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== Education and career ==
== Education and career ==
Mikhail graduated in History and Chemistry from [[Rice University]] in 2001, and received his MA in history from the [[University of California, Berkeley]] in 2003.<ref name=":0" /> 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]] (MESA).<ref name=":0" />
Mikhail graduated in History and Chemistry from [[Rice University]] in 2001, and received his MA in history from the [[University of California, Berkeley]], in 2003.<ref name=":0" /> 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]] (MESA).<ref name=":0" />


He served as a postdoctoral scholar at [[Stanford University]] for two years, before becoming an assistant professor of history at [[Yale University]] in 2010.<ref name=":0" /> In 2013, he was promoted to full professor and became department chair in 2018.<ref name=":0">{{Cite web|last=Mikhail|first=Alan|date=2017|title=Alan Mikhail CV|url=http://www.alanmikhail.org/wp-content/uploads/2017/04/Alan-Mikhail-CV-2017.pdf}}</ref>
He served as a postdoctoral scholar at [[Stanford University]] for two years, before becoming an assistant professor of history at [[Yale University]] in 2010.<ref name=":0" /> In 2013, he was promoted to full professor and became department chair in 2018.<ref name=":0">{{Cite web|last=Mikhail|first=Alan|date=2017|title=Alan Mikhail CV|url=http://www.alanmikhail.org/wp-content/uploads/2017/04/Alan-Mikhail-CV-2017.pdf}}</ref>


== Works ==
== Publications ==


* ''God’s Shadow: Sultan Selim, His Ottoman Empire, and the Making of the Modern World'' (Liveright/W. W. Norton, 2020)
=== Monographs ===
* ''Under Osman’s Tree: The Ottoman Empire, Egypt, and Environmental History'' (University of Chicago Press, 2017)
His first monograph, ''Nature and Empire in Ottoman Egypt'' (2011), was a part of the [[Cambridge University Press]] series Studies in Environment and History.<ref>{{Cite book|last=Mikhail|first=Alan|url=https://www.cambridge.org/core/books/nature-and-empire-in-ottoman-egypt/B05D2208CB9B404D6CA768A62DBAC969|title=Nature and Empire in Ottoman Egypt: An Environmental History|date=2011|publisher=Cambridge University Press|isbn=978-1-107-00876-2|series=Studies in Environment and History|location=Cambridge}}</ref> 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.<ref>{{Cite web|title=Middle East Studies Association - Malcolm H. Kerr Dissertation Awards - Alan Mikhail|url=https://mesana.org/awards/awardee/malcolm-h-kerr-dissertation-awards/alan-mikhail|access-date=2020-10-30|website=Middle East Studies Association|language=en}}</ref> It received a positive reception<ref>{{Cite journal|last=Butzer|first=Karl W.|date=2012|title=NATURE AND EMPIRE IN OTTOMAN EGYPT: An Environmental History. By Alan Mikhail|url=https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1111/j.1931-0846.2012.00161.x|journal=Geographical Review|language=en|volume=102|issue=3|pages=392–393|doi=10.1111/j.1931-0846.2012.00161.x|issn=1931-0846|s2cid=162890954}}</ref><ref>{{Cite journal|last=Borsch|first=Stuart|date=2012-02-25|title=Nature and Empire in Ottoman Egypt: An Environmental History (review)|url=https://muse.jhu.edu/article/467391|journal=The Middle East Journal|language=en|volume=66|issue=1|pages=172–173|issn=1940-3461}}</ref> and won the Roger Owen Book Award from MESA for the best book in a two-year period in economics, economic history, or the political economy of the Middle East and North Africa.<ref>{{Cite web|title=Middle East Studies Association - Roger Owen Book Award - Alan Mikhail|url=https://mesana.org/awards/awardee/roger-owen-book-award/mikhail-alan|access-date=2020-10-30|website=Middle East Studies Association|language=en}}</ref>
* ''The Animal in Ottoman Egypt'' (Oxford University Press, 2014)

