BOOK

Between the Ottomans and the Entente: the First World War in the Syrian and Lebanese Diaspora, 1908- 1925 is published with Oxford University Press (2019). A social history of transnational activism in the Syrian and Lebanese diaspora from the 1908 Young Turk Revolution through the early French Mandate, the book vividly illustrates the precarious position Syrians and Lebanese found themselves in as they occupied a fraught liminal space in Ottoman, French, and American law, while also stressing the agency of mahjari activists who organized, petitioned, and engaged in contentious debates over what a post-Ottoman Middle East should look like.
Awarded the 2020 Evelyn Shakir Nonfiction Award by the Arab American National Museum, the 2019 Khayrallah Prize in Migration Studies, the 2019 Syrian Studies Association Book Prize, and recently featured on Ottoman History Podcast, Jadaliyya, and New Books Network Middle East Studies.
Articles & Book Chapters

“Claimed by Turkey as Subjects: Ottoman Migrants, Foreign Passports, and Syrian Nationality in the Americas,” (2020).

“Arab Labor Migration in the Americas, 1880–1930” in the Oxford Research Encyclopedia of American History (2019).

“Former Ottomans in the ranks: pro-Entente military recruitment among Syrians in the Americas” Journal of Global History (2016).

“Sound Minds in Sound Bodies: Transnational Philanthropy & Patriotic Masculinity in al-Nadi al-Homsi and Syrian Brazil,” International Journal of Middle East Studies (2014).

“Transnational modes and media: the Syrian press in the Mahjar and emigrant activism during World War I” in Mashriq & Mahjar (2013).
Original Work in Digital Outlets

“Essential Readings: Emigration from the Levant, 1870-1930: A Primer in Mahjar Studies,” Jadaliyya (2019).

“A Little Advice: Syrian American Advice Booklets as Knowledge Production,” Migrant Knowledge: a GHI-West Blog (2019).

“Teaching Migrant and Refugee Histories in the Shadow of Trump,” IEHS Online: the Immigration and Ethnic History Society Website (2017).

“What we can learn from America’s Other Muslim Ban (back in 1918),” Tropics of Meta: Historiography for the Masses (2017).

Entries in Cultural Exchange in a Time of Global Conflict: Colonials, Neutrals, and Belligerents during the First World War (2016).
“An Arab American Intelligence Officer.”
“An Arab American soldier writes home.”

“The Other Arab Revolt: on Syrian Mobilization at the Microlevel.” World War I in the Middle East and North Africa NEH Summer Seminar web project at Georgetown University (2014).
Book Reviews
Other Publications
Cultural Exchange in a Time of Global Conflict: Colonials, Neutrals, and Belligerents during the First World War Sourcebook, King’s College London/Humanities in the European Research Area (HERA), November 2016.
- “Photograph of an Arab American military intelligence officer, 1919”
- “Letter by an Arab American soldier writing home from the front, 1918”
“The Syrian and Lebanese American Federation: a Case for Connection.” In Connections and Ruptures: America and the Middle East, edited by Robert Myers, 273-288. Beirut: American University of Beirut Press, 2011.
“Mother Syria and Syrian Motherhood: Imagining Mahjar Nationality between Ideal and Real.” Zaytoon Graduate Student Journal 1 (Spring 2009), 5-16.
Ph.D. Dissertation
Making Nations, in the Mahjar: Syrian and Lebanese Long-Distance Nationalisms in New York City, São Paulo, and Buenos Aires, 1913–1929. Northeastern, 2014.
- Awarded the 2016 Syrian Studies Association Outstanding Dissertation Prize.
Filter by Tags
The Latest 30 Posts
- New publication: “Claimed by Turkey as Subjects”: Ottoman Migrants, Foreign Passports, and Syrian Nationality in the Americas, 1915–1925″
- Between the Ottomans and the Entente wins Arab American Book Award
- New online threads: a week with @Tweetistorian
- New talk online: “Let’s Talk History: World War I in the Syrian Diaspora”
- New Book Series: Refugees and Migrants within the Middle East (Call for Proposals!)
- Between the Ottomans and the Entente awarded the 2019 Syrian Studies Association Book Prize!
- Between the Ottomans and the Entente awarded the 2019 Khayrallah Prize in Migration Studies
- New Texts Out Now interview with Jadaliyya
- Interview on New Books Network Middle East Studies
- New publication: “Arab Labor Migration in the Americas, 1880–1930” in the Oxford Research Encyclopedia of American History
- New Piece on Jadaliyya/MESPI
- New brief piece on Syrian American advice literature
- Between the Ottomans and the Entente featured on the Ottoman History Podcast
- New Book! Between the Ottomans and the Entente is shipping!
- New Publication: “An Archaeology of Rare Books in Arab Atlantic History” in Journal of American Ethnic Studies
- Public Talk on Passports and Post-Ottoman Nationalities, May 29 at the University of Washington
- Book review: Jeffrey Grey’s The War with the Ottoman Empire
- Brief piece online: The Power of Small Stories: a Syrian Abroad in World War I
- Found: George Matook (Massachusetts State Library Archives)
- Book Review: Crescent over Another Horizon: Islam in Latin America, the Caribbean, and Latino USA in the Journal of American Ethnic History
- Interview on CSPAN’s American History Television
- New piece published: “Teaching Migrant and Refugee Histories in the Shadow of Trump” in IEHS Online
- New piece, “What We Can Learn from America’s Other Muslim Ban (Back in 1918),” appears in Tropics of Meta
- State of the Field Roundtable session at OAH meeting in New Orleans
- Making Nations in the Mahjar awarded Syrian Studies Association Dissertation Prize
- SSA special roundtable at the Middle East Studies Association Annual Meeting in Boston
- New Web Publication: Arab American sources for Sourcebook on Cultural Exchanges during First World War
- New article published: “Former Ottomans in the Ranks” at Journal of Global History
- New web piece: “The Other Arab Revolt,” a blog post on the NEH Summer Seminar page, WWI in the Middle East
- New article published: “Sound Minds in Sounds Bodies” in the International Journal of Middle East Studies
The Monthly Archive
- October 2020
- September 2020
- July 2020
- May 2020
- April 2020
- December 2019
- November 2019
- August 2019
- June 2019
- May 2019
- March 2019
- February 2019
- May 2018
- April 2018
- March 2018
- January 2018
- December 2017
- August 2017
- June 2017
- March 2017
- February 2017
- December 2016
- November 2016
- February 2016
- August 2014
- April 2014
- February 2013