Nabil Matar

Nabil Matar is a Professor at the University of Minnesota, holding the Presidential Professorship in the President’s Interdisciplinary Initiative on Arts and Humanities and the Samuel Russell Chair in the Humanities. He teaches in both the English and History departments and contributes to the Religious Studies Program.

• Educated at the American University of Beirut (B.A., M.A.) and Cambridge University (Ph.D., 1976)
• Former Department Head at Florida Institute of Technology (1997-2007)
• Recipient of postdoctoral grants from the British Council and Fulbright

His research focuses on early modern Euro-Islamic interactions, particularly examining Arab-European travel literature, captivity narratives, and religious exchanges. He has authored a foundational trilogy on Islam in Britain and comparative studies on Mediterranean encounters.

Key publication trends include Anglo-Ottoman relations, cross-cultural identity formation, and premodern globalization, with works spanning from 1998 to 2018. His scholarship bridges religious studies, literary analysis, and cultural history.

• Building Bridges award (University of Cambridge, 2012)
• Kuwait Foundation for the Advancement of Sciences Award (2017)

Matar has secured major grants including a National Endowment for the Humanities Conference on 'Shared Cultural Spaces' and has contributed to curricular development in religious and interdisciplinary studies.