltechnik im Roman 'Der Zauberberg' - Eine Untersuchung zu Auktorialitaet und Perspektive bei Thomas Mann (1998). Besides being an academic, Eskandar Abadi is also a accomplished satirist, fiction writer for children, singer and violinist with over a dozen literary and musical publications to his name. He is currently an editor of the Persian Radio Service 'Deutsche Welle' in Bonn, Germany.

Hossein Abadian was born in 1962 in Lar, Iran. He is Associate Professor at the Department of History at Qazvin International University. He received his PhD from Shahid Beheshti University (Tehran) in June 2004. His thesis deals with the Iranian Constitutional Revolution. Also he earned his BA in Iranian history (1988) and his MA on the Iranian Constitutional Revolution from the same University (1991). His research interests deal with Iranian intellectualism, political Shiism and the history of political parties in Iran (1906-1979). Some of his publications are: Iran from the Collapse of Constitutionalism to the Coup of 1921 (2006); The Crisis of Constitutionalism in Iran (1906-1911) (2004); The Biography of Dr Mozaffar Baqa'i (1998); Theoretical Principles of Constitutional and Legitimate Governments (1995); 'Armenians and the Iranian Constitutional Revolution' in Iranian Studies(2005); 'Iranian Intellectuals and the Possibility of Dialogue with West' in Report on Dialogue (2004); 'Toilers Party and the Islamic Revolution' in Historical Studies (2003); 'Taqizadeh, Kaveh newspaper and the Possibility of Renewal of Iran' in Iran Nameh (2003).

Firuza I Abdullaeva is Lecturer in Persian Literature, Faculty of Oriental Studies, University of Oxford, Fellow of Wadham College and the Keeper of the Persian special collection of the Wadham College library. She holds a PhD in Iranian Philology, St Petersburg University, 1989; BA, MA in Iranian Languages, Literature and Art, 1983 (Honours), Faculty of Oriental Studies, St Petersburg University. She has held various positions in the past including: Associate Professor in Persian language and literature, Department of Iranian Philology, Faculty of Oriental Studies, St Petersburg University (1995–2005), Senior Research Associate, British Academy Shahnama Project, Faculty of Oriental Studies, University of Cambridge, UK (2002- 2004), Assistant Professor in Persian, St Petersburg State University (1989–1995), Lecturer in Persian language and literature, St Petersburg State University (1985–1989). Dr Abdullaeva was also Fulbright visiting professor, Middle Eastern Department, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor (2001), and is member of the historical school, Institute for Advanced Study, Princeton (2002). Her research interests include Persian language and literature (classical and modern); Persian codicology and Book Art; Persian Sufi poetry; courtly patronage of the belles-lettres in medieval Iran, early Persian Qur'anic exegesis. Her publications include: Modern Persian Poets on the Banks of the Neva (1999); The Courtly Life of a Poet: Farrukhi from Sistan (2000); Early Persian Exegesis (2000); Commentary on the Qur'an (An 11th Century Lahore Manuscript) (2001); Persian Classical Poetry (10-11th Centuries CE) (2002); 'A Turkish Prose Version of Firdawsi's Shahnama in the Manuscript Collection of the St.Petersburg University  Library' in Manuscripta Orientalia (1997).

Siavash Abghari earned his PhD at the University of Georgia, and is now an Associate Professor of Finance and Chair of Business Administration at Morehouse College, Atlanta, Georgia. He is the Chairman of the Department of Business Administration at Morehouse College as well as the Coordinator and Director of the Banking and Finance program there. He worked in Iran for several years as the head of the Department of Urban Co-opertatives for the Ministry of Land Reforms.  His publications have appeared in the Journal of Third World Studies, the Journal of Accounting and Finance Research, the Iranian Journal of Culture and Politics, the Journal of East West Studies, and the Asian Economic Review as well as in numerous proceedings and several books

Fariba Adelkhah received her MPh (sociology) from the University of Strasbourg and her PhD from the Ecole des Hautes Etudes en Sciences Sociales (EHESS), Paris (1989). She is currently Research Fellow at the Centre d' Etudes et de Recherches Internationales/Fondation Nationale des Sciences Politiques in Paris. Dr Adelkhah is the author of La revolution sous le voile. Femmes islamiques d'Iran (1991); Etre moderne en Iran (1998) and numerous articles. She has co-authored Thermidor en Iran (1993); and co-edited Ramadan et politique (2000) and L'Iran (2005). She has produced Bons baisers de Damas, a film video (2004). Her research focuses on the political anthropology of Iranian society and Islamic modernity. She is member of the editorial board of Iranian Studies and Revue des mondes musulmans et de la Mediterranee.

Janet Afary is an Associate Professor of History and Women's Studies at Purdue University, Indiana. She received her MA from Tehran University and her PhD in Modern Middle East History from the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor. She is the author of The Iranian Constitutional Revolution: Grassroots Democracy, Social Democracy, and the Origins of Feminism(1996), which was also translated and published in Iran in 2000 and co-author of Foucault and the Iranian Revolution: Gender and the Seductions of Islamism (2005). Dr. Afary was awarded year-long fellowships from the National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH) and the American Council for Learned Societies (ACLS). She has co-edited three volumes and published numerous articles, many of which have also been translated or reprinted in the Republic of Azerbaijan, the Czech Republic, Iran, Japan, Spain, the Netherlands, France, and Britain. Dr. Afary is the current President of the International Society for Iranian Studies (2004-2006) and the former president of the Coordinating Council for Women in History of the American Historical Association, and the Association for Middle East Women's Studies.

Wali Ahmadi received his PhD in Persian and Comparative Literature from UCLA in 1997. He is an Assistant Professor of Persian Literature, University of California, Berkeley (2000-present) and his research interests deal with modern literature, literary theory and history, Afghanistan and Iran. Some of his publications are: Anomalous Visions: History and Form in the Modern Literature of Afghanistan (forthcoming); The Barren Sky of Hope: Contemporary Persian Poetry in English Translation (in process); 'Dar har jang, haqiqat nakhostin qorbani ast' in Zarnegar (2003); 'Annemarie Schimmel dargozasht' in Zarnegar (2003); 'After September 11: The Faculty Reflects' in California Monthly (2001); 'Baz-khwanesh-e mafhum-e trazhedi dar Arastu va Nicheh' in Critique & Vision (2000-2001); 'Karavis: az hoqqeh ta haqiqat' in Zarnegar (2001).

Nozhat Ahmady is Assistant Professor at the Department of History at al-Zahra University (Tehran). She holds a PhD in Iranian History from al-Zahra University (2001) as well as a BA in History from Isfahan University (1990) and an MA from al-Zahra University (1994). Dr Ahmady is a member of the Women Association of History Researchers NGO, and head of its branch in Isfahan. Some of her publications are: 'Tashayyo' va vaqf dar dowreh-ye safavi' in Majalleh-ye  elmi-ye pazhuhesh-e daneshkadeh-ye adabiyat va olum-e  ensani-ye  daneshgah-e Esfahan (2005); 'Zanan-e vaqf dar paytakht-e safavi', in Majmu'eh-ye maqalat-e hemayesh-e Esfahan va safavieh (2001).

Mahdi Ahouie is currently a PhD candidate in International Relations at the Graduate Institute of International Studies (IUHEI) - University of Geneva, Switzerland. He has received his Master's degree from the University of Geneva in 2003 specialising in international history and politics. He previously studied at the School of International Relations in Tehran. Before moving to Switzerland, he worked as a research assistant at the Institute for Political and International Studies (IPIS), the think tank of the Iranian Ministry of Foreign Affairs, and at the Institute for Iranian Contemporary Historical Studies. He is currently writing his doctoral dissertation on the cultural origins of Iranian foreign policy towards Israel. He has also worked as a research fellow at the International Centre for Geopolitical Studies (ICGS) in Geneva and has been a lecturer at the ICGS Summer University Course on 'Geopolitics and International Relations' held for a selected group of diplomats, businessmen, and post-graduate students in 2005 and 2006. His main fields of interest relate Iran's foreign policy prior to and after the Islamic Revolution, Middle East geopolitics and contemporary history, Islamic fundamentalism and reformism, democratisation and development in the Middle East. Amongst his publications are Iran's Policy towards the Middle East Peace Process: Evolutions and Consequences (2003), 'Peace Process in the Perspective of Revolutionary Iran: Will Tehran Ever Take Part?' in MIT Iran Analysis Quarterly (2004), and The New Geopolitics of the Middle East and Iran-Israel Relations (2006).

Amir Ismail Ajami is currently the Associate Director of International Agriculture Programs at the University of Arizona, where he is also an Adjunct Professor in the Department of Near Eastern Studies. He received his MA in Sociology from Tehran University and his PhD in Rural Sociology from Cornell University. Previously he was an Associate Professor and Associate Dean, College of Arts and Sciences, Pahlavi University, Shiraz, Iran and Director of the Rural Research Centre, Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development in Iran. In addition, Ajami has worked as Development Officer in the Department of Economics and Social Affairs in the United Nations Secretariat, New York, with the Johns Hopkins Population Center as a Research Scientist and at the Duke University Center for Demographic Studies as a Visiting Scholar. His research interests include peasant studies, agrarian reform, rural stratification, and social change. Some selected publications include: 'Social Class, Family Demographic Characteristics, and Mobility in Three Iranian Villages' in Sociologia Ruralis (1969); Shesh-dangi: A Study in Rural Sociology (in Persian) (1969); Land Reform and Modernization of the Farming Structure in Iran (1973); 'Differential Fertility in Peasant Communities' in Population Studies (1976); 'Co-operatives' in Encyclopaedia Iranica (1993); 'From Peasant to Farmer: A Study of Agrarian Transformation in an Iranian Village 1967-2002' in International Journal of Middle East Studies (2005).

Cyrus Alai was born in Iran and received his PhD degree (Dr.-Ing.) from the Technische Universitaet, Berlin-Charlottenburg. He completed the Executive Controls Program -- a management course -- at the University of Syracuse, USA, and lectured at the University of Tehran for eight years. Dr Alai founded a group of engineering companies in Iran, which he directed for twenty years. He settled later in the United Kingdom, working as a consulting engineer and studying the history of cartography in his free time. He served nine years as the honorary treasurer of the International Map Collector's Society and wrote numerous articles on the cartography of Persia and the traditional cartography of classical Islamic societies. His articles (in English and Persian) appeared in several prestigious cartographic and cultural periodicals, such as:  Map Collector, IMCoS Journal, Mercator's World, Portolan, Journal of the Iran Society, Iranshenasi (Persian), etc. The entry 'Geography iv, Cartography of Persia' in the Encyclopaedia Iranica, has been written by him. He also collects old maps of Persia and owns perhaps the largest personal collection of such maps. Dr Alai has recognised that Persia has been mapped extensively for centuries but the absence of a good carto-bibliography has often deterred scholars from making use of such maps. Therefore, he embarked on a lengthy investigation into the old maps of Persia and visited major map collections and libraries in many countries, producing General Maps of Persia, 1477-1925 (2005).

Nozar Alaolmolki is a Professor and Chair of the Department of Political Science at Hiram College. He received his PhD in Political Science at Miami University. His areas of expertise are international relations, comparative politics and political economy. He served as a Fulbright teaching scholar in Kyrgyzstan and Kazakhstan in 1995 for seven months. He was a recipient of a 3-year grant that took him and a number of his colleagues from Cleveland State University to Kyrgyzstan for the development of academic program at the Osh State University. He is an associate member of the Center for the Middle Eastern Studies at the University of Chicago. His current research interests include regional cooperation organisations, and he is finishing a book manuscript on Militant Islamists. Among his publications are: Life after the Soviet Union: the newly independent republics of Transcaucasus and Central Asia (2001); The Persian Gulf region in the twenty first century: stability and change (1996); Struggle for dominance in the Persian Gulf: past, present, and future prospects (1991).

Elizabeth Alexandrin submitted her PhD dissertation, entitled 'The “Sphere of Walayah”: Isma'ili Ta'wil in Practice according to al-Mu'ayyad (d 1078 CE)', at the Institute of Islamic Studies, McGill University in April 2006.  She has worked as a research assistant in the Department of Jewish Studies and as a lecturer in the Faculty of Religious Studies, McGill University, before joining the Department of Religion at the University of Manitoba in a tenure-track post in Islamic Studies this year.  Her recent scholarly contributions grapple with a wide range of issues in medieval Islamic philosophy and mysticism, as reflected in her publications: 'The Sciences of Intuition and the Riches of Inspiration: Najm al-Din Kubra in Jami's Nafahat al-uns' in B. T. Lawson ed. Reason and Inspiration (2005); 'Éléments de bibliographie sur Nasir al-Din Tusi' in Z. Vesel and N. Pourjavadi eds. Nasir al-Din al-Tusi: Philosophe et savant du XIIIe siècle  (2000); and 'Razi and His Mediaeval Opponents: Discussions concerning Tanasukh and the Afterlife' in Cahiers de Studia Iranica (2002).

