Edward Roger John Owen (27 May 1935 – 23 December 2018) was a British historian who wrote several classic works on the history of the modern

Middle East The Middle East (term originally coined in English language) is a geopolitical region encompassing the Arabian Peninsula, the Levant, Turkey, Egypt, Iran, and Iraq. The term came into widespread usage by the United Kingdom and western Eur ...

. His research interests included the economic, social and political history of the Middle East, especially

Egypt Egypt ( , ), officially the Arab Republic of Egypt, is a country spanning the Northeast Africa, northeast corner of Africa and Western Asia, southwest corner of Asia via the Sinai Peninsula. It is bordered by the Mediterranean Sea to northe ...

, from 1800 to the present, as well as the

theories of imperialism Theories of imperialism are a range of theoretical approaches to understanding the expansion of capitalism into new areas, the unequal Economic development, development of different countries, and economic systems that may lead to the dominance ...

, including military occupations.

Biography

He read Politics, Philosophy and Economics at

Magdalen College, Oxford Magdalen College ( ) is a Colleges of the University of Oxford, constituent college of the University of Oxford. It was founded in 1458 by Bishop of Winchester William of Waynflete. It is one of the wealthiest Oxford colleges, as of 2022, and ...

, from 1956 to 1959, followed by a D Phil in Economic History at St. Antony's College, from 1960 to 1964. One of his close advisers was the renowned Middle East historian

Albert Hourani Albert Habib Hourani, ( ''Albart Ḥabīb Ḥūrānī''; 31 March 1915 – 17 January 1993) was a Lebanese British historian, specialising in the history of the Middle East and Middle Eastern studies. Background and education Hourani was bo ...

. His thesis which was on the cotton production and the development of the economy in nineteenth-century Egypt was later published into a book. When in the 1960s new postgraduate course in modern Middle Eastern studies were introduced at St Antony's College and a raft of new posts created with British government funding, Owen was appointed in Economic and Social History in 1964. He served as Director of St. Antony's College Middle East Centre, from 1971-4, 1980-2, 1986-8, and 1991-3. Subsequently he became the A.J. Meyer Professor of Middle East History at

Harvard University Harvard University is a Private university, private Ivy League research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States. Founded in 1636 and named for its first benefactor, the History of the Puritans in North America, Puritan clergyma ...

and was the director of

Harvard Harvard University is a private Ivy League research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States. Founded in 1636 and named for its first benefactor, the Puritan clergyman John Harvard, it is the oldest institution of higher lear ...

's Center for Middle Eastern Studies (CMES). In addition to his teaching and scholarship, Owen frequently wrote columns for the

English-language English is a West Germanic language that developed in early medieval England and has since become a English as a lingua franca, global lingua franca. The namesake of the language is the Angles (tribe), Angles, one of the Germanic peoples th ...

versions of the Arabic newspapers

Al-Hayat ''Al-Hayat'' ( ''Life'') was an Arabic newspaper based in Beirut from its founding 28 January 1946 to 1976 and in London after its refounding in 1988. It was a pan-Arab newspaper owned by Saudi Prince Khalid bin Sultan, that had a circulation ...

and

Al-Ahram ''Al-Ahram'' (; ), founded on 5 August 1876, is the most widely circulating Egyptian daily newspaper, and the second-oldest after '' Al-Waqa'i' al-Misriyya'' (''The Egyptian Events'', founded 1828). It is majority owned by the Egyptian governm ...

. He was a member of the

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 ...

, also known as MESA. He died on 23 December 2018.

Awards and honors

In 2007 he received a Doctorate in Humane Letters from the

American University of Cairo The American University in Cairo (AUC; ) is a private research university in New Cairo, Egypt. The university offers American-style learning programs at undergraduate, graduate, and professional levels, along with a continuing education program. ...

. In July 2010, he received the prestigious “Award for Outstanding Contributions to Middle Eastern Studies 2010” from the World Congress for Middle Eastern Studies (WOCMES) in Barcelona. In 2012, he received the

Giorgio Levi Della Vida Giorgio Levi Della Vida (22 August 1886 in Venice – 25 November 1967 in Rome) was an Italian Jewish linguist whose expertise lay in Hebrew, Arabic, and other Semitic languages, as well as on the history and culture of the Near East. Biography B ...

medal for Excellence in Islamic studies, Von Grunebaum Center

UCLA The University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) is a public land-grant research university in Los Angeles, California, United States. Its academic roots were established in 1881 as a normal school then known as the southern branch of the C ...

Selected works

''The Rise and Fall of Arab Presidents for Life''

Harvard University Press Harvard University Press (HUP) is an academic publishing house established on January 13, 1913, as a division of Harvard University. It is a member of the Association of University Presses. Its director since 2017 is George Andreou. The pres ...

(2012) * ''Lord Cromer: Victorian Imperialist, Edwardian Proconsul'' (2004)
''State, Power and Politics in the Making of the Modern Middle East''
Routledge, revised version (2004)
''A History of the Middle East Economies in the 20th Century''
with Şevket Pamuk). I.B. Tauris (1999) * ''The Middle East in the World Economy 1800–1914'' (1981) * ''Cotton and the Egyptian Economy, 1820–1914'' (1969)

References

External links

Faculty page at Harvard University
*, March 17, 2008.
One Hundred Years of Middle Eastern Oil
By Prof. E. Roger Owen, 2008. {{DEFAULTSORT:Owen, Roger 1935 births 2018 deaths Alumni of Magdalen College, Oxford British historians Fellows of St Antony's College, Oxford Historians of the Middle East Middle Eastern studies in the United States Harvard University Department of History faculty