Alan Mikhail (born 1979) is an American historian who is a professor of history at

Yale University Yale University is a Private university, private Ivy League research university in New Haven, Connecticut, United States. Founded in 1701, Yale is the List of Colonial Colleges, third-oldest institution of higher education in the United Stat ...

. His work centers on the history of the

Ottoman Empire The Ottoman Empire (), also called the Turkish Empire, was an empire, imperial realm that controlled much of Southeast Europe, West Asia, and North Africa from the 14th to early 20th centuries; it also controlled parts of southeastern Centr ...

Education

Mikhail graduated in History and Chemistry from

Rice University William Marsh Rice University, commonly referred to as Rice University, is a Private university, private research university in Houston, Houston, Texas, United States. Established in 1912, the university spans 300 acres. Rice University comp ...

in 2001, and received his MA in history from the

University of California, Berkeley The University of California, Berkeley (UC Berkeley, Berkeley, Cal, or California), is a Public university, public Land-grant university, land-grant research university in Berkeley, California, United States. Founded in 1868 and named after t ...

in 2003. His PhD was conferred from the same university in 2008. His thesis ''The Nature of Ottoman Egypt: Irrigation, Environment, and Bureaucracy in the Long Eighteenth Century'' was awarded the Malcolm H. Kerr Dissertation Award in the Social Sciences (2009) by

Middle East Studies Association of North America Middle East Studies Association (often referred to as MESA) is a learned society, and according to its website, "a non-profit association that fosters the study of the Middle East, promotes high standards of scholarship and teaching, and enco ...

(MESA).

Career

He served as a postdoctoral scholar at

Stanford University Leland Stanford Junior University, commonly referred to as Stanford University, is a Private university, private research university in Stanford, California, United States. It was founded in 1885 by railroad magnate Leland Stanford (the eighth ...

for two years, before becoming an assistant professor of history at

in 2010. In 2013, he was promoted to full professor and became department chair in 2018.

Works and Reception

''Nature and Empire in Ottoman Egypt''

His first monograph, ''Nature and Empire in Ottoman Egypt'' (2011), was a part of the

Cambridge University Press Cambridge University Press was the university press of the University of Cambridge. Granted a letters patent by King Henry VIII in 1534, it was the oldest university press in the world. Cambridge University Press merged with Cambridge Assessme ...

series Studies in Environment and History. Based on his doctoral dissertation, the book argues for using an environmental lens to understand relations between the Ottoman Empire and the province of Egypt. It received a positive reception and won the Roger Owen Book Award from MESA for the best book in two years in economics, economic history, or the political economy of the Middle East and North Africa.

''Water on Sand: Environmental Histories of the Middle East and North Africa''

''Water on Sand'', published by Oxford University Press in 2013, was met with positive reviews.

''The Animal in Ottoman Egypt''

''The Animal in Ottoman Egypt'', published in 2014 by

Oxford University Press Oxford University Press (OUP) is the publishing house of the University of Oxford. It is the largest university press in the world. Its first book was printed in Oxford in 1478, with the Press officially granted the legal right to print books ...

, examines Egypt's changing place in the Ottoman Empire and world economy from the sixteenth to the nineteenth centuries through human-animal relations. Scholarly reception was mixed. It received the Gustav Ranis International Book Prize for being the best book on an international topic by a Yale ladder faculty member.

''Under Osman's Tree''

''Under Osman's Tree'', published by the

University of Chicago Press The University of Chicago Press is the university press of the University of Chicago, a Private university, private research university in Chicago, Illinois. It is the largest and one of the oldest university presses in the United States. It pu ...

in 2017, received critical acclaim and was awarded the M. Fuat Köprülü Book Prize of the Ottoman and Turkish Studies Association.

''God's Shadow''

''God's Shadow'' was published by Liveright, (an imprint of W. W. Norton & Company) in August, 2020. The book argues for the central place of the Ottoman Empire in world history using the life and times of

Selim I Selim I (; ; 10 October 1470 – 22 September 1520), known as Selim the Grim or Selim the Resolute (), was the List of sultans of the Ottoman Empire, sultan of the Ottoman Empire from 1512 to 1520. Despite lasting only eight years, his reign is ...

. It was named of the best books of 2020 by the ''Times Literary Supplement'', ''Publishers Weekly'' and ''History Today'', and was Longlisted for the

American Library Association The American Library Association (ALA) is a nonprofit organization based in the United States that promotes libraries and library education internationally. It is the oldest and largest library association in the world. History 19th century ...