Tariq Ali was born and grew up in Lahore, now part of Pakistan. While studying at the Punjab University, he organised demonstrations against Pakistan's military dictatorship. His parents sent him to England to study at Oxford, because they feared for his safety due to his connections to radical movements. There he quickly became a leader and a distinguished spokesman for anti-imperialism. His extensive knowledge of history and his dedication to the ideals of the Enlightenment made him a popular figure in the radical circles of the 1960s and early 1970s. His reputation began to grow during the Vietnam War, when he engaged in debates against the war with such figures as Henry Kissinger and Michael Stewart. During the 1980s and early 1990s he set up an independent film company producing a wide range of documentaries on politics, culture and cinema, including a trilogy on three philosophers: Spinoza, Locke and Wittgenstein.  After 9/11 he became increasingly critical of American and Israeli foreign policies, and emerged as a leading critic of American foreign policy across the globe. He was also a vigorous opponent of American relations with Pakistan that tended to back military dictatorships over democracy. His book Bush in Babylon attacks the invasion of Iraq by American president George W. Bush. The book has a unique style, using poetry and critical essays in portraying the War in Iraq as a failure. His previous book, Clash of Fundamentalisms, puts the events of the September 11 attacks in historical perspective, covering the history of Islam from its foundations. Since 1991 he has been working on a set of historical novels that have become known as 'The Islam Quintet': Shadows of the Pomegranate Tree (1992); The Book of Saladin (1998); The Stone Woman (2000) and A Sultan in Palermo (2005). Other recent publications include Pirates of the Caribbean: Axis of Hope (2006); Rough Music (2005); Speaking of Empire and Resistance: Conversations with Tariq Ali  with D. Barsamian (2005); Street-Fighting Years: An Autobiography of the Sixties (New ed. 2005); Conversations with Edward Said (2005); Bush in Babylon (2003). His novels have been published in dozens of languages including, most recently, Persian.

Christine Allison (BA Oxford, PhD SOAS) is tenured lecturer in Kurdish at the Institut National des Langues et Civilisations Orientales (INALCO), Paris.  Her research interests are: orality and literacy in the Near and Middle East, oral literatures, memory studies, Kurdish literature and culture,  in particular the Kurdish minority religions such as Yezidism.  She is a member of the CNRS/INALCO/EPHE/Paris III research team 'Mondes Iranien et Indien'. Her publications include The Yezidi Oral Tradition in Iraqi Kurdistan (2001); ed. with Ph. Kreyenbroek Kurdish Culture and Identity (1996).

Mehrdad Amanat was born in Tehran. He received a BS in Civil Engineering (1976), an MA in Islamic Studies (1979) and a PhD in History (2006), all at UCLA. His publications include: 'Prelude to Exile: Nationalism and Social Change in Contemporary Iran' in R. Kelleyed ed.  Irangeles:  Iranians in Los Angeles (1998); 'Zurkhaneh' in J. L Esposito ed. Oxford Encyclopaedia of the Modern Islamic World (1995); with Nikkie Keddie 'Iran Under the Later Qajars, 1848-1922' in  P. Avery, G. Hambly and C. Melville eds The Cambridge History of Iran, vol. 7 (1991).

Camron Michael Amin received his PhD from the Department of Near Eastern Languages and Civilizations, University of Chicago in 1996. He is Associate Professor of History at the University of Michigan-Dearborn. He is the author of The Making of the Modern Iranian Woman: Gender, State Policy and Popular Culture, 1865-1946 (2002) and a co-editor of The Modern Middle East: A Sourcebook for History (2006).

Fariba Amini received her BA from George Mason University in Sociology and her MA in History from the Ecole des Hautes Etudes en Science Sociales in Paris.  She also holds a certificate of Business Administration from Georgetown University. Fariba Amini has been a long time human rights activist in the Washington DC area.  She was instrumental in the formation of the Alliance for Defense of Human Rights in Iran and was the editor of its bi-weekly newsletter.  She is also active in the American Iranian community in the Washington DC area and organised the Iranian American Volunteer Association which held a successful fundraising event for Bam earthquake victims.  She has written extensively on the issues of politics, culture and human rights in Iran on the website Iranian.com and has done over 40 interviews with well-known political figures including former American diplomats in Iran.  Her articles are posted on several other websites as well.  She is currently editing the biography of her father, Nosratollah Amini, who was the former mayor of Tehran and Prime Minister Mohammad Mosaddeq's personal attorney. Her publications include Letters from Ahmad Abad (2004), Mosaddeq's personal letters to Nosratollah Amini while exiled in Ahmad Abad.  Ms Amini is currently the President of the Foundation for Educational Progress, a non-profit organistion that attempts to send educational materials to Afghanistan, Iran, and other Persian-speaking countries.

Hooshang Amirahmadi holds a PhD in planning and international development from Cornell University and is a professor of planning and public policy at Rutgers, the State University of New Jersey.  He is also director of the University's Center for Middle Eastern Studies. Professor Amirahmadi has served as chair and graduate director of his department at the Bloustein School of Planning and Public Policy and as the University Coordinator of the Hubert Humphrey Fellowship Program. He is founder and president of the American Iranian Council, a research and policy think tank devoted to improving dialogue and understanding between the peoples of Iran and America. Dr Amirahmadi is also a founder of the Center for Iranian Research and Analysis and served as its director for many years. He is the author of Revolution and Economic Transition: The Iranian Experience (1990), and three other books in Persian on civil society, industrial policy, and geopolitics of energy. Dr Amirahmadi has edited of ten books on Iran and the Greater Middle East, and 16 conference proceedings on US-Iran relations. His edited books include The Caspian Region at a Crossroad: A New Frontier of Energy and Development (2000); Small Islands, Big Politics: The Tomb and Abu Musa Islands in the Persian Gulf (1996); The United States and the Middle East: A Search for New Perspectives (1993); Post-Revolutionary Iran; Iran and the Arab World (1988); and Reconstruction and Regional Diplomacy in the Persian Gulf (1992). Dr Amirahmadi's writings have been translated and published in Europe, Iran, and the Arab world. 

Raisa I Amirbekyan received her BA from the Fine Arts Education Faculty, the Armenian State Kh. Abovyan Pedagogical Institute,1969; her MA in Art History from E. Repin Institute of Russian Academy of Arts, St Petersburg, and her doctoral degree in Art History from the State Institute of Fine Arts Research, Moscow, Russia (1988). Her dissertation is titled '18th Century Kashmiri Miniature Painting: Illustrative Cycles of Sufi Codices'.  During 1977-2000 she was a senior research fellow at Mashtots Institute of Ancient Manuscripts (Matenadaran), Yerevan, Armenia. Since 2003 she has been an associate professor at the Armenian State University, Department of Iranology, Yerevan, Armenia. Her research interests focus on cultural-historical and ethnographical aspects of Iranian peoples and specificity of the contact zones (Armenian-Iranian, Armenian-Iranian-Kurdish, Talish-Iranian-Azerbaijanian, and Bukhara Jews-Iranian-Uzbekistanian), Qajar and Safavid miniature painting; Persian diplomatica, calligraphy and ornamentation, Byzantine and Armenian miniature painting, Coptic textiles design. Her publications include Golshan-e Afghan Ali Akbar Oraqzai with V.V. Kushev (in Russian) (forthcoming); 'The Culture and Arts of Talish People' in Talish People History (in Russian) (2006); Sufism as Reflected in Safavid Art (forthcoming).

Masserat Amir-Ebrahimi received her MA in Urban Sociology in 1986 and her PhD in Human, Economic and Regional Geography in 1999) from the Universite de Paris X – Nanterre. Since her return to Tehran in 1986 she has worked extensively with different municipal and urban organistions on several projects related to Tehran, especially in the very populated areas in the south of Tehran. From 2001-2005 she was the executive and scientific coordinator of the Atlas of Tehran Metropolis (Published in 2005 in Tehran by TGIC in three languages), a collaborative project between the Tehran Geographical Information Centre (TGIC- Municipality of Tehran) and 'Le Monde Iranian' CNRS in Paris, where she is an associate researcher. She lectured in the Environment Department of the University of Tehran from 2001-2003. She was also the initiator and coordinating member of the 'Public Spaces in Iran' project, an International collaborative grant (Reconceptualizing Public Spheres in the Middle East & North Africa) between 2002-2004 for SSRC (Social Science Research Council – New York). For 2006-2007 she will be the Nikki Keddie-Balzan Fellow at UCLA, in the Departments of Sociology and Geography. Currently she is conducting new research on gender and public spaces in Iran, and continues her studies on the emergence of new public spheres and the impact of weblog writing on the daily lives of women and youth in Tehran. She has published more than 30 articles in Persian, French, English, Italian, and German. Her recent articles are 'La jeunesse iranienne dans le miroir du blog' Cahiers de L'Orient (2005); 'I giovani alla ricerca dello spazio perduto' with Z. Jalali-Naini in Limes: l'Iran tra maschera e volto'(2005); and Atlas of Tehran Metropolis, a book co-authored with B. Hourcade, S.M. Habibi, and Sh. Zarrin (2005).

Mahshid Amirshahi occupies a place of choice in the gallery of Iranian authors. She started her career early in life and was soon hailed by art critics for her precocious talent as well as the high quality of her writings. Her refined prose, which became more and more sophisticated from book to book, promoted her to one of the most prominent figures of contemporary Persian literature. Her force of character and artistic rigour have kept her from following the literary or political fashions that every now and again shake and shape the intelligentsia of Iran. Her ties with literature and politics remind one of those of Andre Gide. As devoted as the latter to creating literature of great value, she does not hesitate to intervene in crucial public issues. At the dawn of the revolution that brought Khomeini to power, Mahshid Amirshahi's deep respect for human dignity, so palpable in her writings, made her take publicly position against the effervescence of fundamentalism and fend for the slender chance of a secular democracy with all her might. This standpoint forced her into exile, where she kept on writing her novels as well as fighting against Islamism. Her publications include The Blind Alley (1966), Bibi Khanom's Starling (1968), After the Last Day (1969), First Person Singular (1970), An Anthology of Short Stories (1972), At Home (1987), Away (1995), Short Stories (1998), Abbas Khan's Wedding (1998), Dadeh Good Omen (1999), Miscellaneous (2000), Shahrbanoo's Honey Moon (2001).

Amir Mohammad Amirtash was born in 1937 in Mashhad, Iran. He graduated from ENSPS (Paris- France) in 1964 (BSc in Physical Education). He received an MA in Psychology from Tehran University in 1967, an MSc in PE from the University of Oregon, Eugene -- USA (1980) and a PhD in Administration in PE from the University of Oregon, Eugene (1982). Currently, he is Associate Professor at the Tarbiat-e Mo'allem University in Tehran, Iran. Dr Amirtash is the founder of Team Handball in Iran. He has been the President of the Iranian National Handball Federation for several years, Dean of the Iranian Institute for Physical Education and Sports and author of several books on Physical Education, Handball, Sport Sociology and Psychology. Moreover he has produced various national and international articles that have been printed in the scholarly journals or presented in national or international scientific conferences. His research interests deal with administration and organisational behaviour in physical education and sports, team handball, physical education and fitness.

Elena Andreeva is an Associate Professor of History at Virginia Military Institute, where she teaches Middle Eastern Studies and World History.  Dr Andreeva has a PhD in Middle Eastern Studies from New York University and a BA and MA from Moscow State University.  Her research focuses on the interaction between East and West, Iranian history and culture in the 19th and early 20th centuries, and aspects of colonialism and imperialism in the Middle East.  She has published articles on Persian and Dari literature, on Russian Orientalism, and on Russian travellers to Iran.  Her forthcoming book Iran and Russian in the Great Game: Russian Travelogues about Iran will be the first book to introduce and examine the approximately 200 travelogues about Iran published in Russian.  Among her articles are: 'Russian Travelers to Iran in the 19th and Early 20th Centuries' in Encyclopaedia Iranica (2005); 'Iran in World War I' in Encyclopaedia of World War I:  A Political, Social, and Military History (2005); 'Iran in World War II' Encyclopedia of World War II:  A Political, Social, and Military History (2004); 'Travelogues of Berezin, a Nineteenth-Century Russian in Iran' in Society and Culture in Qajar Iran: Studies in Honor of Hafez Farmayan (2002).

Miguel Angel Andres-Toledo is at the present Research fellow at the University of Salamanca (Spain). As a doctoral candidate he is working on a critical edition of the Avestan and Pahlavi texts of books eleventh-fourteenth of the Videvdad. His publications include 'Jahi-: la prostituta en los textos zoroástricos', in Actas del Séptimo Seminario de Estudios sobre la Mujer en la Antiguedad (forthcoming).

Koorosh Angali received his high school diploma in 1968 in Iran; and his first BA in Public Relations in l970, from the College of Mass Communication Sciences. In 1976 he migrated to the United States, and received his second BA in Fine Arts from the Humboldt State University in 1980. In 1993 he enrolled in the Department of Near Eastern Studies, at the University of California, Berkeley, where he received his Master's degree in 1998, and his PhD in 2004, both in the field of Iranian Studies. Until June 2006 he taught Persian Syntax and Grammar at the University of California at Berkeley, and De Anza Community College, in Cupertino, California. As of July 2006 he has occupied a post doc position at University of Texas at Austin, as Senior Research Fellow. In 1997 he published a compilation of his Persian poetry titled In Search of One's Own Self.  Koorosh Angali is also an artist. His exhibitions include: Life As Art As Life; group show (2005) and exhibitions at the Seyhun Gallery in Tehran (2002). He is also the first prize winner of the Ovissi Gallery Art Contest (1996) and Humboldt State University Art Contest (1980).

