Recent News
The MELC department is proud to announce a study abroad opportunity in Morocco for Summer 2025, in Arabic Language and Culture. The program is a unique opportunity for students to learn the Arabic Language within the context of Arabic culture in Morocco. Students will be exposed to the language within the context of culture and therefore will acquire a deeper understanding of diction, word choice, meaning, and tone.
Studying abroad is integral to any student hoping to seriously study a foreign… Read more
On Ladino Day 2024, acclaimed fantasy author Leigh Bardugo (“Shadow and Bone”) discussesd her new novel, “The Familiar,” which features a Sephardic Jewish heroine in 16th-century Spain who draws magic and power from her family’s secret language, Ladino, also known as Judeo-Spanish.
Event recordings — Interview with… Read more
"I don't remember exactly whether my youth ended, and then the USSR, or if it was the other way around. But I do know that those two things are connected. Now I'm left here between two truths: the truth of the land, and the truth of the sea" —Mothersland
After the Soviet Union’s collapse, the newly formed Republic of Uzbekistan set out to erase traces of Tajik Persian from its cultural fabric, targeting cities like Samarqand and Bukhara—historical hubs of Persian… Read more
UW undergraduate Adrian Brunke was recently awarded the Redhouse Best Progress in the Turkish Language Award by the American Association of Teachers of Turkic Languages (AATT). Adrian is a student in the Department of Linguistics and has been working with MELC professor Melike Yücel-Koç in the MELC Turkish & Ottoman Studies Program since fall of 2023.
According to Yücel-Koç, Adrian is a curious, diligent, self-disciplined, and creative language learner. He is an independent student who… Read more
Prof. Aria Fani discusses the dynamic and interconnected ways Afghans and Iranians invented their modern selves through literature.
Contrary to the presumption that literary nationalism in the Global South emerged through contact with Europe alone, Reading Across Borders demonstrates how the cultural forms of Iran and Afghanistan as nation-states arose from their shared Persian heritage and cross-cultural exchange in the twentieth century.
In this book, Aria Fani charts the… Read more
The Svoboda Diaries Project (SDP) is a digital humanities and historical preservation project founded in 2006 in the department of Middle Eastern Languages and Cultures. This project utilizes a collection of diaries written by Joseph Mathia Svoboda between 1862 and 1908, in which Joseph recorded his life and travels as a purser on a British steamship traveling the Tigris River between Baghdad and Basreh. These diaries afford us a glimpse into… Read more
This September, MELC Acting Instructor Dr. Shai Ben Ami, assisted by Grace Elizabeth C. Dy, lead a zoo tour for 33 new and returning students as part of Dawg Days. Dr. Ben Ami drew on his extensive experience from working at the Tisch Family Zoological Gardens in Jerusalem, also known as the Biblical Zoo, and past visits to Woodland Park Zoo—where he previously had the opportunity to work behind the scenes with the keepers in 2006.
The visit began with a brief introduction to the history of… Read more
This last summer, MELC Lecturer Amina Moujtahid led a group of UW students in a Summer Intensive Language Program in Morocco. Participating in the study abroad program in Morocco was a transformative experience that blended immersive language learning with exposure to the cultural, historical, and social fabric of the Arab world.
Daily classes, coupled with interactions in marketplaces, cafés, and host families, pushed students of the Arabic language outside of their comfort zone and provided… Read more
Book Launch - Motherland by Shahzoda Samarqandi, translated by Shelley Fairweather-Vega
Location: Thirdplace Books, 6504 20th Ave NE, Seattle, WA 98115
Time: Wednesday, November 13, 7-8:30 PM
Workshop - Writing Self, Writing War: Workshop by Asef Soltanzadeh (in Persian)
Location: UW, Seattle, Denny 211, MELC conference room
Time: Thursday, November 14, 1:00-3:00 PM
Panel Discussion - Translating… Read more
The Department of Middle Eastern Languages and Cultures (MELC) at the University of Washington in Seattle, Washington invites applications for an Assistant Teaching Professor to a 3-year, non-tenure track appointment in Persian language and culture to begin in September 2025. This is a full-time, 9-month position, renewable pending a review during its third year.
University of Washington faculty engage in teaching, scholarship, and service. Our faculty, staff, and students are intellectually… Read more