Biography

Author Picture

Stephen Sheehi

Stephen Sheehi is Associate Professor of Arabic and Arab Culture and Director of the Arabic Program at the University of South Carolina. He teaches intellectual, literary, cultural, and artistic heritage of Arabo-Islamic world. His work interrogates various modalities of self, society, art and political economy with Arab modernity.
He is the author of Foundations of Modern Arab Identity, which examines the foundational writing of intellectuals of the 19th century Arab Renaissance or al-nahdah al-`arabiyah. The book discusses how Arab intellectuals offered a powerful cultural self-criticism along side their critiques and discussions of modernity, capitalism and European imperialism.
He has also published in journals such as International Journal of Middle Eastern Studies, The British Journal of Middle East Studies, Discourse, Critique, The Journal of Arabic Literature, and The Journal of Comparative South Asian, African, and Middle Eastern Studies.
He has also written on the contemporary politics in Lebanon and academic repression in the United States.
In addition to his scholarship, Prof. Sheehi has also been active in social justice movements in the Middle East and North America.