Ali M Ansari (BA (Lon), PhD (Lon)) is a Reader in Modern History at the University of St Andrews and Associate Fellow of the Middle East Programme, Royal Institute for International Affairs (Chatham House). Currently his research focuses on contemporary political developments in Iran; democratistion; political myth, ideology and historical narratives; 'Persia' in the Western imagination. Dr Ansari is the author of: Confronting Iran: The Failure of US Policy and the Roots of Mistrust (2006); Modern Iran Since 1921: The Pahlavis and After (2003); Iran, Islam & Democracy: The Politics of Managing Change (2000); 'Persia in the Western Imagination' in V. Martin ed. Anglo-Iranian Relations Since 1800 (2000); 'Iran and the US in the Shadow of 9/11: Persia and the Persian Question revisited' in Homa Katouzian ed. Iran Faces the 21st Century, (2006); 'Cultural Transmutations: The Dialectics of Globalisation in Contemporary Iran' in T. Dodge and R. Higgot eds Globalisation and the Middle East: Economy, Society & Politics (2002); 'The Myth of the White Revolution: Mohammad Reza Shah, 'Modernisation' and the Consolidation of Power' in Middle Eastern Studies (2001); 'Iranian Foreign Policy under Khatami: Reform and Reintegration' in A. Ehteshami and A. Mohammadi eds. Iran and Eurasia (2000); 'Continuous Regime Change from Within' in The Washington Quarterly (2003).

Leili Anvar-Chenderoff was born in 1967 in Tehran. She was a former student of the Ecole Normale Superieure (Ulm), Persian and English literature and civilistion at the University of Sorbonne Nouvelle (Paris). Dr Anvar-Chenderoff  received her PhD in Persian Literature with a thesis entitled 'From Paradox to Unity: A Study of the Divan-e Shams' (1998). She was Lecturer at the University of Sorbonne Nouvelle in English and American Civilisation (1992-2001) and currently she is Lecturer in Persian Language and Literature at INALCO, Paris. She is also attached researcher to the CNRS (UMR Monde Iranien et Indien). Dr Anvar-Chenderoff is Head of the Iranian Languages Department (Institut des Langues et Civilisations Orientales); co-founder and member of the Research group on the relationships between the Anglo-Saxon world and the Middle East (Anglorient, University of Sorbonne Nouvelle, University of Marle la Valle, EHESS); member of the scientific board of IISMM (Institute for the Study of Islam and the Islamic Societies, attached to the Ecole des Hautes Etudes en Sciences Sociales, Paris). Her publications include 'Le genre hagiographique a travers le Tadhkirat al-awliya de Farid al-Din Attar' in Saints Orientaux (1995); Noms de personnes en Islam, translation from English into French of A. Schimmel's Islamic Names (1996); 'Attar', 'Rumi', 'Vin' in Le dictionnaire Critique de l'Esotérisme (1998); 'L'amour de Majnun pour Leyli: folie ou sagesse?' in Les fous d'amour dans les litteratures medievales orientale et occidentale (2005); Orient, Mille ans de Poesie et de Peinture (2004); Rumi (2004).

Roya Arab is completing a Master's degree in Public Archaeology at the Institute of Archaeology, where she also received her BA in Archaeology. Her interests are in the socio-economic and political contexts of an artefact, once it has been removed from or highlighted in the landscape, for study and/or display. She has visited various sites around Iran and collaborated with scholars on excavations and public outreach studies, including workshops at the National Museum in Tehran. She assisted in the teaching programme and the accompanying booklet for students about the Achaemenids for IHF which was in conjunction with the British Museum's Persian Exhibition in 2005-6. Prior to studying archaeology, Roya was a singer/song writer and recorded with various artists. Academic publications: with Th. Rehren, 'Die Expedition zur Pyrotechnologie von 1968' Persiens Antike Pracht (2004), 'The Pyrotechnological Expedition of 1968' in IAMS (2004).

Shokoh Arabi-Hashemi received his PhD from the Islamic Azad University. Dr Arabi-Hashemi's publications include 'Kamal al-Din Behzad va negareshi bar asar-e u' in Faslnameh-ye Honar (1998); 'Esfahan-e asr-e Safavi', in Faslnameh-ye Farhang-e Esfahan (1999); 'Sheklgiri va pishraft-e Joufa' in Faslnameh-ye Farhang-e Esfahan (1999); 'Kelisaha-ye Armaniyan-e Jolfa', in Faslnameh-ye Farhang-e Esfahan (2000); 'Monasebat-e Shah Abbas ba Aramaneh' in Faslnameh-ye Hasti (2000); 'Gozareshat-e sayyahan-e orupa'i-ye asr-e Safavi darbareh-ye Aramaneh-ye Jolfa', in Ketab-e Mah (2003); 'Naqsh-e Aramaneh dar tejarat-e asr-e Safavi' in Majmu'eh-ye maqalat-e hamayesh-e Iran Zamin dar gostare-ye tarikh-e Safaviyeh(2004).

Mazdak Asgary is a junior in the College of Arts and Sciences at Cornell University in Ithaca, NY, where he serves on the Student Assembly, the undergraduate student government, is an Ambassador for the College of Arts and Sciences, and is a writer for Turn Left, Cornell's Premier Liberal Voice.  He also serves as Vice President of the Ivy Council, the student government of all eight Ivy League universities, is a Resident Advisor for incoming students, is a Student Supervisor for the Department of Computing and Information Technologies, and is a Tradition Fellow and has been placed on the Dean's List since his inception at Cornell.  Mazdak Asgary is co-author of the paper entitled 'Multi-National Corporations and College Students' Knowledge about International Business Ethics: An Empirical Study' in Journal of Business Case Studies (forthcoming).

Nader Asgary is an Associate Professor of International Business and Economics and the Director of Center for International Business at SUNY-Geneseo. He earned his PhD from the University of Houston-Central in 1991.  His primary research interests are international business, comparative economic development, and applied microeconomics.  He has many publications in economics, international business and ethics. His publications include: 'Family Homeostasis Theory and Its Application to International Human Resource Issues' in Journal of Global Business with Alf Walle (2005); 'Relative Employment and Earnings of Female Household Heads in Mexico, 1987-1995' in Journal of Developing Area with Jose Pagan (2004); 'Toward a Model for International Business Ethics' in Journal of Business Ethics with Mark Mitschow (2002); 'Money Demand and Quantity Constraints: Evidence from the Soviet Interview Project' in Economic Inquiry with Paul Gregory and Manouchehr Mokhtari (1997).

Hesameddin Ashna is a member of the Faculty of Islamic Studies, Culture, and Communication, Imam Sadiq University, Tehran. He received his MA in Islamic Studies and Communication (1992) and his PhD in Culture and Communication (2004), both from Imam Sadiq University. The title of his thesis is 'US Public Diplomacy in Iran 1954-1979'. Dr Asha currently teaches international communication, cyber communication, research methods in communication studies, political communication and international and intercultural communication. His publications include Aggression and Culture, the Collection of Documents on Unveiling (1992) and From Politics to Culture: State Cultural Policies in Iran 1921-1941 (2004), and numerous articles in the following journals, where he is also a member of the editorial board: Rasaneh, Sanjesh va pazhuhesh, Nameh-ye pazhuhesh-e farhangi, and Shi'eh shenasi. Dr Ashna is a member of the International Association of Media and Communication Research, the Iranian society for Information Society, the Iranian Society for Cultural and Communication Studies, and the National Centre for Globalisation Studies.

Daryoush Ashouri was born in Tehran in 1938. He studied at the Faculty of Law, Political Science and Economics of the University of Tehran, and has been visiting professor at the universities of Tehran, Oxford and Tokyo. He has worked as essayist, translator, encyclopaedist, and lexicographer, and is the author, compiler and translator of about 25 books. His intellectual interests cover a wide interdisciplinary range, including political science, literature, philosophy and linguistics. His main interest is in the cultural and linguistic affairs of his native country Iran, as a third world country encountering modernity. He has made important contributions to the development of Persian vocabulary in the domains of human sciences and philosophy, compiled in the Farhang-e olum-e ensani. Among his major works is a hermeneutical, intertextual study of the Divan of Hafiz (Erfan va rendi dar she'r-e Hafez)(1998). He has translated the works of Nietzsche, Machiavelli, Shakespeare and others into Persian.

Nilufar Ashtari, of Belgo-Iranian descent, is an independent scholar and multi-media artist. She earned her PhD at the University of Wales, Swansea in 2004. Her thesis examines the history of Iranian cinema in its wider social and political context and establishes the link between gender, nationalist political and cultural processes in contemporary Iran. Currently, she works as a consultant for the Yellow Design Foundation, covering the influence of design on the perception of security in transit zones of public transport.  Ashtari's research interests are in the areas of Iranian culture, especially cinema, and how it is constructed and constantly negotiated, with regard to its Islamic, gendered identity. Special attention is paid to Iran's propaganda cinema and the processes and practices that allow for the creation of a counter-culture and cinema. Other research interests include theories of social, public and urban space in relation to the built environment and cultural identity. Articles are forthcoming in two edited books and in Gender and History Journal, and Critique: Journal for Critical Studies of the Middle East.

Sebouh David Aslanian is a PhD candidate in the Department of Middle East and Asian Languages and Cultures at Columbia University. He holds an MA in Political Science from the Graduate Faculty at the New School for Social Research, an MPhil from Columbia University, and has served as an Executive Editor of Conference: A Journal of Philosophy and Theory. His publications include: ''The Treason of Intellectuals'? Reflections on the Uses of Nationalism and Revisionism in Armenian Historiography' in Armenian Forum (2003); 'Dispersion History and the Polycentric Nation: The Role of Simeon Yerevantsi's Girk vor Kochi Partavchar'in The Armenian National Revival of the Eighteenth Century(2004) and 'Trade Diaspora Versus Colonial State: Armenian Merchants. The English East India Company and the High Court of Admiralty in London, 1748-1752' in Diaspora: A Journal of Transnational Studies (2006). He is currently completing a dissertation in economic history entitled 'From the Indian Ocean to the Mediterranean: Circulation and the Global Trade Networks of Armenian Merchants from New Julfa, Isfahan, 1605-1747'. He is also working on a co-authored book with H. Berberian on a commercial biography of a transnational Armenian merchant family originally from New Julfa, tentatively entitled The Cosmopolitans: The House of Sceriman (Shahrimanian) between New Julfa and Venice.

Farhad Assar received a BSc and an MSc in Chemical Engineering from the University of Tehran and a PhD in Chemical Engineering from Heriot-Watt University, Edinburgh, Scotland. He was then involved in post-doctoral research in enhanced oil recovery processes from 1983 to 88 at Heriot-Watt University. Dr Assar was technical manager with ICI Chemicals and Polymers Plc., Wilton, Middlesbrough, England (1988-91) and has been the Sir Harold Bailey Research Associate, St Catherine's College, Oxford since 2005. His current academic interests are focused on Parthian history and numismatics. His publications include: 'Recent Studies in Parthian History: Part I' in The Celator (2000); 'Recent Studies in Parthian History: Part II' in The Celator (2001); 'Recent Studies in Parthian History: Part III' in The Celator (2001); 'Parthian Calendars at Babylon and Seleucia on the Tigris' in Iran (2003); 'Genealogy and Coinage of the Early Parthian Rulers. I.' in Parthica (2004); 'The Genealogy of the Parthian King Sinatruces (93/2-69/8 BC)' in The Journal of the Classical and Medieval Numismatic Society (2005); 'Genealogy and Coinage of the Early Parthian Rulers. II. A Revised Stemma' in Parthica (2005); 'History and Coinage of Elymais During 150/149 – 122/121 BC' in Name-ye Iran-e Bastan. The International Journal of Ancient Iranian Studies (2006); 'Moses of Chorene and the Early Parthian Chronology' in Electrum (2006); 'A Revised Parthian Chronology of the Period 165-91 BC' in Electrum (2006); 'A Revised Parthian Chronology of the Period 91-55 BC' in Parthica (2006); 'An Early Parthian “Victory” Coin' in Parthica (2006).

Touraj Atabaki is Professor of Modern History at the University of Amsterdam and Senior Research Fellow at the International Institute of Social History. He studied theoretical physics (BSc, MSc) and history at the National University of Iran and the University of London, and received his MA and PhD from the Utrecht University. Touraj Atabaki holds the endowed chair of Social History of the Middle East and Central Asia at the Department of History of the University of Amsterdam and is in charge of the Department of the Middle East and Central Asia at the International Institute of Social History. He has published numerous articles on Iran, the Caucasus and Central Asia. His books include Azerbaijan: Ethnicity and the Struggle for Powers in Iran (1993), Beyond Essentialism. Who writes Whose Past in the Middle East and Central Asia? (2003); editor of Post-Soviet Central Asia (1998); co-editor with E. J. Zurcher Men of Order, Authoritarian Modernisation in Turkey and Iran (2004); co-editor with S. Mehendale Central Asia and the Caucasus: Transnationalism and Diaspora (2005); Iran and the First World War: Battleground of the Great Powers (2006); editor of The State and the Subaltern: Society and Politics in Turkey and Iran (forthcoming). His current work focuses on ethnic issues in contemporary Iran, historiography of everyday life and comparative subaltern history in Iran and the former Soviet south.