's Andrew Carnegie Medal for Excellence in Nonfiction. It has been translated into nine languages. The book garnered a mostly positive response from reviewers, and was named an Editors’ Choice selection by the ''

New York Times Book Review ''The New York Times Book Review'' (''NYTBR'') is a weekly paper-magazine supplement to the Sunday edition of ''The New York Times'' in which current non-fiction and fiction books are reviewed. It is one of the most influential and widely rea ...

'', where Ian Morris called it “full of fine details”, writing that “the story is always interesting” and that “ e highest praise for a history book is that it makes you think about things in a new way.” Historian

Peter Frankopan Peter Frankopan (born 22 March 1971) is a British historian, writer, and hotelier. He is a professor of global history at Worcester College, Oxford, and the Director of the Oxford Centre for Byzantine Research. He is a fellow of the Royal Asiati ...

of ''

Air Mail Airmail (or air mail) is a mail transport service branded and sold on the basis of at least one leg of its journey being by air. Airmail items typically arrive more quickly than surface mail, and usually cost more to send. Airmail may be the ...

'' called the book "captivating” and “a welcome and important corrective.”

Justin Marozzi Justin Marozzi (born 1970) is an English journalist, historian and travel writer. Biography Marozzi studied at Cambridge University, where he gained a Starred Double First in History in 1993. He has also earned degrees in broadcast journalism f ...

of ''

The Spectator ''The Spectator'' is a weekly British political and cultural news magazine. It was first published in July 1828, making it the oldest surviving magazine in the world. ''The Spectator'' is politically conservative, and its principal subject a ...

'' dubbed ''God’s Shadow'' “a refreshingly Ottoman-centric picture of the 15th- and 16th-century Mediterranean”, while Clayton Trutor of ''

The New Criterion ''The New Criterion'' is a New York–based monthly literary magazine and journal of artistic and cultural criticism, edited by Roger Kimball (editor and publisher) and James Panero (executive editor). It has sections for criticism of poetry ...

'' called it “a revisionist history in the best sense of the term.” In contrast, Ottoman historian

Caroline Finkel Caroline Finkel is a British historian and writer based in Turkey; she has a doctorate in Ottoman history from the School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London. Publications Her book ''Osman's Dream: The History of the Ottoman ...

characterized its assertions as "overblown". In an essay for Firenze University’ online journal ''Cromohs'', Cornell Fleischer, Cemal Kafadar, and

Sanjay Subrahmanyam Sanjay Subrahmanyam (born 21 May 1961) is an Indian American historian of the early modern period. He is the author of several books and publications. He holds the Irving and Jean Stone Endowed Chair in Social Sciences at UCLA which he joined i ...

described the work as a "tissue of falsehoods, half-truths, and absurd speculations." The motives of that essay were subsequently questioned by historians Efe Khayyat and Ariel Salzmann, writing in the

Duke University Press Duke University Press is an academic publisher and university press affiliated with Duke University. It was founded in 1921 by William T. Laprade as The Trinity College Press. (Duke University was initially called Trinity College). In 1926 ...

journal ''boundary 2'' that, “ t only does their tract misrepresent and mischaracterize the aims and methods of ''God’s Shadow'', but its vitriol launches a further broadside attack on other examples of global and popular history and has fueled a social media frenzy attacking the author and his book in Turkey as well as United States.” Fleischer, Kafadar and Subrahmanyam penned a subsequent rejoinder, citing a series of tweets by Abdürrahim Özer of

Bilkent University Bilkent University () is a private non-profit research university located in Ankara, Turkey. It was founded by İhsan Doğramacı, the first president of the Council of Higher Education and the head of the prominent Doğramacı family, with th ...

critical of Mikhail's interpretation of Selim I's legacy, which expanded on what they characterize as Mikhail's factual errors, misrepresentations, and unorthodox scholarly practices. In an article for the

International Studies Review The ''International Studies Review'' is a quarterly peer-reviewed academic journal published by Oxford University Press on behalf of the International Studies Association. Current editors-in-chief are Sumit Ganguly and Hussein Banai (Indiana Un ...

, Ali Balci found the work to contain "some excessive comments for the sake of making Selim a part of the global history."

''My Egypt Archive''

Published in 2023 by

Yale University Press Yale University Press is the university press of Yale University. It was founded in 1908 by George Parmly Day and Clarence Day, grandsons of Benjamin Day, and became a department of Yale University in 1961, but it remains financially and ope ...

, ''My Egypt Archive'' depicts a decade (2010-2001) Mikhail spent as a young researcher at National Archives of Egypt.

Honors

In 2018, he received the Anneliese Maier Research Award of the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation.

References

External links

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Yale faculty page
{{DEFAULTSORT:Mikhail, Alan 21st-century American historians Yale University faculty Rice University alumni Living people 1979 births