Hakem Rustom has completed a PhD in social anthropology from the London School of Economics (LSE) for a dissertation entitled “Anatolian Fragments: Armenians Between Turkey and France”. His research investigates the past of the Armenian population that remained in Anatolia after the signing of the Lausanne Treaty in 1923 and their subsequent migration to France in the 1970s.

Broadly, his research and teaching interests lay in the intersection between anthropology and history in examining political and historical ethnographies, ethnographies of the state and settler colonialism. Geographically, his research focuses on post-Ottoman states–Anatolia, Middle East, and the Balkans–where he has researched nation-state building; sectarianism in everyday life; racialization of religious identity; and the politics of ‘minorities’ / ‘majorities’ in governing population diversity.

Hakem has published and lectured on topics that include alternative approaches to the study of Middle Eastern societies, international treaties and classification of populations, Armenian diaspora, Arab Jews, Christians in Middle East, and Muslims in Europe. His research on the intellect of Edward Said, orientalism, ‘clash of civilizations’, and knowledge production led to the publication of Edward Said: A Legacy of Emancipation and Representation which he co-edited in 2010.

Hakem has taught social anthropology at the American University in Cairo and at the LSE, and was a visiting scholar at Columbia University in New York and Sciences Po in Paris. As the Manoogian Simone Foundation Postdoctoral Fellow at Michigan, he will teach a course on anthropological and historical approaches to studying post-Ottoman societies.