Kamal Athari received his BA in Economics from the University of Tehran (1975).  He is currently the Head of Economic Studies of the Tehran Master and Comprehensive Plan project -- Iran Centre of Urban Development and Architecture Research and Studies. He was also the Head of Economic Studies of the Tehran Conurbation project – Iran Centre of Urban Development and Architecture Research and Studies Tehran Conurbation. An advisor on urban development legislation at the Iran Parliamentary Research Centre (1996 – 2002) and Head of economic studies on peripheral and marginal settlements in Iran at the Iran Centre of Urban Development and Architecture Research and Studies (1995). His research interests focus on political economy (Iran) and urban economics. His publications include 'In Search of Social Justice' in Social Welfare Quarterly (2001); 'Justice in Space' in Seven City Publication (2002); 'Globalisation: Inevitable Continued Production Revolutions' in Majlis and Research Journal (2004).

Michael Axworthy visited Iran many times in the 1970s as a teenager and travelled extensively over the country with his family. In the early 1980s he studied history at Peterhouse, Cambridge before joining the Foreign and Commonwealth Office (FCO) in 1986. After a variety of jobs in London and postings in Malta and Germany he served as the Head of Iran Section in the Middle East Department of the FCO from 1998-2000, that period coinciding with the improvement in UK/Iran relations at the beginning of the Presidency of Mohammad Khatami. He visited Iran again in 1999 in that capacity. He left the FCO in 2000 and since then has been making a living in Cornwall as a writer and editor. He has written a book on Nader Shah (for publication in the summer of 2006), and has attended conferences in Bamberg, London, Durham and Oxford on Iranian history and current affairs subjects, making some presentations, which will be published as articles. One of these is about the Greek traveller (and biographer of Nader Shah) Basile Vatatzes. He has also been a regular contributor to the Gulf2000 Internet forum, and
has written a series of pieces on contemporary Iran and other subjects for Prospect Magazine. Since October 2005 he has been teaching Middle East History at the Institute of Arab and Islamic Studies at the University of Exeter on an informal basis.

Kathryn Babayan received her PhD in Near Eastern Studies from Princeton University and is an Associate Professor of Iranian History and Culture at the Department of Near Eastern Studies, University of Michigan. She specialises in the cultural and social histories of Safavid Iran. She is the author of Mystics, Monarchs and Messiahs: Cultural Landscapes of Early Modern Iran (2003) and a co-author of Slaves of the Shah: New Elites of Safavid Iran, with S. Babaie, I. Baghdiantz-McCabe, and M. Farhad (2004). Her most recent scholarship on female friendships will appear in Islamicate Sexualities Studies: Translations across Temporal and Geographical Zones of Desire, co-edited with Afsaneh Najmabadi (forthcoming).

Askar Bahrami was born in 1967 in Shush, Iran. He holds an MA  in Culture and Languages of Ancient Iran (Tehran University, 1999) and a BSc in Geology (Isfahan University, 1988). His publications include: Iranian Feasts (2004); 'Parthian Glossary' in H. Rezaei Bagh-Bidi's Handbook of Parthian Language (2006). He has also translated various works into Persian, such as M. Boyce's Zoroastrians: Their Religious Beliefs and Practices (2002) and P. D. Netsley's, The Stone Age (2003). Some of his articles in Persian are: 'Figures of Children in the Literature of Ancient Iran' in Adabiyat-e Kudak va Nowjavan (1996); 'Avesta' in Danesnameh-ye Sebheh Qarreh (2006); 'Kushans: A Political History' in The Comprehensive History of Iran, Centre for the Great Islamic Encyclopaedia (forthcoming); 'Zurvanism' in The Comprehensive History of Iran, Centre for the Great Islamic Encyclopaedia (forthcoming).

Farahnaz Bahrampour was born in 1963 in Tabriz. She is a graduate student in history at Islamic Azad University, Shabestar. She received her BA in History in 2000 and her MA in 2004. She is presently a librarian at the Shahriyar Library in Tabriz. She has presented various papers in conferences 'The economy of Azarbaijan in the Safavid period (International Symposium of Iranology, 2004); 'The silk road as an economic and cultural bridge in history (International Symposum of Iranlogy, 2004); 'Reciprocal effects of Iranian and Arab cultures in the Umayyad and Abbasid periods (Third Emulation Religion Congress, 2002); 'The economy of the Persian Gulf and Siraf (The Siraf International Congress, 2005).

Golbarg Bashi was born in Iran, raised in Sweden, and educated in Britain.  She is currently a doctoral candidate at the Department of Theology and Religious Studies, Bristol University, and a Visiting Scholar at the Department of Middle East and Asian Languages and Cultures, Columbia University. She holds a First Class BA (with Honours) in Middle Eastern Studies from  the University of Manchester and an MSc in Women's Studies from Bristol University. The title of her PhD thesis is 'A Feminist Critique of the Human Rights Discourse in Iran'. Her research interests are in women's studies, Black and Third World feminisms and post-colonial theory. Her publications include 'Crisis in Iranian Women's Studies' in Gooya (2005); 'Eyewitness History: Interview with Ayatollah Montazeri' in Payvand News (2006); 'A Historic Landmark: Women's Rights Gathering in Tehran on June 12th' in Open Democracy (2006); 'The Proper Etiquette of Meeting Shahrnush Parsipur in the United States' (forthcoming); 'Oriental Express: On Women's Memoir Industry' (forthcoming).

Oliver Bast is Lecturer in Persian Studies at the University of Manchester. He read History and Persian Studies at Berlin (Humboldt-Universitaet), Tehran (University of Tehran) and Paris (Université de la Sorbonne Nouvelle – Paris III). He received his joint doctorate (thèse en co-tutelle) from the universities of Bamberg (Otto-Friedrich Universitaet Bamberg, Germany) and Paris III. Between 1995 and 1997 he was a research fellow at the French Foreign Ministry's Institut Français de Recherche en Iran (IFRI) in Tehran where he organised the international conference La Perse et la Grande Guerre, which was jointly hosted by IFRI and the Iranian Foreign Ministry's research centre IPIS. He joined the University of Manchester in 2000. His research interest is the Modern History of Iran with a special emphasis on political and diplomatic history. His publications include: 'Council for International Propaganda (SOVINTERPROP) and the Genesis of the Iranian Communist Party (1920/21)' in Touraj Atabaki ed. Iran and the First World War (2006); 'Putting the Record Straight: Vosuq al-Dowleh's Foreign Policy in 1918/19' in T. Atabaki and E. J Zuercher eds. Men of Order: Authoritarian Modernization under Ataturk and Reza Shah (2004); Les Allemands en Perse pendant la Première Guerre mondiale (1997) and La Perse et la Grande Guerre (2002).

Masoud Bayat was born in 1968 in the city of Zanjan. He finished high school in 1987 and received his higher education at the University of Tehran, from where he got his BA, MA and PhD. Then he was employed as an academic member of Department of History in the Faculty of Humanities of Urmia University. He is currently Deputy of the Faculty in educational affairs. Dr Bayat's research interests deal with the history of Iran during the Timurid era and the historical upheavals in Zanjan province. He has written two books: Islamic Revolution in Zanjan (2006); A Look at the Ups and Downs of Democratic Party of Azarbaijan (2006).

Ali Banuazizi is Professor of Cultural Psychology at Boston College and Codirector of the Program in Middle Eastern and Islamic Studies. After receiving his PhD from Yale University in 1968, he taught at Yale and the University of Southern California before joining the Boston College Faculty in 1971. Since then, he has held visiting appointments at the University of Tehran, Princeton, Harvard, MIT, and Oxford University. He served as the founding editor of the journal of Iranian Studies, from 1968 to 1982. He is a past President of the International Society for Iranian Studies (ISIS) and of the Middle East Studies Association of North America (MESA). Ali Banuazizi is the author of numerous articles on society, culture, and politics in Iran and the Middle East, and the coeditor (with Myron Weiner) of three books on politics, religion and society in Southwest and Central Asia, including The State, Religion, and Ethnic Politics in Afghanistan, Iran, and Pakistan (1986), The Politics of Social Transformation in Afghanistan, Iran, and Pakistan (1994), and The New Geopolitics of Central Asia and Its Borderlands (1994).

Michael Beard received his PhD in Comparative Literature from Indiana University in 1974.  He then taught for four years at the American University in Cairo, and has been teaching in the English Department at the University of North Dakota since 1989. His research interests include genre theory, comparative aesthetics (Persian, Arabic, European), and popular culture. His publications include Hedayat's 'Blind Owl' as a Western Novel (1990) and a series of translations in collaboration with Adnan Haydar: notably Khalil Hawi's Threshing Floors of Hunger (1984) and In Forbidden Time:  Love Poems by Henri Zoghaib (1991). With Ahmad Karimi-Hakkak he has published Edges of Poetry: Selected poems of Esmail Khoi (1995). Most recently he has published two volumes of translation from the poems of Abbas Kiarostami: Walking with the Wind/Hamrah bad (2001, trans. with A. Karimi-Hakkak) and A Wolf Lying in Wait / Gorgi dar kamin (2006, trans. with the late K. Emami).  He is also translator of a forthcoming collection of poems by Adonis (Ali Ahmed Sa'id), Mihyar of Damascus, his Songs. Currently he is the co-editor of the journal Middle Eastern Literatures (incorporating Edebiyat), and, with Adnan Haydar, co-edits a series, 'Translations from the Middle East'.

Simin Behbahani, renowned Iranian poet and human rights activist, was born in Tehran in 1927, of literary parents. Her first poem was published when she was only fourteen. She has produced a prodigious body of work and has been admired and acclaimed by an ever-growing number of readers inside and outside Iran. Simin Behbahani has revolutionised the rhythms of the Persian ghazal, a free flowing, lyrical poetry style similar to the western sonnet, and the dynamics that produce it. Called by many critics 'the king of contemporary ghazal', she has created a distinct poetic voice, at once traditional and provocatively contemporary. With poignancy, passion, and purpose, her poetry has conquered the heart of its many readers. Concern for social justice has been one of the strongest drives in her poetry. As the 'voice of freedom rising against repression everywhere' she was nominated for the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1997. She was also awarded a Human Rights Watch Hellman-Hammet grant in 1998, and the Carl von Ossietzky Medal in 1999 for her struggle for freedom of expression in Iran. She was honoured in 2002 by Columbia University's Encyclopaedia Iranica for the unparalleled beauty of her poetry and her lifelong devotion to freedom and social justice.

Maziar Behrooz is Assistant Professor of history at San Francisco State University and the author of Rebels With a Cause (1999) and Reflections on the History of Rebels with a Cause (2006).

Sohrab Behdad is Professor and John E. Harris Chair in Economics, Denison University. He is a former member of Faculty of Economics of the University of Tehran. His publications include (with Farhad Nomani) Class and Labor in Iran: Did the Revolution Matter? (2006); coeditor with Farhad Nomani Islam and Everyday Life: Public Policy Dilemmas (2006).

Houri Berberian is Associate Professor of History at California State University, Long Beach, and the Director of the Middle Eastern Studies Minor Program. She received her BA from the University of California, Berkeley in 1988 and her MA and PhD in Middle Eastern and Armenian History from the UCLA in 1993 and 1997, respectively. She is the author of several published and forthcoming articles, including 'Traversing Boundaries and Selves: Iranian Armenian Identities during the Iranian Constitutional Revolution' in Comparative Studies of South Asia, Africa, and Middle East (2005); 'Armenian Women and Women in Armenian Religion' in Encyclopaedia of Women and Islamic Cultures (2004); the prize-winning 'Armenian Women in Turn-of-the-Century Iran: Education and Activism' in Iran and Beyond: Essays in Honor of Nikki R Keddie (2000); 'The Dashnaktsutiun and the Iranian Constitutional Revolution, 1905-1911' in Iranian Studies (1996); 'Armenian and Iranian Collaboration in the Constitutional Revolution: The Agreement between Dashnakists and Majles Delegates, 1908' an annotated translation with introduction in The Modern Middle East: A Sourcebook for History (forthcoming); Armenians and the Iranian Constitutional Revolution of 1905-1911: The Love for Freedom Has No Fatherland (2001). She is currently working on two projects, one on issues of Iranian-Armenian identity and memory and the other, a co-authored work with Sebouh David Aslanian, tentatively titled The Cosmopolitans: A Commercial Biography of the Sheriman Family of Julfa and Venice.

Bhaswati Bhattacharya is a Research Fellow affiliated with the International Institute of Asian Studies, Leiden, and the University of Leiden. Her specialisation is maritime trade in the Indian Ocean, 1500-1800. She has published numerous articles on the subject. Currently she is working on a history of the Armenian community who came to India from New Julfa, Iran. One of the questions addressed in this research is the relationship between Iran and India from the seventeenth to the mid-twentieth centuries. Recent publications include 'Between Fact and Fiction - Khwaja Gregory or Gurguin Khan - The 'Evil Genius' of Mir Qasim' in J. Gommans and O. Prakash eds Circumambulations in History: Essays in Honour of Professor D. H. A. Kolff (2003); 'Armenian-European relationship in India, 1500-1800: No Armenian Foundation of the European Colonial Empire?' in Journal of the Economic and Social History of the Orient (2005).