* ed., ''Water on Sand: Environmental Histories of the Middle East and North Africa'' (Oxford University Press, 2013)
''The Animal in Ottoman Egypt'', published in 2014 by [[Oxford University Press]], examines Egypt's changing place in the Ottoman Empire and world economy from the sixteenth to the nineteenth centuries through the lens of human-animal relations.<ref>{{Cite book|url=https://global.oup.com/academic/product/the-animal-in-ottoman-egypt-9780190655228?cc=us&lang=en&#|title=The Animal in Ottoman Egypt|date=2016-12-01|publisher=Oxford University Press|isbn=978-0-19-065522-8|location=Oxford, New York}}</ref> Scholarly reception was mixed.<ref>{{Cite journal|last=Trumbull|first=George R.|title=The Environmental Turn in Middle East History|date=February 2017|url=https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/international-journal-of-middle-east-studies/article/abs/environmental-turn-in-middle-east-history/ECAF758734856427CCA051D5FFEA0D5E|journal=International Journal of Middle East Studies|language=en|volume=49|issue=1|pages=173–180|doi=10.1017/S0020743816001252|issn=0020-7438}}</ref><ref>{{Cite journal|last=Barakat|first=Nora|date=2016|title=Review of THE ANIMAL IN OTTOMAN EGYPT|url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/44746861|journal=The Arab Studies Journal|volume=24|issue=1|pages=305–309|jstor=44746861|issn=1083-4753}}</ref><ref>{{Cite journal|last=Rader|first=Karen A.|date=2014-12-01|title=Alan Mikhail. The Animal in Ottoman Egypt.|url=https://academic.oup.com/ahr/article/119/5/1821/44826|journal=The American Historical Review|language=en|volume=119|issue=5|pages=1821–1822|doi=10.1093/ahr/119.5.1821|issn=0002-8762}}</ref><ref>{{Cite journal|last=Lanz|first=Tobias J.|date=2015-04-01|title=The Animal in Ottoman Egypt. By Alan Mikhail.|url=https://academic.oup.com/envhis/article/20/2/312/528940|journal=Environmental History|language=en|volume=20|issue=2|pages=312–314|doi=10.1093/envhis/emv015|issn=1084-5453}}</ref><ref>{{Cite journal|last=Sedra|first=Paul|date=2016-01-01|title=The Animal in Ottoman Egypt|url=https://www.questia.com/library/journal/1P3-4321779413/the-animal-in-ottoman-egypt|journal=International Journal of Turkish Studies|volume=22|issue=1/2|pages=109}}</ref><ref>{{Cite journal|last=Buquet|first=Thierry|date=2017-06-15|title=Mikhail, Alan, The Animal in Ottoman Egypt (Oxford University Press, 2014)|url=http://journals.openedition.org/remmm/9361|journal=Revue des mondes musulmans et de la Méditerranée|language=fr|issue=141|doi=10.4000/remmm.9361|issn=0997-1327|doi-access=free}}</ref> It received the Gustav Ranis International Book Prize, awarded for the best book on an international topic by a Yale ladder faculty member.<ref>{{Cite web|date=2015-05-29|title=The MacMillan Center International Book Prizes|url=https://macmillan.yale.edu/research-support/macmillan-center-international-book-prizes|access-date=2020-12-21|website=The MacMillan Center|language=en}}</ref>
* ''Nature and Empire in Ottoman Egypt: An Environmental History'' (Cambridge University Press, 2011)

