Amir Moosavi
About
Amir Moosavi is an assistant professor in the Department of English at Rutgers University-Newark. He holds a PhD in Middle East and Islamic studies from New York University. His research and teaching interests center around Arabic and Persian literatures, with a focus on modern and contemporary fiction. His publications have appeared in the International Journal of Middle East Studies, Middle East Critique, Alif, and Iran Namag, among other venues. In 2021, he co-edited Losing Our Minds, Coming to Our Senses: Sensory Readings of Persian Literature and Culture (Leiden UP, 2021). During his fellowship year with ISGRJ he will complete his book manuscript titled Dust That Never Settled: Afterlives of the Iran-Iraq War in Arabic and Persian Literatures and two articles related to a second project on cultural representations of the late Cold War era in the Middle East.
Publications & Speaking Engagements
Publications
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“Sonic Triggers and Fiery Pools: The Senses at War in Hossein Abkenar’s Scorpion in Losing Our Minds, Coming to Our Senses (Leiden University Press, 2021)
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“Desacralizing a Sacred Defense: The Iran-Iraq War in the fiction of Hossein Mortezaeian Abkenar” Iran Namag (Fall 2020)
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New Books Feature: “Losing Our Minds, Coming to Our Senses” with M. Khorrami, for TRAFO – Blog for Transregional Research, May 3, 2022, https://trafo.hypotheses.org/37120
Media Appearances/Speaking Engagements:
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Iraq: 20 Years After the U.S. Invasion
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“Mourning Mothers and Never-ending Wars: Animals and the Environment in Nasim Mara’shi’s Haras,” paper presented at European Congress of Iranian Studies, Leiden, Netherlands, August 2023
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“Collecting Fragments: An Arabic-Persian Translation Workshop,” workshop for Arabic and Persian language students at Bard College
Organizations/Accomplishments/Upcoming Projects
Previous Organizations:
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Brown University
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Forum Transregionale Studien
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New York University
Accomplishments:
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PI UISFL Grant
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NEH Grant
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Mellon/Volkswagen Foundation Fellow
Upcoming Projects:
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Dust That Never Settled: Afterlives of the Iran-Iraq War in Arabic and Persian Literatures (book manuscript, in progress for submission to Stanford University Press, October 2023)
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“War and Relation: Reading the 1980s across the War Literatures of Lebanon and Iran” (in progress for Middle Eastern Literatures)
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“Mourning Mothers and Wars that Never End: reading Nasim Marʿashi’s Haras in the shadow of the Iran-Iraq War” (forthcoming in the British Journal of Middle Eastern Studies)
How Do Social and Racial Justice Concerns Appear in Your Work?
My work deals with artistic reckonings with violent pasts (wars, social violence, and environmental ruin).
ISGRJ Project: Undergraduate International Studies and Foreign Language (UISFL)
UISFL is a Department of Education grant that provides funding to plan, develop, and carry out programs to strengthen and improve undergraduate instruction in international studies and foreign languages.
Professors Mayte Green-Mercado and Amir Moosavi were awarded this grant to develop the Arabic Language Initiative (ALI) at Rutgers University-Newark which aims at expanding Arabic Language instruction, courses on Middle Eastern history, politics, society, and culture, as well as study abroad and service-learning opportunities for Rutgers-Newark undergraduate students. The Arabic Language Initiative will also launch a lecture series devoted to exploring questions of human displacement and transitional justice.