News

The Center for Middle East and Islamic Studies at UNC is proud to join the NC Arabic Teachers' Council in presenting the 2025 Arab American Heritage Festival! All are invited to enjoy an evening filled with art and food from across the Arab world. The event will include poetry recitations, [...]

Due to forecasted inclement weather, this event has been postponed. This page will be updated to reflect a new date later in March. At that time, we will celebrate the work of UNC graduate students and staff. The event will feature the research of Georgina Gamayel, PhD student in the [...]

Please visit this webpage for more details closer to the event date.

This webpage will be updated closer to the date of the event.

Join us in celebrating Arab American Heritage Month on April 10th starting at 3:30pm. This event will be held at Al-Iman School in Raleigh (address: 3020 Ligon St, Raleigh, NC 27607). This webpage will be updated closer to the event.

Ramadan Mubarak! Please join UNC’s Muslim Students Association for an Iftar celebration supported by the Center for Middle East and Islamic Studies and Carolina Asia Center. Dinner has been generously donated by Med Deli. The event will take place in the atrium of the Fed Ex Global Education Center. Please [...]

Please join us on Feb 18 for a meet and greet with Yusuf Sezgin, a PhD candidate in the Department of History. Yusuf’s reasearch interests include “decolonization, postcolonialism, the ideas of religion, social justice and liberation in the Global South, Christian and Muslim liberation theologies, and contemporary Muslim political thought.”

Graduate students who plan to submit conference paper proposals to MESA, AAR, and other conferences with submission deadlines in February and March, are invited to attend a conference paper proposal party! Gather together to brainstorm and begin the process of writing your conference paper proposal.    

Memories & Futures in Middle East Studies–Temporalities, Nostalgias, Anxieties   Description: This interdisciplinary conference of North Carolina-based scholars of the Middle East studies aims to illuminate the complex interplay between memory and futurity, fostering critical conversations about how historical narratives and collective memories shape contemporary realities and future possibilities in [...]

On April 2, Professor Lior Sternfeld (Pennsylvania State University) will be giving a lecture on "How WWII Changed Iran’s Social, Political, and Cultural Landscape: Nationalism, Political Participation, and Anti-Semitism".   During World War II, millions of refugees fled their homes and were displaced across Europe, central Asia, and the Middle [...]

Please join the Persian Studies Program and the Center for Middle East and Islamic Studies for a Nowruz celebration featuring artwork by UNC Studio Art Graduate Student, Rojano Mohammadzadeh. “Metamorphosis” showcases a recurring motif in the artist’s work: the feminine figure with a beak, a long neck, and a form [...]

Dr. Amal Eqeiq will be joining the Center for Middle East and Islamic Studies on March 20th to discuss “Brush Strokes of Global Dissent: On South-South Solidarities.” Dr. Eqeiq is Chair of Arabic Studies and Associate Professor of Comparative Literature at Williams College. Her lecture will be based on work [...]