''Under Osman's Tree'', published by [[University of Chicago Press]] in 2017, received critical acclaim<ref>{{Cite journal|last=Duffy|first=A.|date=2019-08-06|title=Under Osman's Tree: The Ottoman Empire, Egypt, and Environmental History, by Alan Mikhail|url=https://academic.oup.com/ehr/article/134/568/721/5424791|journal=The English Historical Review|language=en|volume=134|issue=568|pages=721–722|doi=10.1093/ehr/cez107|issn=0013-8266}}</ref><ref>{{Cite journal|last=Stolz|first=Daniel A.|date=2019-06-01|title=Alan Mikhail. Under Osman's Tree: The Ottoman Empire, Egypt, and Environmental History.|url=https://academic.oup.com/ahr/article/124/3/1178/5509682|journal=The American Historical Review|language=en|volume=124|issue=3|pages=1178–1179|doi=10.1093/ahr/rhz389|issn=0002-8762}}</ref><ref>{{Cite journal|last=Dedeoglu|first=Cagdas|date=2018-10-30|title=Alan Mikhail, Under Osman's Tree: The Ottoman Empire, Egypt, and Environmental History|url=https://journal.equinoxpub.com/JSRNC/article/view/10526|journal=Journal for the Study of Religion, Nature and Culture|language=en|volume=12|issue=3|pages=343–345|doi=10.1558/jsrnc.36555|issn=1749-4915}}</ref><ref>{{Cite journal|last=Çalışır|first=M. Fatih|date=2018-04-15|title=Under Osman's Tree: The Ottoman Empire, Egypt, and Environmental History|url=https://nazariyat.org/sayilar/cilt-4-sayi-2/d0052|journal=Nazariyat İslam Felsefe ve Bilim Tarihi Araştırmaları Dergisi (Journal for the History of Islamic Philosophy and Sciences)|volume=4|issue=2|pages=164–166|doi=10.12658/Nazariyat.4.2.D0052|doi-access=free}}</ref><ref>{{Cite journal|last=White|first=Sam|date=2017-01-01|title=Under Osman's Tree: The Ottoman Empire, Egypt, and Environmental History|url=https://www.questia.com/library/journal/1P4-1985568187/under-osman-s-tree-the-ottoman-empire-egypt-and|journal=International Journal of Turkish Studies|volume=23|issue=1/2|pages=115}}</ref><ref>{{Cite journal|last=Low|first=Michael Christopher|date=2018-07-01|title=Under Osman's Tree: The Ottoman Empire, Egypt & Environmental History. By Alan Mikhail|url=https://academic.oup.com/envhis/article/23/3/641/4993995|journal=Environmental History|language=en|volume=23|issue=3|pages=641–643|doi=10.1093/envhis/emy013|issn=1084-5453}}</ref><ref>{{Cite journal|last=Imber|first=Colin|date=2018-03-01|title=The environment in the history of Ottoman Egypt|url=https://doi.org/10.1007/s11016-017-0271-1|journal=Metascience|language=en|volume=27|issue=1|pages=151–153|doi=10.1007/s11016-017-0271-1|s2cid=172076893|issn=1467-9981}}</ref> and was awarded the M. Fuat Köprülü Book Prize of the Ottoman and Turkish Studies Association.<ref>{{Cite book|url=https://press.uchicago.edu/ucp/books/book/chicago/U/bo25125906.html|title=Under Osman's Tree}}</ref>