Carol Bier is Research Associate at The Textile Museum in Washington, DC. Trained in Near Eastern Art and Archaeology at the University of Chicago's Oriental Institute and New York University's Institute of Fine Arts, early in her career she resided in Shiraz to document Sasanian monuments and rock reliefs, the results of which are now housed in the Archives of the Freer Gallery of Art. From 1984 to 2001 she served as Curator for Eastern Hemisphere Collections at The Textile Museum and continues to pursue her research on patterns as the intersection of art and mathematics. Among her publications are: The Persian Velvets at Rosenborg(1995); Ed. Woven from the Soul, Spun from the Heart: Textile arts of Safavid and Qajar Iran, 16th-19th century (1987).

Abu Musa Mohammad Arif Billah received a BA and an MA in Persian from Dhaka University, Bangladesh. He has also obtained a degree of Mumtazul Muhaddethin from Madrasa-i Alia Dhaka. He is currently a PhD student at SOAS and the title of his dissertation is 'Influence of Persian on Shah Muhammad Sagir's Yusuf Zulaikha and Alaol's Padmavai'.  He is also an assistant Professor of Persian in the Department of Persian, Dhaka University, Bangladesh.  His main publications are 'Origin and Development of Tazia in Iran' The Dhaka University Studies, (1994); 'Indo-Iranian Thought: A World Heritage' The Dhaka University Studies, (1997); 'Origin and Development of Persian Drama in Iran' The Dhaka University Studies, (2000); 'Indo-Iranian Relation during the Vedic and Avestic period'Journal of  the Center for Social Science Research, (2000); 'Influence of Persian in the Sub-continent During the Ghaznavid Period'Social Science Review (2001); 'Baṃgla Bhaṣay Arabi Farsi sabda o avidhan'Sahity Patrica, Journal of the Department of Bengali, Dhaka University, (1995); 'Pherdausi o tar sahnama (Ferdowi and his Shahnamah)' News Letter, monthly magazine of the Iranian Cultural Centre Dhaka, (1990); 'Sufi Kabi Maolana Rumi (Mawlana Jalaluddin Rumi as a Mystic Poet)' High Court Majar Quarterly (1994).

Ilker Evrim Binbas studied Political Science at the Middle East Technical University (BSc Ankara/Turkey), and History at Hacettepe University (MA, Ankara Turkey). Currently, Ilker Evrim Binbas is a PhD candidate at the University of Chicago, Department of Near Eastern Languages and Civilizations. Binbas is studying the Oghuz Khan narratives and their role in late medieval Islamic political discourse. Since January 2006, he has been teaching at the Faculty of Oriental Studies, the University of Oxford.

Stephen Blum received his PhD from the University of Illinois (1972) with a dissertation on performers of sung poetry in northern Khorasan. His research interests centre on the history of musical thought and on musical analysis, especially analysis of sung poetry in Iran and elsewhere. He taught at the University of Illinois and at York University, Toronto, before assuming his present position at CUNY in 1987. He has held guest professorships at the University of Pennsylvania, Columbia University, and the University of Texas-Austin. His publications on Iranian topics include the entries on 'Central Asia' and 'Iran: regional and popular traditions' in The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians (2001); 'The Concept of the Asheq in Northern Khorasan' in Asian Music (1972, Persian translation 2002); 'Changing Roles of Performers in Meshhed and Bojnurd, Iran' in B. Nettl ed. Eight Urban Musical Cultures (1978); 'Musical Questions and Answers in Iranian Xorasan' in EM: Annuario degli Archivi di Etnomusicologia dell'Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia (1996); 'The Morning of Freedom Rose Up: Kurdish Popular Song and the Exigencies of Cultural Survival' with A. Hassanpour, in Popular Music (1996).

Habib Borjian teaches the Department of Comparative Literature and Languages Hofstra University. He took graduate courses on Iranian Studies at Columbia University while completing his graduate work in engineering. Dr Borjian further pursued his studies on Iranian languages, which resulted in an MA in Ancient Iranian Languages, University of Tehran (1998), and a PhD in Iranian Linguistics, Yerevan State University (2004). His research interests include Iranian languages and dialects, Central Asia and the Caucasus, history of Persia and Eurasia. He has published dozens of articles on the subjects above, in the Encyclopeadia Iranica and in major journals and collected works. His books are Orthography of Iranian Languages (2000) and Median Dialects of Isfahan (2006).

Mehrzad Boroujerdi is Associate Professor of Political Science at the Maxwell School and Director of the Middle Eastern Studies Program at Syracuse University. He received his BA in Political Science and Sociology from Boston University, and his PhD in International Relations from the American University in Washington, DC. He has been a post-doctoral fellow at Harvard University's Center for Middle Eastern Studies and a Rockefeller Foundation fellow at the University of Texas at Austin. He is presently an adjunct scholar at the Middle East Institute in Washington, DC. Dr Boroujerdi is the author of Iranian Intellectuals and the West: The Tormented Triumph of Nativism (1996). His articles have appeared in Bulletin of the Center for Iranian Research and Analysis, Critique: Journal for Critical Studies of the Middle East, Iranian Journal of International Affairs, International Third World Studies Journal and Review, Journal of Peace Research, Middle East Economic Survey, Oxford Encyclopaedia of the Modern Islamic World, and more than a dozen edited books and Persian-language journals. He is the General Editor of the Modern Intellectual and Political History of the Middle East series published by Syracuse University Press and the Book Review Editor of the International Journal of Middle East Studies. Dr Boroujerdi's research interest is on the intellectual history of modern Iran.

Vladimir Boyko is Associate Professor of Asian Studies and Director of the Centre for Regional Studies at Barnaul State Pedagogical University (Barnaul, Russia). He obtained his PhD from the Institute of Oriental Studies, Russian Academy of Sciences in Moscow. He held visiting positions at Ruhr University (Germany), Harvard University (USA) as respectively DAAD and Fulbright scholar. Dr Boyko's research interests include history, politics and international relations in Central Asia, he is a member of the Association for the Study of Persianate Societies, Royal Asiatic Society (UK) and the International Institute for Strategic Studies (UK). He is editor/co-author of about 10 books and more than 100 articles on Afghanistan and adjacent countries: Russia, Siberia, and Central Asia: Interrelation of Peoples and Cultures (2005); Greater Altai in Geopolitics of Central Eurasia - Central Asia and Caucasus. Regional Developments: Interaction and Encounter of Strategies (2005); 'Afghanistan's International Relations in 1930s' in Afghanistan and Security of Central Asia (2005); 'Central Asian Emigration in Afghanistan in 1920s - early 1930s' in Uzbekistan Tarihi (2004); Regionalism in Afghanistan: 'Herat republic' of Abdul Rahim - Muslim Countries at CIS Borders (2001).

Sonja Brentjes studied mathematics at the Technical University, Dresden (1969-1973), history of mathematics at Karl Marx University, Leipzig (1973-1976) and Arabic and Near Eastern cultures at Martin Luther University, Halle/S and Wittenberg (1978-1982). She received her first doctoral degree in 1977 from the Technical University, Dresden on the history of linear programming and her second doctoral degree in 1989 from Karl Marx University, Leipzig on history of number theory in Islamic societies (9th-13th centuries), followed in 1991 by a habilitation at the University of Leipzig. She worked until 1997 at the Karl Sudhoff Institute for History of Medicine, Science and Mathematics in Leipzig. Between 1997 and 2004 she worked as a senior researcher at Max Planck Institute for History of Science, Berlin and the Institute for History of Science, Johann Wolfgang Goethe University, Frankfurt/Main. Since 2004, she has been an associate professor at the Institute for the Study of Muslim Civilisations, Aga Khan University in London. She is elected member of the International Academy for History of Science, Paris. She worked on history of mathematics, science and cartography in Islamic societies and Catholic, Protestant and secular societies in Europe in three major fields: transmission of ancient Greek mathematical texts; exchange of knowledge between Islamic societies and Catholic and Protestant societies; ancient sciences at institutions in Islamic societies. Her publications include: 'Pride and Prejudice: The Invention of a Historiography of Science in the Ottoman and Safavid Empires by European Travellers and Writers of the Sixteenth and Seventeenth Centuries' in J. Brooke and E. Ihsanoglu eds Religious Values & The Rise of Science in Europe (2005); 'Mapmaking in Ottoman Istanbul between 1650 and 1750: a domain of painters, calligraphers, or cartographers?' in: C. Imber, K. Kiyotaki, and R. Murphey eds Frontiers of Ottoman Studies (2005).  

Gay Breyley is Faculty of Arts Post-doctoral Research Fellow in the School of Music - Conservatorium at Monash University, Australia. Her current project is a study of selected musical and poetic texts of Persian-speakers in Australia. In 2005 she completed her PhD at the University of Wollongong, with a thesis on 'Memory, Music and Displacement in the Minor Memoirs of Evelyn Crawford'. Her publications include articles in the Journal of Australian Studies, Borderlands, Altitude and Prose Studies, chapters in C. Huff ed. Women's Life Writing and Imagined Communities (2005) and S. Williams et al eds The Regenerative Spirit: Australian Post-Colonial Reflections (2004), and Breyley's own book (edited and translated), Changing the Curtains, the Money and the Guns (1997). This book is a volume of transcribed oral histories, most of which she recorded in eastern Germany. Her research interests include Iranian and Central Asian musical and literary cultures, migration, the effects of past conflicts and current policies on displaced lives, disillusionment with revolution and other forms of political change, memory and humour.

Dominic Parviz Brookshaw teaches Persian Language and Literature (medieval and modern) at the Institute of Islamic Studies, McGill University, Montreal. He received his BA (1998) and MA (2005) from the University of Oxford and is currently a DPhil candidate at the same university. Before moving to McGill, he taught Persian Language and Medieval Persian Literature at the Oriental Institute, University of Oxford from 2002 to 2005. He is currently the Assistant Editor of Iranian Studies.His research interests include medieval Persian and Arabic lyric poetry, modern and medieval Persian prose writing, and women in the Qajar period. His recent publications include 'Odes of a Poet-princess: The Ghazals of Jahan-Malik Khatun' in Iran (2005); 'Palaces, Pavilions and Pleasure-gardens: The Context and Setting of the Medieval Majlis' in Middle Eastern Literatures (2003).

Elizabeth M Bucar, holds a BA in Government from Harvard University, an MA in Religious Studies from the University of Chicago, and is completing a PhD in Religious Ethics at the University of Chicago Divinity School.  She is currently a Postdoctoral Fellow at Georgetown University. Her research and writing focuses on clerical rhetoric and women's social movements within two religious traditions: Roman Catholicism and Shiite Islam. She is currently completing her dissertation, Creative Obedience: Feminist Ethics From the Rhetoric of Pope John Paul II and Ayatollah Khomeini, which analyses Ayatollah Khomeini's and Pope John Paul II's writings on women in order to uncover their strategies for soliciting obedience to a vision of women's moral duties. Her publications include the edited volume, Does Human Rights Need God? (2005) and 'Speaking of Motherhood: The Epideictic Rhetoric of John Paul II and Ayatollah Khomeini' in Journal of the Society of Christian Ethics (2006).

Matthew Canepa is Assistant Professor of Roman and Near Eastern Art at the College of Charleston, Charleston South Carolina. Dr Canepa received his BA from the University of Colorado and an MA in the Humanities from the University of Chicago with a concentration on the languages and civilistions of the classical world and ancient Near East. He pursued his doctoral research at the University of Chicago, earning his PhD in June 2004.  He has been the recipient of numerous research grants including a fellowship from the Council of American Overseas Research Centers. A specialist in the art and cultures of the late Roman Empire and Sasanian Iran, his present research focuses on cross-cultural interaction in the ancient world. Among other projects, he is currently publishing the book Transformation of the Classical Heritage under the editorship of Peter Brown. Another book is entitled The Two Eyes of the Earth: Competition and Exchange in the Art and Ritual of Kingship between Rome and Sasanian Iran.

Alberto Cantera is at present Assistant Professor at the University of Salamanca, Spain. Formerly he has worked in a research project at the Institut fuer Iranistik of the Freie Universitaet Berlin. His publications include Studien zur Pahlavi-Uebersetzung des Avesta (2004); 'Die Behandlung der indogermanischen Lautfolge *(C)RHC- im Iranischen' in Muenchener Studien zur Sprachwissenschaft (2001); 'Die indogermanischen Vorformen von avestisch uruu- und damit verwandte Probleme' in Indogermanische Forschungen (2001); 'Die Zwischenlagerung der Leiche im Zoroastrismus' in Archaeologische Mitteilungen aus Iran und Turan (2002); 'Medical Fees and Compositional Principles in Avestan Videvdad' in Name-ye Iran-e Bastan. The International Journal for Acient Iranian Studies (2005).

