History

Harvard’s Center for Middle Eastern Studies (CMES) is widely recognized as having one of the largest and most distinguished concentrations of Middle Eastern and Islamic scholars anywhere in the world. Founded in 1954 to further the systematic study of a vital, but at that time largely unknown, part of the world, it was the first center of its kind in the United States. The Center’s original mandate covered both the classical and modern aspects of the region, but its interests evolved to include Islamic societies and cultures worldwide. The establishment of the Prince Alwaleed Bin Talal Islamic Studies Program (AISP) at Harvard University in 2005 allowed CMES to return its primary focus on its original regional mandate, while still having the flexibility to partner with AISP, and others at Harvard, in joint programming focused on Islam in the Middle East and North Africa. From the start CMES has been responsible for teaching (PhD and AM programs) as well as research. The Center is a primary source of intellectual and material support within Harvard for scholarly pursuits covering the vast area between Morocco and Iran, and beyond.

Soon after its inception and under the directorship of the eminent Arabist Hamilton Gibb (from 1957 to 1966), the Center witnessed rapid growth in faculty and students, along with a variety of programs such as visiting fellowships and specialized publications. The dominant emphasis of CMES in the humanities, particularly history, became firmly rooted in this period, though it has never been an exclusive emphasis. In the 1970s, for example, the Center focused seriously on energy policy and development planning.

In the late 1980s and 1990s, the Center undertook major initiatives to broaden its horizons beyond the Middle East to encompass the larger realm of Islam. At the same time, it was instrumental in significantly expanding Harvard’s resources in Iranian and Turkish studies, along with modern Middle Eastern history and modern Arabic language instruction. CMES also launched research projects in areas ranging from Ottoman court records and Iranian oral history to Islamic finance and contemporary Arab studies, some of which continue today.

In 2004, on the occasion of its 50th anniversary, the Center committed itself to a determined effort to balance its traditional strengths in the humanities and the pre-modern era with a greater focus on the social sciences and contemporary issues. This commitment expanded Harvard’s teaching and research on the contemporary Middle East, and moved beyond area-specific frameworks of inquiry in favor of approaches that are interdisciplinary, transregional, and transnational in scope.

In the fall of 2011, at the beginning of a period of unprecedented transformation in the region, CMES convened the Working Group on the Transformative Movements of the Arab World. The group, composed of prominent local scholars from Harvard, MIT, Boston University, Brown University, Northeastern University, and experts from the region, met regularly to read, discuss, and learn from new research exploring the pre-history of the movements for change, cultural resource mobilization, and changes in society-government relations that, since January 2011, have been transforming the conceptions of state, politics, society, and culture in the Arab World.

In 2017, CMES opened its first international office, in Tunis, Tunisia, with the generous support of Harvard College alumnus Hazem Ben-Gacem ’92. Since its founding, the Tunis office has hosted well over 100 Harvard University students and faculty, and has sponsored lectures, seminars, workshops, and conferences attended by Harvard, Tunisian, and other participants from around the MENA region and the world.