Cemal Kafadar (born 1954) is Professor of History and the

Vehbi Koç Ahmet Vehbi Koç (20 July 1901 – 25 February 1996) was a Turkish entrepreneur and philanthropist who founded the Koç Group, one of Turkey’s largest groups of companies. During his lifetime he came to be one of Turkey's wealthiest citiz ...

Professor of Turkish Studies in the

Harvard University Department of History The Department of History at Harvard University (also known as the Harvard History Department) is a department of history located in Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States. The school offers bachelor's degrees in history, master's degrees in his ...

. He is an honorary member of the

Turkish Historical Society The Turkish Historical Society ( tr, Türk Tarih Kurumu, TTK) is a research society studying the history of Turkey and the Turkish people, founded in 1931 by the initiative of Mustafa Kemal Atatürk, with headquarters in Ankara, Turkey. It has been ...

. Kafadar graduated from

Robert College The American Robert College of Istanbul ( tr, İstanbul Özel Amerikan Robert Lisesi or ), often shortened to Robert, or RC, is a highly selective, independent, co-educational high school in Turkey.The Turkish education system divides schools ...

, then Hamilton College, and received his PhD from the

McGill University Institute of Islamic Studies The McGill University Institute of Islamic Studies and the Islamic Studies Library were established in 1952 by Wilfred Cantwell Smith, and since 1983 both have been housed in Morrice Hall on McGill's campus in downtown Montreal, Quebec. McGill's in ...

in 1987 and taught for two years in Princeton's

Near Eastern The ''Near East''; he, המזרח הקרוב; arc, ܕܢܚܐ ܩܪܒ; fa, خاور نزدیک, Xāvar-e nazdik; tr, Yakın Doğu is a geographical term which roughly encompasses a transcontinental region in Western Asia, that was once the hist ...

Studies department before going to Harvard. Kafadar teaches seminars related to popular culture, hagiography and Ottoman historiography as well as the early modern history of the Middle East and

Balkans The Balkans ( ), also known as the Balkan Peninsula, is a geographical area in southeastern Europe with various geographical and historical definitions. The region takes its name from the Balkan Mountains that stretch throughout the who ...

. He is a member of the editorial board of th
Historians of the Ottoman Empire
and was a member of the jury of the

Antalya Golden Orange Film Festival The Antalya Golden Orange Film Festival ( tr, Antalya Altın Portakal Film Festivali), known for a few years from 2015 as Antalya International Film Festival, is a film festival, held annually since 1963 in Antalya, and is the second most impor ...

in 2009. He is the author of the book ''Between Two Worlds: The Construction of the Ottoman State'' (1995).

Selected publications

* * * * * * *Gülru Necipoğlu, Cemal Kafadar, and Cornell Fleischer, eds. (2019). ''Treasures of Knowledge. An Inventory of the Ottoman Palace Library (1502/3-1503/4)''. 2 vols. Leiden: Brill.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Kafadar, Cemal 1954 births 20th-century Turkish historians 21st-century Turkish historians Harvard University faculty Scholars of Ottoman history Living people McGill University Institute of Islamic Studies alumni Robert College alumni