Carlo G Cereti was born in Turin in 1960. In 1985 he received the Degree in Lingue e Civilta Orientali (IUO). He has taught postgraduate courses at the School of Oriental and African Studies, London University (1986-1987) and in 1992 he earned his Doctorate in Iranian Studies. He was post-doctoral fellow (IUO) and a visiting scholar at the University of Goettingen (1993-1994), a contract professor at the Faculty of Humanities of the University of Rome 'La Sapienza' (1995-1998), a member of the Kommission für Iranistik of the Oesterreichische Akademie der Wissenschaften (1997-1999) and 'directeur de recherche invite' and thereafter 'membre associe' of the UMRS Monde iranien, CNRS (2002).   He is the author of many works such as The Zand i Wahman Yasn. A Zoroastrian Apocalypse (1995). His main current research projects are: 1) Middle Persian Dictionary Project, together with Prof. Shaul Shaked, Hebrew University, associate editor. 2) Sylloge Nummorum Sasanidarum, (eds) M. Alram and R. Gyselen, editor of vol. V on Husraw II, together with M. Alram. A selective list of his sixty publications includes: 'Zarathustra / Zoroastrismus', in Religion in Geschichte und Gegenwart. Handwoerterbuch fuer Theologie und Religionswissenschaft (2005); 'Middle Persian Geographic Literature: the Case of the Bundahishn' in R. Gyselen ed. Contributions à l'histoire et la geographie historique de l'empire sassanide (2005); 'Un canone mazdeo?' in Testo sacro e religioni. Ermeneutiche a confronto (2006).

Houchang Esfandiar Chehabi is of Iranian and German descent and was born in Tehran in 1954.  He studied Geography at the University of Caen, France, and International Relations at the Institut d'Etudes Politiques in Paris before going to Yale University, where he received an MA in International Relations in 1979 and a PhD in Political Science in 1986.  He then taught at Harvard University and UCLA, and in 1998 became a professor of international relations and history at Boston University.  He is the author of Iranian Politics and Religions Modernism: The Liberation Movement of Iran under the Shah and Khomeini (1990), principal author of Distant Relations: Iran and Lebanon in the Last 500 Years (2006); and co-editor, with Juan Linz, of Sultanistic Regimes (1998).  His articles have appeared in Aus Politk und Zeitgeschichte, Daedalus, Diplomacy and Statecraft, Du, Esprit, Government and Opposition, International Journal of the History of Sport, International Journal of Middle East Studies, Iranian Studies, Political Science Quarterly, and several edited volumes.  His main research interests are the cultural history of Iran since the nineteenth century and Iran's relations with neighbouring countries and South Africa.

Mohammad Reza Chitsaz received his BA in Archaeology from Tehran University in 1988, an MA in History of Ancient Iran from the Islamic Azad University in 1991, and a PhD in History of Ancient Iran from Islamic Azad University in 2002. He currently teaches ancient Iranian history at Islamic Azad University in Tehran and is head of the 'Costume and Clothing' section of the Great Islamic Enclyclopaedia. He has numerous publications, with the most recent being: 'Elamite Political History', 'Elamite Coins', 'Elamite Art and Architecture',  and 'Persian Clothing and Costume (Pre-History – Qajar)' in Great Islamic Encyclopaedia (forthcoming); 'Aramaic Inscriptions on Elamite Coins' in Archaeology Journal of Tehran University (forthcoming).

Matteo Compareti was born in Padua in 1971. He graduated from Venice University Ca' Foscari (1999) at the Faculty of Oriental Languages and Literatures (main language: Chinese). He received his PhD in Iranian Studies from the University of Naples (2004). His main research interests include the archaeology and art of pre-Islamic Iran and Central Asia with a focus on the iconography of Mazdean divinities of the Sasanian period and Sogdiana during 5th-8th centuries. He participated at the excavations of the sites of Uch Kulakh (region of Bukhara), Uzbekistan (Fall 2002): Italian-Uzbek Archaeological Mission; Kurgan Vardanze(region of Bukhara), Uzbekistan (Fall 2002). At present he is an active member of the group studying under the leadership of G. Scarcia at Venice University Ca' Foscari, focusing on many aspects of Iranian culture during Islamic and (especially) pre-Islamic periods.

Stephanie Cronin received her BSc from the London School of Economics and her MA and PhD from SOAS. She has taught at SOAS and at the Faculty of Oriental Studies, University of Cambridge and is now Iran Heritage Foundation Fellow, University of Northampton. Her publications include The Army and the Creation of the Pahlavi State in Iran, 1910-1926 (1997); Tribal Politics in Iran: Rural Conflict and the New State (2006); The Making of Modern Iran: State and Society under Riza Shah, 1921-1941 (2003); Reformers and Revolutionaries in Modern Iran: New Perspectives on the Iranian Left (2004); Subalterns and Social Protest: History from Below in the Middle East and North Africa (2006). Her current work focuses on subaltern responses to modernity in Iran. She has recently published 'The Tehran Crowd and the Rise of Riza Khan: Popular Protest, Disorder and Riot in Iran' in International Review of Social History (2005) and 'Resisting the New State: Peasants and Pastoralists in Iran, 1921-1941' in Journal of Peasant Studies (2005).  She is also completing a new book entitled Shahs and Subalterns: Urban Politics and Popular Protest in Iran. Dr Cronin is a member of the editorial boards of Iranian Studiesand Middle Eastern Studies and a member of the advisory council of Qajar Studies.

Ghazzal Dabiri is currently a PhD candidate and Teaching Fellow at the UCLA. She received a BS from the University of Miami in Microbiology and Immunology and an MA from UCLA in Near Eastern Languages and Cultures. Her research interests encompass the development of literary genres and the focus of her current research is on the origin and development of Persian epics. She has taught elementary Persian at UCLA and at Santa Monica College. She is currently teaching intermediate Persian at UCLA. She is also working on a digital library project researching Persian manuscripts. The project's aim is to catalogue and digitise one of the largest Middle Eastern manuscript collections in the United States for web publication. She has been Associate Editor of Jusur Magazine and helped coordinate and organise the Jusur Graduate Student Conference.

Ashk P Dahlen is a reseacher in Iranian Studies and translator of classical Persian Literature into Swedish. He has a PhD in Iranian Languages from Uppsala University, Sweden, and his main research interests are Islamic spirituality, Persian Sufi literature and modern Islamic thought. He is the author of Islamic Law, Epistemology and Modernity: Legal Philosophy in Contemporary Iran (2003) and has published several articles on Persian literature and Sufism in various journals such as Orientalia Suecana and Svensk Religionshistorisk Arsbok (Swedish Journal of History of Religions). Among his Swedish translations are Song of the the Reed: Selected Poems of Jalal al-din Rumi, The Lama'at of Fakhr al-din 'Araqi and Ghazaliyyat of Shams al-din Hafez.

Gholamreza Dar-Katanian receid his BA in History from Tabriz University in 1992 and will be completing his MA in History at Islamic Azad University at Shabestar in August 2006. His publications include 'Women's Cultural Movements and the Establishment of Girls Schools in Iran' in Proceedings of the Second Iranology Conference (2004); 'Water Sharing Methods Among Farmers in the District of Tabriz During the Qajar Era' in Proceedings of the Second Iranology Conference (2004); 'The Role of the 29 Bahman Uprising in the Victory of the Islamic Revolution as Documented in the Materials of the National Archives' in Management of National Archives (2004).

Touraj Daryaee received his PhD in History from UCLA in 1999 and was appointed Assistant Professor of Ancient History at California State University, Fullerton in the same year. He is now Associate Professor of Ancient History and the Vice-Chair of the History Department at California State University, Fullerton. His interests and research include the history of ancient Persia, Armenia, Zoroastrianism and Old and Middle Iranian languages. He is the editor of Name-ye Iran-e Bastan, The International Journal of Ancient Iranian Studies and the online Bulletin of Ancient Iranian History. Some of his publications include: The Spirit of Wisdom (Menog i Xrad), Essays in Memory of Ahmad Tafazzoli, co-edited with M. Omidsalar (2004); Sahrestaniha io Eransahr, A Middle Persian Text on Late Antique Geography, Epic and History (2002); 'Sasanians and their Ancestors' in Societas Iranologica Europoea – Proceedings (2005); 'A Note on the Great Seal of King Peroz and Middle Persian Nycny' in Indo-Iranian Journal (2005); 'Two Recently Discovered Inscribed Sasanian Silver Bowls', with J. Lerner and D. Akbarzadeh, in Bulletin of the Asia Institute (2001, 2005); 'The 'Bow of Rustam' and the 'Gleaming Armor' of the Parthians: Notes on the Parthian Epic Ayadgar i Zareran' in Electrum (2005).

Olga M Davidson is currently Visiting Associate Professor in the Program of Middle Eastern Studies at Wellesley College. Her teaching interests centre on Persian and Arabic languages and literatures, comparative literature, and women's studies. She was Chair of the concentration in Islamic and Middle Eastern Studies, Brandeis University, 1992-97. Besides her academic duties, she has served as Chair of the Board, Ilex Foundation, since 1999. She is author of Poet and Hero in the Persian Book of Kings (1994) and Comparative Literature and Classical Persian Poetry (2000). The first book has been published in Persian translation as Sha'er va pahlavan dar Shahnameh (2000). She is also the author of several articles, including 'Formulaic Analysis of Samples Taken From the Shahnameh of Ferdowsi' in Oral Tradition (1988); 'The Haft Khwan Tradition as an Intertextual Phenomenon in Ferdowsi's Shahnameh' in C. A. Bromberg, B. Goldman, P. O. Skjaervo, and A. S.  Shahbazi eds  In Honor of Richard N Frye: Aspects of Iranian Culture Bulletin of the Asia Institute (1990); 'Women's Lament as Protest in the Persian Book of Kings' in G. R. G. Hambly ed. Women in the Medieval Islamic World (1998); 'The Text of Ferdowsi's Shahnameh and the Burden of the Past' in Journal of the American Oriental Society (1998).

Ali Dehbashi studied Persian literature and started his journalistic career in his youth, working with such literary and cultural magazines as Arash, Borj, Cheragh, Donya-ye Sokhan, and Adineh. In 1990, he founded Kelk, a prominent monthly magazine with a wide readership in Iran and abroad. Since September 1999, Ali Dehbashi has held the position of the editor-in-chief of Bukhara, a monthly magazine that covers a wide range of subjects in Iranian studies. So far 50 issues of Bukhara have been published, along with some theme issues on the life and works of some of the most renowned authors and poets, such as Rabidranath Tagore, Gunter Grass, Osip Mandelstam, Umberto Eco and Virginia Woolf. As Director of Shahab Publications, Dehbashi has published and/or edited 45 books, including: Travelogue of Mozaffar al-Din Shah to Europe (1982); Travelogue of Sherley Brothers (1983); Travelogue of Hajj Sayyah (1984); Letters of Jalal Al-e Ahmad (first volume, 1985); Correspondence of Kamal al-Molk (1987) and several memorial volumes on the life and works of Mohammad Ali Jamalzadeh (1998), Abdol Hosein Zarrinkub (1999), Fereidun Moshiri (1999), Sadeq Chubak (2001), Sadeq Hedayat (2001), and Bozorg Alavi (2005).

Bianca Devos is Research Associate and a PhD candidate at the University of Freiburg, Germany, where she coordinates the Digital Persian Archives database project. She received her MA in Islamic Studies and Economics in 2005. Her research interests focus on aspects of modernisation in the early Pahlavi period with a dissertation topic on press politics under Reza Shah. Her book Kleidungspolitik in Iran: Die Durchsetzung der Kleidungsvorschriften fuer Maenner unter Reza Schah is forthcoming. She has received a one-year scholarship to study at Tehran University by the German Academic Exchange Office (DAAD) in 2001-02 and a State of Baden-Wuerttemberg research grant to work in Iranian archives in 2004.

Andreas Dittmann teaches at the Department of Geography, the University of Bonn, Germany. His research interests focus on Human Geography, Social Geography, Development Geography, Cultural Geography, Geography of Violence, Time and Space Perceptions. His geographical interests include Northern Africa (Egypt, Libya), South and Central Asia (Afghanistan, Pakistan), and Southern Africa (Botswana, Namibia). Dr Dittmann's publications include 'Focusing Kabul. Afghanistan's Capital as a Chessboard of the New Great Game' in Geographische Rundschau International (2006); with G. J. Arez eds Kabul - Aspects of Urban Geography (2005); 'Das New Great Game der Aufbauhilfe in Afghanistan' in Petermanns Geographische Mitteilungen (2004); 'Segregation und Migration in staedtischen Zentren zwischen Hindukusch und Himalaya' in W. Gamerith, P. Messerli, P. Meusburger and H. Wanner eds. Alpenwelt - Gebirgswelten. Inseln, Bruecken, Grenzen. Tagungsbericht und wissenschaftliche Abhandlungen des 54. Deutschen Geographentags (2003); with J. Clemens, 'The Power of Maps and the War against Terrorism in Afghanistan. A critical Review of German News Maps', in Internationales Asienforum (2004).

David Durand-Guedy obtained his PhD from the University of Aix-en-Provence under the direction of J.-Cl. Garcin in 2004. He also graduated from the Ecole Normale Superieure and Ecole des Langues Orientales (INALCO). He was trained in Arabic at the French Research Institute in Damascus (IFEAD, now IFPO) and Sorbonne University. He benefited from a four-year doctorate fellowship at the French Research Institute in Iran (IFRI) and has lived in Tehran since 1999. Dr Durand-Guedy specialises in the history of pre-Mongol Iran, especially the Saljuq period. His PhD dealt with the history of Isfahan and the transformation of the local society during the Turkish domination (publication is forthcoming). His main research interests include urban elites, particularly in Western Iran; the attitude of the Turks toward city life, and cultural divides inside Iranian territory. He also works on Saljuq historiography, such as Imad al-Din's unpublished chronicle of the Saljuqs. He will be in Turkey for the year 2006-7. His most recent publications are: 'Iranians at War under Turkish Domination: The Example of Pre-Mongol Isfahan' in Iranian Studies (2005); 'Un fragment inedit de la chronique des Salguqides de Imad al-Din al-Isfahani: le chapitre sur Tag al-Mulk' in Annales Islamologiques (2005); 'Memoires d'exiles. Lecture de la chronique des Salguqides de Imad al-Din al-Isfahani' in Studia Iranica (2006).

