Faculty and Staff

John Meloy - Director                                                             Professor John Meloy received his Ph.D. in History at the University of Chicago in 1998. Since 2004 he has been an Associate Professor at the Department of History and Archaeology, at AUB. Between 2004 and 2006, he was the director of CAMES , and is the director of CAMES for the . Professor Meloy’s research focuses mainly on the history of the pre-modern Islamic world and in particular the Middle Periods of Islamic history, ca. 1000 to ca. 1500.

His recent publications include: "Economic Intervention and the Political Economy of the Mamluk State under al-Ashraf Barsbay." Mamluk Studies Review 9:2 (2005); "Celebrating the Mahmal: The Rajab Festival in Fifteenth Century Cairo." History and Historiography of Post-Mongol Central Asia and the Middle East, ed. J. Pfeiffer and S. Quinn. Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz (2006); "The Privatization of Protection: Extortion and the State in the Circassian Mamluk Period." The Journal of the Economic and Social History of the Orient 47:2 (2004): 1-18; "Imperial Strategy and Political Exigency: The Red Sea Spice Trade and the Mamluk Sultanate in the Fifteenth Century." Journal of the American Oriental Society 123:1 (2003): 1-19.

Tarif Khalidi - Shaykh Zayid Professor of Arabic and Islamic Studies
Between 1996 and 2002 Professor Khalidi was the Sir Thomas Adams' Professor of Arabic and Fellow of King's College, Cambridge. He was also Director of the Center for Middle Eastern Studies at the school. His principal field of interest is pre-Ottoman cultural history of the Arab world.

At the start of the 2002-03 academic year, Professor Khalidi returned to AUB taking on the post of The Shaykh Zayid Professor of Arabic and Islamic Studies. Professor Khalidi had been a faculty member at AUB for over 25 years before leaving the university. He received degrees from University College, Oxford (BA, Modern History, 1960; MA, 1963) and the University of Chicago (PhD, Islamic Studies, 1970).

Among his recent publications are: Arabic Historical Thought in the Classical Period (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1994) and The Muslim Jesus (Cambridge, Mass: Harvard University Press, 2001) and The Quran: A Translation (Penguin Books, 2008).  While at AUB, Professor Khalidi will be working on two scholarly projects: a biography of the Prophet Mohammad for Random House and an introduction to Arab social history for Cambridge University Press.

Aliya Saidi - Assistant Director
Aliya Saidi received her Ph.D. from King's College, University of Cambridge, in Oriental Studies in 2001 and joined CAMES soon afterwards. She has a background in Modern Middle Eastern Studies and specialized in the role of women in Medieval Islam. As the Assistant Director at CAMES, she coordinates student affairs and the center's activities, lectures, conferences, and publications, in addition to being the academic advisor for CAMES students.

Fawwaz Traboulsi - Visiting Professor (Fall 2009-2010)

Rosemary Sayigh - Visiting Professor (Fall 2009-2010)

Nina Ghattas - Administrative Assistant
Nina Ghattas has been with CAMES for the past 35 years, providing support for the faculty and students of the Center.