Greetings everyone! It had been my hope to upload some new content, but life has been a bit busier than usual over the past year or so. After (finally!) completing my PhD in History at the University of Chicago, I’ve had the honor of being appointed as a Junior Fellow in the Dartmouth Society of Fellows (Dartmouth College) during the past year. It was both a pleasure and a privilege to spend time among such eminent scholars, from whom I learned a great deal. As a lifelong city dweller, it took some adjustment to appreciate life in western New Hampshire over the past year, but it quickly started to feel like home. The intellectual exchanges at Dartmouth, to say nothing of the excellent resources provided by the fellowship, allowed me to spend some much-needed time rethinking my various projects, and beginning work on my book manuscript. This helped make the last year among the most enjoyable and intellectually stimulating of my life.
(Aerial view of Dartmouth College. Source)
(View from my backyard in Lebanon, NH)
(Baker Berry Library, Dartmouth College. Source)
(Dartmouth College in winter. Source)
Prior to leaving the Upper Valley, I also had the opportunity to explore the White Mountains.
In September 2019, I was appointed as an Assistant Professor of Medieval History at Stony Brook University. I now live in the town of Port Jefferson, located on the north shore of Long Island, which is an awesome little town where I’m hoping to finish writing my book.
(Port Jefferson, NY. Source)
My current book project is tentatively titled “Lord of the Pen and Sword” and examines the phenomenon of the “scholar-statesman”—litterateurs, physicians, and jurists who ascended to the highest administrative and executive offices of state—in the late medieval world. It focuses on the career and writings of Lisān al-Dīn ibn al-Khaṭīb (d. 1374), the preeminent historian, philosopher and chancellor of the Nasrid Kingdom of Granada, situating this figure within a dynamic intellectual and political network of scholars, functionaries and statesmen across the late medieval Mediterranean world. While my dissertation was largely a bio-biography of Ibn al-Khaṭīb, the book is a more thematic exploration of key topics–including historiography, sovereignty, and urban history–in order to better contextualize the life and works of this particular thinker.
(Folio from a manuscript of Ibn al-Khaṭīb’s “History of the Nasrid Dynasty”)
At Stony Brook University, I’ll be teaching both undergraduate and graduate courses on medieval Europe and the Mediterranean, premodern Islamic history, Late Antiquity, political thought, travel literature, as well as various aspects of early modern history.
Between writing and teaching, I will nevertheless make every effort to continue blogging and uploading new content! Keep an eye on this page over the next few weeks.
(Finally settled in!)
Ballandalus 