Hormoz Ebrahimnejad received a BA in History from the University of Mashhad in 1980, after which he completed a Master's degree in Paris specialising in reformist movements and revolutionary doctrines. His MA dissertation was entitled 'Les doctrines revolutionnaires en Islam shiite' (1987). His PhD on the question of dynastic succession in Iran (1726-1834), completed at the Sorbonne (1995), focused particularly on the formation of state power in the 18th- and 19th century through an analysis of the kinship system of the reigning Qajar tribe that governed in Iran until 1925. His doctoral research has resulted in the publication of a book entitled Pouvoir et Succession en Iran (1999). The response of the nascent modern state in Iran to new epidemics forms the link between his study of the Qajar dynasty and his present interest in the history of medicine at large. Since 1998 he has been working on the process of medical modernistion in Iran with the support of the Wellcome Trust. He is currently Research Officer at the Wellcome Unit for the History of Medicine (Oxford).  His major publications on the history of medicine in Iran include Medicine, Public Health and the Qajar State: Patterns of Medical Modernization in Nineteenth-Century Iran (2004); 'Religion and Medicine in Iran: From Relationship to Dissociation' in History of Science (2002); 'Epidemie, medecine et politique dans l'Iran du XIXe siecle' in Studia Iranica (2001); 'Theory and Practice in Nineteenth Century Persian Medicine: Intellectual and Institutional reforms' in History of Science (2000).

Eckart Ehlers is Professor of Geography at the University of Bonn, Germany.  He was Secretary General of the International Geographical Union (IGU) 1992-2000, Chairman of the Scientific Committee of IHDP 1996-2001, Chairman of the German National Committee of Global Change Research 1996-2002, and honorary member of the Iranian Geographical Society. Since 1968 his research has focused on Iran. His publications include 8 monographs on topics of Iranian geography and approximately 100 scholarly articles in journals, including: Arabisch-Persischer Golf, Erdoelwirtschaft with Erhard Gabriel (1977); Iran : Ein Bibliographischer Forschungsbericht mit Kommentaren und Annotationen(1980);  Suedkaspisches Tiefland (Nordiran) und Kaspisches Meer(1971);Traditionelle und moderne Formen der Landwirtschaft in Iran (1975).

Kaveh Ehsani is a geographer and regional planner who has studied at Johns Hopkins University. Currently he is a Research Scholar at the University of Illinois in Chicago, a visiting professor at the Central European Univerity in Budapest, and a member of the editorial boards of the quarterly journals Goft-o-Gu (Dialogue) and Middle East Report. His current areas of research include post-revolution urban change in Iran, the sociology of declining post-industrial oil company towns; and the environmental impact of agro-industrial projects. Some of his recent publications are 'Democratic Struggle Under Siege: Nuclear Standoff and Mounting Repression in Iran' in Middle East Report Online (2006); 'Rural Society and Agricultural Development in Post-revolution Iran' in Critique (2006); 'Social Engineering and the Contradictions of Modernization in Khuzestan's Company Towns' in International Review of Social History (2003).

Parviz Ejlali received his BS in National Development from Shiraz University in 1977 and his MA in Social Science from Mazandaran University in 1987.  He earned his PhD in Sociology from Islamic Azad University in 1995. He worked as a social worker from 1982 until 1987, and as an official English translator from 1985 up to 1988 in Hamedan.  Since 1989 he joined the Management and Planning Organistion of Iran in Tehran, and since 2003 he has been a faculty member at the Institute of Management and Planning MPS), Tehran. Furthermore, since 1989 he has been a part-time lecturer in different social science faculties of Tehran, and for the time being he continues to teach as a part -time lecturer in Islamic Azad University in Tehran. His main publications (all in Persian) include Cultural Policy and Planning In Iran (2001), Irrational Man: Theories of Vilfredo Pareto (2002); Social Change and Popular Films in Iran (1930-1979) (2004).

Maryam Ekhtiar is a scholar and specialist in the field of later Persian art and culture. One of her particular areas of expertise is calligraphy.  She received her PhD from the Department of Middle Eastern Studies at New York University in 1994 and has worked and taught at various museums and universities in the United States, namely the Brooklyn Museum of Art, New York University and Swarthmore College. She served as Senior Research Associate for the exhibition, Royal Persian Paintings: The Qajar Epoch 1785-1925, and was co-editor and a major contributor to the catalogue.  In 2002 she was a Morgan Whitney Post-Doctoral Fellow at the Metropolitan Museum of Art and is currently Research Associate in the Islamic Department.

Parviz Emamzadeh Fard was born in Shiraz in 1952. He received his BA and MA degrees in political science from Texas A&M University in Kingsville, Texas, USA, and his PhD from Islamic Azad University in Tehran.  Since 1987, he has been a faculty member in the Faculty of  Law and Political Science, Islamic Azad University in Karaj, teaching the undergraduate course on the Persian Gulf and its problems and a graduate course on international relations. His research interests deal with the international system after the Cold War and the Persian Gulf region; globalistion and the Middle East countries; the American Middle East and Persian Gulf Policy; Israel and the 'Greater' Middle East. Some of his publications are: 'The Structure of American-Israeli Relations and the Extent of its Influence on Israeli Foreign Policy Decision-making' in Political Science Quarterly (2005); 'The US and UK Policies toward the Middle East Peace Process after the Cold War' in Studies on Europe, Special on the US-UK (2005); 'Foreign Policy Decision-making Patterns in the Arab Countries of the Persian Gulf' in Collection of Papers: Fifteenth International Conference of the Persian Gulf, March 2004 (2004).

Haleh Emrani was born in Tehran in 1963. Her elementary and secondary schooling was in Tehran. She obtained her MA in History with emphasis on Late Antique Near East from California State University, Fullerton in 2005 and is currently working towards her PhD in the same field at the UCLA.  Her concentration is on the position of women in late Sasanian and early Islamic Iran, as well as the religious issues of the time. She has also created and is maintaining the following professional websites: www.sasanika.com – Sasanika: Late Antique Near East Project; www.IranAncientHistory.com – Bulletin of Iranian Ancient History.  Her publications include a review of Jamsheed K. Choksy, Evil, Good, and Gender: Facets of the Feminine in Zoroastrian Religious History in Nameye Iran-e Bastan: The International Journal of Ancient Iranian Studies (2006).

Anisseh Van Engeland-Nourai is a jurist and a political analyst.  She holds a PhD from the Institut d'Etudes Politiques, a Master in Laws from Harvard Law School, a Master in International Relations from Université Paris II – Assas, and a Master's in Iranian Studies from Paris III --Sorbonne. She was previously a research assistant on terrorism, a research assistant on Islamic law and a visiting researcher on human rights at Harvard Law School. She has worked for NGOs around the world on issues such as capacity building, advocacy, women empowerment, refugees and immigration. Her field of expertise are international human rights, human rights in Iran, international humanitarian law, Islamic humanitarian law, refugees' issues, terrorism and torture. She has published articles in all these fields and is a consultant for several universities, research centres and think tanks worldwide. She is now an ICRC delegate. Her publications include: 'Torture and High Coercive Interrogations: Is there a Line under International Law?' in International Studies Journal (2006); 'Islamic Humanitarian Law and International Humanitarian Law: Two Visions of Just World?' in International Studies Journal (2006).

Kouross Esmaeli, the director of The Legacy of the Imam, is a visual artist currently living in the United States.  The Legacy of the Imam is a documentary that charts Iran's contemporary transsexual rights movement and is based on one of the five pieces that he produced in 2006 for the US-based network, Current TV. Before turning his attention to the visual arts, Mr Esmaeili studied modern Arabic and Persian literature at New York's Columbia University with intermittent residences and studies in Paris, Cairo and Tehran. His translations of contemporary Persian prose can be found in the PEN Anthology of Contemporary Iranian Literature, Strange Times My Dear. After leaving graduate school, he made his first film in 2000. Whistle has been shown at various US and international film festivals and was recently included in After the Revolution: Contemporary Artists from Iran at Koldo Mitxelena Museum in San Sebastian, Spain and Kunstforeningen in Denmark. At NewYork's independent video collective, Paper Tiger Television, Mr Esmaeli helped produce two videos related to the events of 9/11/2001, Turning Tragedy into War and Who's Paying the Price? In 2003 he travelled to Iraq to co-produce a documentary for MTV on life from the perspective of young Iraqis and American soldiers.  His photographs from Iraq, Greetings without Flowers, exhibited in New York and Boston, have travelled the United States with the anti-war exhibit, Eyes Wide Open. He is currently dividing his time between New York and Boston where he teaches video, photography, and film studies at the New England Institute of Art.

Mansoureh Ettehadieh obtained her PhD in 1979 from the University of Edinburgh. She taught history in the department of history of the University of Tehran from 1963 to 2000. She is the founder of the publishing house Nashr-e Tarikh-e Iran, which specialises in the history of the Qajar period. She is the author of Peydayesh va tahavvol-e ahzab-e siyasi-e mashrutiyat (2002); Majles va entekhabat az mashruteh ta payan-e Qajariyeh (1996); Zendegani-ye siyasi Reza Qoli Khan Nezam al-Saltaneh (2000); editor of the second and third volumes of Reza Qoli Khan Nezam al-Saltaneh, surat-e jalesat-e dowlat-e movaqqat (2000) and Reza Qoli Khan Nezam al-Saltaneh, mokatebat va moraselat (2000), Inja Tehran ast, majmu'eh-ye maqalat darbareh-ye Tehran (1998). She has also written two novels Zendegi bayad kard (1997) and Zendegi khali nist (1999). She is currently engaged in working on a recently acquired booklet, which is the register of Sheikh Fazlallah Nuri and contains over 1400 transactions. The subject matter of these transactions cover a wide range of social and judicial questions of great importance for the social history of the late Qajar period and are being analysed and prepared for publication.

Nasser Fakouhi is associate professor and a member of the Department of Anthropology, Faculty of Social Sciences, University of Tehran. He was Head of this Department from 2004 to 2005. A PhD holder in Political Anthropology from the University of Paris in 1993, Dr Fakouhi returned to Iran the same year. He is the ex-president of the Anthropological Society of Iran and a current member of Board of the Directors of the Iranian Sociological Association. He is working presently, in the framework of a group of different anthropologists and specialists on Iran, to create an International Society of Iranian Anthropology. His fields of interest are ethnicity, development and political Studies. His geographical focus has been on the western part of Iran (Luristan and Kurdistan). During the last decade Fakouhi has striven to renovate the field of Iranian anthropology and to incorporate into it modern subjects, i.e., urban anthropology, economic and political problems of Iranian cities. Dr Fakouhi has published many books and papers in scientific journals. Some of his books are Political Violence, Theories, Forms and Solutions (1998); Political Mythology, Art and Power (1999); From Culture to Development (2000); Anthropological Theories (2002); Urban Anthropology (2004); Labyrinth of Globalization (2005). Two of his forthcoming works are Visual Anthropology, A Reader (2006) and Anthropological Short Essays (2006). Fakouhi has also a very active presence in the media and the public intellectual life of Iran.

Samira Farahani received her BA in Social Communication-Journalism from the Islamic Azad University of Tehran in 1998. She has since been active in various capacities with several professional NGOs, and has acted as a consultant for community development issues with relevant organisations, especially in the fields of environment and sustainable development. Her publications have appeared in GFI newsletter, CAWTAR, FRW organization monthly, Ava monthly. She has also published a book entitled What We Learned, which documented the output of the Community Empowerment - Mangrove Conservation Project. She has presented conference papers at National and international events like: Land Reform and its Impacts on Natural Resources of Iran, WFAR, Valencia, 2004; CE for Mangrove Conservation, International Workshop on the Asiatic Cheetah Conservation, Iran, 2004; Development Projects Impacts on Poverty Reduction, IRDEPs Workshop, Phnom Penh, 2004; MDF5, Beirut, 2005. She is currently affiliated with the Afghanistan programme of Ockenden International as a senior community development advisor.

Mahdi Farhani-Monfared is Professor of History at al-Zahra University in Tehran. He received his MA from Ferdowsi University of Mashhad (1991) and his PhD from Tarbiat-e Modarres University, Tehran (1999). His research interests include the history of medieval Iran. His most recent publications are: Emigration of Shiite Scholars from Jabal Amel to Iran under the Safavids (1999); Politics and Culture at the End of the Timurid and Early Safavid Period (1468-1505) (2002), both in Persian.

Edward K Faridany received his BA in Economics and Political Science from the University of California, Berkeley (1963), his MA (1966) in Middle East Studies, and his MBA (1967) from Harvard University. In the first phase of his professional life he worked at OPEC in Vienna, at the Economist Intelligence Unit in London, and various oil companies. He then became an independent scholar pursuing his interests in Iran which has culminated in his current research interest is in the commercial and diplomatic activities of Robert Sherley and those closely associated with him, from his initial journey to Iran in 1598 until his death there in 1628.

