Dr. phil. in Islamic Studies, University of Tübingen, Germany.
04/1993
M.A. Islamic Studies and Iranian Studies, University of Tübingen.
1987-1993
University of Tübingen, Islamic Studies and Iranian Studies.
Academic Professional Experience
01/2010
Director, Institute of Iranian Studies, Austrian Academy of Sciences
10/2009
Researcher, Institute of Iranian Studies, Austrian Academy of Sciences
2009-
Affiliate Assistant Professor, Department of History, University of Washington, Seattle
2005-2009
Assistant Professor, University of Washington, Department of History (History of the Pre-Modern Middle East and Central Asia)
Adjunct Assistant Professor, Department of Near Eastern Languages and Civilization
1999-2005
Wissenschaftlicher Assistent, Ruhr University Bochum, Department of Oriental and Islamic Studies (Seminar für Orientalistik und Islamwissenschaften)
1996-1998
Researcher, University of Tübingen, Research Center for Islamic Numismatics (Forschungsstelle für Islamische Numismatik)
Current Research
Collaborator in the project "Denkmal und Kontext in Buchara (Usbekistan); Öffentliche und private Architektur in Buchara in der Zusammenschau von islamischer Kunstgeschichte, Geschichte, Restaurierungswissenschaft und Bauforschung”, funded by the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft and based at the University of Bamberg (co-ordinator: Prof. Lorenz Korn). For more information see www.uni-bamberg.de/buchara-projekt
Descriptive inventories of Persian, Turkic and Arabic documents in Museum collections in Bukhara and Samarkand (the latter currently in collaboration with a research project funded by the Volkswagen Foundation and led by Prof. Jürgen Paul, University of Halle)
Religious scholarship in the Ottoman-Safavid borderlands in the 17th and 18th centuries
Iranian and Central Asian Muslim Translators/Diplomats/Entrepreneurs, 1860s to 1930s
Academic Honors, Awards and Fellowships
2009
University of Washington, nomination for Distinguished Graduate Mentor Award
1999
German Academic Exchange Service (DAAD), postdoctoral research fellowship for a project on Persian hagiographies at the Institute for Near Eastern Studies (Prof. R.D. McChesney), New York University (declined for the position at the University of Bochum)
1997
American Numismatic Society (New York), Islamic and South Asian Book Award for the year 1995 for "Sylloge Numorum Arabicorum XIVd: Gazna und Kabul"
1995
Studienstiftung des deutschen Volkes (German National Academic Foundation), graduate fellow
1994
German federal state North Rhine-Westphalia, graduate fellow
1990-1992
Studienstiftung des deutschen Volkes (German National Academic Foundation), undergraduate fellow
Teaching Experience
University of Washington, 2005-2009: lecture courses, undergraduate seminars, graduate seminars and independent study and thesis courses on the medieval, early modern and modern Middle East, Iran and Central Asia
Ruhr University Bochum, 1999-2005: introductory survey courses, seminars and language courses (classical Arabic) on the medieval, early modern and modern Middle East, Iran and Central Asia