=== Controversy over ''God's Shadow'' ===
''God's Shadow'' was published by [[Liveright]] (an imprint of the trade publisher [[W. W. Norton]]) in August, 2020. The book argues for the central place of the Ottoman Empire in world history using the life and times of the empire's ninth sultan, [[Selim I]].{{cn|date=January 2021}} The book garnered mostly positive reviews in commercial venues <ref>{{Cite web|title=God's Shadow by Alan Mikhail book review {{!}} The TLS|url=https://www.the-tls.co.uk/articles/gods-shadow-alan-mikhail-review-gerald-maclean/|access-date=2020-12-21|website=TLS|language=en-GB}}</ref><ref>{{Cite news|last=Ormsby|first=Eric|date=2020-09-11|title='God's Shadow' Review: Sword of the Caliph|language=en-US|work=Wall Street Journal|url=https://www.wsj.com/articles/gods-shadow-review-sword-of-the-caliph-11599837430|access-date=2020-12-21|issn=0099-9660}}</ref><ref>{{Cite news|last=Spencer|first=Richard|title=God's Shadow by Alan Mikhail review — the Ottoman sultan who made our world|language=en|url=https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/gods-shadow-by-alan-mikhail-review-selim-ottoman-sultan-pt39nzfr6|access-date=2020-12-21|issn=0140-0460}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web|title=The King's Reach|url=https://airmail.news/issues/2020-8-15/the-kings-reach|access-date=2020-12-21|website=airmail.news|language=en}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |last1=Marazoni |first1=Justin |title=In just eight years Selim I became 'God's Shadow on Earth' |url=https://www.spectator.co.uk/article/in-just-eight-years-selim-i-became-god-s-shadow-on-earth- |website=www.spectator.co.uk |access-date=22 January 2021}}</ref><ref>{{Cite news|last=Morris|first=Ian|date=2020-08-18|title=When the Ottoman Empire Threatened Europe — and the World|language=en-US|work=The New York Times|url=https://www.nytimes.com/2020/08/18/books/review/gods-shadow-alan-mikhail.html|access-date=2020-12-21|issn=0362-4331}}</ref> and was given starred reviews in ''Library Journal'', ''Kirkus'', and ''Publishers Weekly''.<ref>{{Cite book|url=https://www.kirkusreviews.com/book-reviews/alan-mikhail/gods-shadow/|title=GOD'S SHADOW {{!}} Kirkus Reviews|language=en}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |title=God's Shadow: Sultan Selim, His Ottoman Empire and the Making of the Modern World |url=https://www.publishersweekly.com/978-1-63149-239-6 |website=www.publishersweekly.com |access-date=22 January 2021}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web|last=Alan|first=Mikhail|title=God's Shadow: Sultan Selim, His Ottoman Empire, and the Making of the Modern World|url=https://www.libraryjournal.com/?reviewDetail=gods-shadow-sultan-selim-his-ottoman-empire-and-the-making-of-the-modern-world|access-date=2020-12-21|website=Library Journal}}</ref> Writing for the ''Literary Review'', Caroline Finkel, however, characterized its assertions as "overblown."<ref>{{Cite web|title=Caroline Finkel - Master of the Universe?|url=https://literaryreview.co.uk/master-of-the-universe-3|access-date=2021-02-22|website=Literary Review|language=en}}</ref> In what may be the only 2020 reviews that were not commissioned by a newspaper, three authorities in Ottoman history and early modern global history, [[Cornell Fleischer]], [[Cemal Kafadar]] and [[Sanjay Subrahmanyam]], pointed out errors of fact and interpretation at every level and described "God’s Shadow" as "tissue of falsehoods, half-truths and absurd speculations"<ref>{{Cite web|last=|first=|date=2020|title=How to Write Fake Global History{{!}} Cromohs - Cyber Review of Modern Historiography|url=https://oajournals.fupress.net/index.php/cromohs/debate|url-status=live|archive-url=|archive-date=|access-date=2021-01-04|website=oajournals.fupress.net|language=en-US}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web|title=Fake global history in the age of fake news|url=https://www.eurozine.com/fake-global-history-in-the-age-of-fake-news/|access-date=2021-02-22|website=www.eurozine.com}}</ref> In response, [[Pamela Kyle Crossley|Pamela Crossley]] (who opened with the admission "I know nothing about Mikhail’s book") and then Efe Khayyat and Ariel Salzmann questioned the motives of Mikhail's critics.<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.dartmouth.edu/~crossley/comments_7.html|access-date=2021-02-17|website=www.dartmouth.edu}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web|last=boundary2|date=2020-10-01|title=Efe Khayyat and Ariel Salzmann — On the Perils of Thinking Globally while Writing Ottoman History: God's Shadow and Academia's Self-Appointed Sultans|url=https://www.boundary2.org/2020/10/e-khayyat-and-ariel-salzmann-on-the-perils-of-thinking-globally-while-writing-ottoman-history-gods-shadow-and-academias-self-appointed-sultans/|access-date=2021-02-17|website=boundary 2|language=en-US}}</ref> Kafadar, Fleischer, and Subrahmanyam wrote a bilingual rejoinder in the Turkish internet journal ''T24'', which expanded the list of Mikhail's errors, misrepresentations, and unorthodox scholarly practices, such as a reliance on Wikipedia articles.<ref>{{Cite web|title=Romancing "American Selim" - K24|url=https://t24.com.tr/k24/yazi/romancing-american-selim,2892|access-date=2021-02-22|website=T24|language=Turkish}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web|title="Amerikalı Selim" sevdası - K24|url=https://t24.com.tr/k24/yazi/amerikali-selim-sevdasi,2967|access-date=2021-02-22|website=T24|language=Turkish}}</ref> Other specialists aired their concerns about ''God's Shadow'' and its ethical and scholarly standards on Twitter, including Ali Yaycıoğlu of Stanford and Abdürrahim Özer of Bilkent University.

