Dr. Sonja Mejcher-Atassi is Assistant Professor in the Civilization Sequence Program at the American University of Beirut. She studied Comparative Literature and Arabic Studies at the Free University of Berlin (MA 2000) and Oriental Studies at Oxford University (DPhil 2005). Her research interests are in modern and contemporary literature and art in the Arab world, interrelations of word and image, book art, collection and museum studies, cultural memory and history.

Her publications include: Reading across Modern Arabic Literature and Art. Three Case Studies: ‘Abd al-Rahman Munif, Jabra Ibrahim Jabra and Etel Adnan (Wiesbaden: Reichert, Literaturen im Kontext 34, 2012); (ed. together with John Pedro Schwartz), Museums, Archives and Collecting Practices in the Modern Arab World (Fernham: Ashgate, 2012); "Contemporary Book Art in the Middle East: The Book as Document in Iraq," in: Art History 35/5 (2012); "On the Necessity of Writing the Present. Elias Khoury and ‘the Birth of the Novel’ in Lebanon," in: Angelika Neuwirth, Andreas Pflitsch and Barbara Winckler (eds.), Arabic Literature. Postmodern Perspectives (London: Saqi, 2010), reprinted in: Twentieth Century Literary Criticism (Gale/Cengage Learning, vol. 262, 2012); "The Forbidden Paradise. How Etel Adnan Learned to Paint in Arabic," in: Angelika Neuwirth, Andreas Pflitsch and Barbara Winckler (eds.), Arabic Literature. Postmodern Perspectives (London: Saqi, 2010); (ed.), Writing a ‘Tool for Change’: ‘Abd al-Rahman Munif Remembered, MIT Electronic Journal of Middle East Studies 7 (2007); Geschichten über Geschichten: Erinnerung im Romanwerk von Elias Khoury (Wiesbaden: Reichert, Literaturen im Kontext 8, 2001).

Courses taught at AUB:

FAAH 150 Survey of Art

CVSP 201 Ancient Near East and Classical Civilizations

CVSP 202 Medieval, Islamic and Renaissance Civilizations

CVSP 203 Enlightenment and Modernity

CVSP 204 Contemporary Studies

CVSP 208G Gender and Cultural Production (pre-modern to modern)

CVSP 250 Introduction to Art Appreciation: Changing Notions of Art and Artist

CVSP 251 Civilization through the Arts: Modern Art’s Many Faces: The Arab World

MEST 316D Contemporary Art in the Middle East