Mohsen Farsani teaches Persian Language at the Association Philotechnique in Paris (2005-2006).  He is currently a PhD candidate at the Sorbonne Nouvelle, and his dissertation is entitled 'Etymological and Lexicological Studies of the Iranian Language'.   His research interests focus on lamentation of the Bakhtiari nomads of Iran, poems and songs of the Bakhtiari nomads of Iran, a comparison of the oral poetry of the Bakhtiari, traditional songs and dances of the Bakhtiari of Iran, stone lions in the Bakhtiari tribe and other Iranian tribes. His publications include Divan-e Molla Zolf-Ali Bakhtiari (1995); Zabanshenasi chist? (1995); Lamentations chez les nomades bakhtiari d'Iran (2002-2003); Analysis of the Persian Poem (1993, in Persian).   He is also working on a dictionary of the Bakhtiari language, for which he has so far assembled 50,000 entries.

Maryam Farzaneh studied at the Islamic Azad University in Shahr-e Rey, where she received a BA in History in 1990. She received an MA in post-Islamic Iranian History from Islamic Azad University, Science and Research Branch in 2000. Her current research covers women's education, women's cultural organistions and women's clothing during the government of Reza Shah. Her publications include 'The Effect of Nader Shah's Disease on his Role as Ruler' in Roshd-e Tarikh (2005); and 'Preliminary Practical Actions for Establishing Shir-o-Khorshid-e Sorkh' in Payam-e Helal (forthcoming).

Mateo Mohammad Farzaneh was born in Ahvaz and spent his elementary and middle school years in that city, but was forced to move to his ancestral city of Isfahan in 1980 upon the onset of the Iran-Iraq War.  Volunteering as a Red Crescent junior medic and the Mobilistion Force (Basij) in Isfahan, he was involved in the war efforts from the age of 14-16.  In 1984 he moved to the United States where he finished his high school education and attended college studying Nursing and Health Care Management.  Working as a healthcare professional for over seven years, Mr Farzaneh followed his passion to study history and received both his BA and MA in History from California State University, Fullerton, and is currently a PhD Candidate in University of California, Santa Barbara.  An active member of the UCSB's Center for Middle East Studies, he mentors the undergraduate class and the Model Arab League and teaches different history classes in the area.  He is the founder of Asturias International Record Company, an independent record corporation, and the creator of the Maze Called the Middle East, a one-day seminar about culture, politics, and Middle Eastern societies.

Sasan Fatemi received his PhD in Ethnomusicology from the Universite de Paris X - Nanterre. His thesis is entitled 'Light Urban Music in Iranian Culture: Reflections on the Notions of Classical and Popular'. He is a lecturer in Ethnomusicology at University of Tehran and his research interests focus on the folk music (urban and rural) of Iran, Central Asia and Azerbaijan; nursery rhymes of Iran; general classification of music (folk/classical/popular); music and festivities. His publications include: 'Le chanteur silencieux, un aprercu de la vie musicale en Iran' in CEMOTI, (2000); 'Music, Festivity, and Gender in Iran from the Qajar to the Early Pahlavi Period' in Iranian Studies (2005); Musiqi va zendegi-ye Musiqiya 'i dar Mazandaran (2002); Ritm-e kudadan dar Iran (2003).

Schirin Fathi is currently employed as an Hochschulassistent (equivalent to Assistant Professor) at the Department of the History and Culture of the Middle East  (Hamburg University, Asia-Africa Institute). She received her PhD in Islamic Studies from Hamburg University (1993) and her MA in Middle Eastern Studies and Economic Development from George Washington University (1983). Dr Fathi graduated in International Relations from George Washington University (1981). She was a research fellow in the Europe in the Middle East: Political Key Concepts in the Dialogue of Cultures Programme at the Van Leer Jerusalem Institute. She had also a three-year stay in Jordan with the Friedrich-Ebert Foundation to conduct research for her PhD. She was employed at the World Bank and free-lance worker on documentary films. Her research interests include transnational Islamic reception, Arab nationalism, Arab-Israeli conflict, liberalistion and transition in the Middle East, conspiracy theories. Her recent relevant publications include: Jordan - An Invented Nation? Tribe-State Dynamics and the Formation of National Identity (1994); Cosmopolitanism and Cultural Specificity: The Case of Jordan (1999); Nahostlexikon. Der israelisch-palastinensische Konflikt von A-Z (2001); 'Jordanian Survival Strategy: The Election Law as a “Safety Valve”' in Middle Eastern Studies (2005); 'The Evolving Arab Reception of the Holocaust and Palestinian Textbooks: A Contribution to Democracy and Peace Education?' in M. al-Haj, R. Mielke, I. Du Bois and N. Smidt eds Education, Multiculturalism and Empowerment: Israeli and German Perspectives (2006).

Nematollah Fazeli received his PhD in Social Anthropology from SOAS in 2004; his thesis was entitled 'Anthropology and Political Discourses in Twentieth Century Iran', and he is now a full time lecturer at Allameh Tabataba'i University, Tehran. He obtained his BA in Sociology from the University of Tabriz in 1988 and his MA in Social Anthropology from the University of Tehran in 1991. His main fields of interest are social anthropology and cultural studies. He has carried out research on higher education, contemporary Iranian culture, and the history of anthropology in Iran. His current research focuses on ethnography, social anthropology, politics of culture, cultural change, knowledge studies and contemporary Iranian and British culture. Dr Fazeli's publications include 'Barrasi-ye mardomnegari  va tatbiqi-ye farhang-e daneshgahi dar Iran va Britania'  in Nameh-ye Ensanshenasi (2004); 'Mardomnegari-ye farhang-e naqd dar olume ejtema'i-ye Iran” Ketab Mah-e Olume Ejtema'i.  (2002); 'Mardomnegari tamashachian film-e dokhtara-e farari' Ensanshenasi (2001); 'Jelveha-ye mardomshenakhti-ye farhang-e Iran' in Sima-ye farhangi-ye Iran (2001).

Christiane Fellbaum received her PhD in Linguistics from Princeton University. She is a Senior Research Scientist in the Cognitive Science Laboratory at Princeton. Her work focuses on computational linguistics and lexical semantics. She is a co-developer of WordNet, a large lexical database. She is a founder and current president of the Global WordNet Association.

Ali Ferdowsi holds a PhD in Sociology from the University of Pennsylvania and is currently an Associate Professor and Chair in the Department of History and Political Science at Notre Dame de Namur University in Belmont, California. His research interests are related to the intellectual history of Iran in the Islamic period. Dr Ferdowsi's publications include 'Haj Sayyah and the Encumbrance of Attachment' in Iran Nameh (2001); 'Raw Desire: The Litany of Revolutionary Hangover in Iran' in Iran Nameh (1998).

Behrang Foroughi is a PhD Candidate and a research associate at the Ontario Institute of Studies in Education of the University of Toronto. His research area is adult education and community development; examining the citizenship learning aspect of participatory community development in Iran, India and Canada. He has been working with UNICEF and UNDP-funded rural development projects in Iran prior to working with the International Development and Relief Foundation and the City of Toronto in Canada. He has been actively involved in organistion and coordination of major events of the Iranian Association at the University of Toronto (IAUT). He has also been reporting the Iranian stories of the multicultural Toronto through his column in Shahrvand.

Babak Fozooni obtained his first degree in Psychology from the University of Keele. He completed a Master's in Research Methods in Psychology (University of Reading), followed by a Master's in Critical Psychology (University of Reading) and a Masters' in Film and Television Studies (University of Westminster). He received his PhD in Psychology from Manchester Metropolitan University. He has taught at Manchester Metropolitan University and the University of East London. His published works include articles on cinema, football and the politics of the Middle East, such as 'All Translators are Bastards!' in South African Journal of Psychology  (2006); 'A Critique of the Iranian Psy-Complex' in Annual Review of Critical Psychology  (2006); 'Kiarostami Debunked!' in New Cinemas (2005); 'Religion, Politics and Class: Conflict and Contestation in the Development of Football in Iran' in  Soccer & Society  (2004). His current interests include Critical Psychology, Vygotsky and Bakhtin.

Ali Gheissari is Professor of History at the University of San Diego, specialising in the intellectual and political history of modern Iran. He studied at the Faculty of Law and Political Science of the University of Tehran, and at St Antony's College, Oxford. He has held visiting appointments at the University of Tehran, the Oriental Institute at Oxford, UCLA, and Brown University. Selected publications include Democracy in Iran: History and the Quest for Liberty, with Vali Nasr (2006); Iranian Intellectuals in the Twentieth Century (1998); Persian Translation of Immanuel Kant's Groundwork of the Metaphysic of Ethics, with Hamid Enayat (1991); 'Poetry and Politics of Farrokhi Yazdi' in Iranian Studies (1993); 'Truth and Method in Modern Iranian Historiography and Social Sciences' in Critique (1995); 'Critique of Ideological Literature: A Review of Intellectual and Doctrinaire Writings in Iran' in Iran Nameh (1994); 'Modernity and Nationalism in the Literature of the late-Qajar and early-Pahlavi Iran (1921-1941)' in Iran Nameh (2000); 'Iran's Democracy Debates' with Vali Nasr, in Middle East Policy (2004); 'Despots of the World Unite! Satire in the Persian Constitutional Press: Introducing Majalleh-ye Estebdad, 1907-1908' in Comparative Studies of South Asia, Africa and the Middle East (2005); 'Merchants without Frontier: Trade, Travel, and a Revolution in late Qajar Iran' in R. Farmanfarmaian ed. War and Peace in Qajar Persia: Implications Past and Present (forthcoming).

Elham Gheytanchi teaches Sociology at Santa Monica College, California. She earned her BA (1995) and an MA (1998) in Sociology from UCLA. She completed PhD courses in Sociology at UCLA in 2001. Her MA thesis entitled 'Civil Society in Iran: Politics of Motherhood and Public Sphere' was published in the International Sociology Journal (2001). Her field of research has been women in post-revolutionary Iran. Her other publications are 'Chronology of Events Regarding Women in Iran since the Revolution of 1979' (appendix to Nikki Keddie's article) in Social Research Journal (2000); 'Women in the Islamic Iranian Public' in N. Gole and L. Ammaneds. Islam in Public: Turkey, Iran, and Europe (2006). In addition to sociological research, Ms Gheytanchi has written literary reviews and criticism on contemporary Iranian literature in the Persian Book Review Journal, Karnameh and Iranian.com. Born and raised in Tehran, Iran, Ms Gheytanchi has also been a consultant to various broadcasting companies and radio programmes in the USA and Europe.

Mehrdad Ghodrat-Dizaji is Assistant Professor of Ancient Iranian History at Urmia University. He received his PhD in Ancient Iranian History from Tehran University (2005). His thesis was about Adurbadagan during the Sasanian Period and was conducted under the supervision of Dr Shirin Bayani and Dr Zhaleh Amuzegar. He also received an MA degree from the same university (1995) and his MA thesis dealt with the scientific and cultural movementof Iran in the sixth century.  His research interests are: Sasanian Iran, especially historical geography and historiography and the historiography of Ancient Iran. Some of his publications are: 'Afrasiyab' in The Great Islamic Encyclopaedia (2000); 'Tarikh-e mokhtasar-e al-Dowal' in Encyclopaedia of the World of Islam (2002); Sasanian Iran (forthcoming).

Eshrat Gholipour was born in 1951 in Masjed Soleiman, Iran. She has been trained as a teacher in social science. Ms Gholipour has taught in various institutions in Iran including the Education Ministry (1972-2002) and the Tehran Training and Educating Centre (Children jail). She was a  member of the board of directors of the Children Rights Support Assembly and manager of the Children Rights Support Assembly Journal. In between 2002-2005 she was the manager of Shush Children House and manager of the 'Making Powerful Children'project which addresses the problems of children in difficult situations, with an emphasis on street children. Since 2005 she has been the executive manager of the Omid Mehr Foundation which focuses on helping disadvantaged young girls and women in Iran by strengthening the social, emotional, and economic competencies of these girls and by providing them with a sense of self-worth and opportunities to experience a full range of life options through self-empowerment, education and training.

Gad Gilbar holds degrees from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem (BA 1969) and the School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London (PhD 1974). He is Professor of Economic History (Middle East) and head of the Tujjar Project at the University of Haifa. He served as Rector and Pro-Rector of the University of Haifa (1997-2000, 2001-2004). He has been a visiting scholar / professor at several universities and research institutions in the United States, including Harvard, Lehigh and RAND. In Israel he was senior research fellow at the Dayan Center (Tel Aviv University) and fellow of the Institute of Advanced Studies (Hebrew University). He served as a member of Israel's Council for Higher Education (1990-95) and participated in the Israel-Jordan economic cooperation talks (1993-95). He has published books and articles on the economic history of Qajar Iran; the history of Islamic entrepreneurship; and the political economy and demography of the contemporary Middle East. His books include: Ottoman Palestine 1800-1914: Studies in Economic and Social History (ed.) (1990); Population Dilemmas in the Middle East (1996); The Middle East Oil Decade and Beyond (1997); Competing Commercial Networks in the Mediterranean (forthcoming); 'The Muslim big merch