===Edited collections===
''Water on Sand: Environmental Histories of the Middle East and North Africa'', published by Oxford University Press in 2013, was met with positive reviews.<ref>{{Cite journal|last=Cederlöf|first=Gunnel|date=2013-12-01|title=Alan Mikhail, editor. Water on Sand: Environmental Histories of the Middle East and North Africa.|url=https://academic.oup.com/ahr/article/118/5/1640/20978|journal=The American Historical Review|language=en|volume=118|issue=5|pages=1640–1642|doi=10.1093/ahr/118.5.1640a|issn=0002-8762}}</ref><ref>{{Cite journal|last=Abe|first=Satoshi|date=2016-05-01|title=Water on Sand: Environmental Histories of the Middle East and North Africa Edited by A lan M ikhail|url=https://academic.oup.com/jis/article/27/2/258/2458855|journal=Journal of Islamic Studies|language=en|volume=27|issue=2|pages=258–261|doi=10.1093/jis/etw003|issn=0955-2340}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web|date=2013-06-02|title=Mikhail, Water on Sand|url=https://merip.org/2013/06/mikhail-water-on-sand/|access-date=2020-12-04|website=MERIP|language=en-US}}</ref><ref>{{Cite journal|date=2013|title=Review of Water and Sand: Environmental Histories of the Middle East and North Africa|url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/10.13169/arabstudquar.35.2.0214|journal=Arab Studies Quarterly|volume=35|issue=2|pages=214–215|doi=10.13169/arabstudquar.35.2.0214|jstor=10.13169/arabstudquar.35.2.0214|issn=0271-3519}}</ref>


== Honors ==
== Honors ==

Revision as of 20:55, 26 February 2021

Alan Mikhail (born 1979) is an American historian who is a professor of history at Yale University.[1] His work centers on the history of the Ottoman Empire.

Education and career

Mikhail graduated in History and Chemistry from Rice University in 2001, and received his MA in history from the University of California, Berkeley, in 2003.[2] 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 (MESA).[2]

He served as a postdoctoral scholar at Stanford University for two years, before becoming an assistant professor of history at Yale University in 2010.[2] In 2013, he was promoted to full professor and became department chair in 2018.[2]

Publications

  • God’s Shadow: Sultan Selim, His Ottoman Empire, and the Making of the Modern World (Liveright/W. W. Norton, 2020)
  • Under Osman’s Tree: The Ottoman Empire, Egypt, and Environmental History (University of Chicago Press, 2017)
  • The Animal in Ottoman Egypt (Oxford University Press, 2014)
  • ed., Water on Sand: Environmental Histories of the Middle East and North Africa (Oxford University Press, 2013)
  • Nature and Empire in Ottoman Egypt: An Environmental History (Cambridge University Press, 2011)

Honors

In 2018, he received the Anneliese Maier Research Award of the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation.[3]

References

  1. ^ "Anneliese Maier Research Award 2018 - The Award Winners". www.humboldt-foundation.de (in German).
  2. ^ a b c d Mikhail, Alan (2017). "Alan Mikhail CV" (PDF).
  3. ^ "Alan Mikhail honored for work on environmental history".
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