Lara Deeb

Lara Deeb is Professor of Anthropology and holds the Laura Vausbinder Hockett Endowed Chair at Scripps College, where she also chairs the Department of Middle East and North Africa Studies (MENA). She is a leading scholar in cultural anthropology with deep expertise in the Middle East, particularly Lebanon, and her work bridges anthropology, gender studies, and religious studies.

Her research focuses on the intersections of gender, religion, and politics, with a particular emphasis on Islam, transnational feminism, and sectarianism. She explores how religious and gendered identities are formed and negotiated in everyday life, especially within Shi'i communities in Lebanon. Her scholarship critically examines knowledge production, public piety, and moral geographies.

Deeb’s recent publications highlight her evolving focus on interreligious marriage, social difference, and resistance movements in Lebanon. Her articles span topics from Hizbullah’s cultural strategies to feminist anthropological theory, reflecting a broad yet cohesive intellectual trajectory centered on identity, power, and resistance in the Middle East.

Scientific Awards and Honors:

• American Council of Learned Societies (ACLS) Collaborative Research Fellowship (2009–2011)
• Wenner-Gren International Collaborative Research Grant (2008–2009)
• Malcolm H. Kerr Dissertation Award (2004)
• Postdoctoral Fellowship, Harvard Academy for International and Area Studies (2003–2004, 2006–2007)

Deeb has advised numerous students and led significant collaborative research projects, often in partnership with scholars in the Middle East. Her work has been supported by major grants that enabled ethnographic fieldwork and interdisciplinary collaboration. She teaches courses such as Introduction to Sociocultural Anthropology, Anthropology of the Middle East, and Senior Seminar in Ethnographic Writing.

She is actively involved in academic and public discourse, contributing to journals like Middle East Report and HAU: Journal of Ethnographic Theory. Her recent book Love Across Difference (2024) exemplifies her ongoing commitment to understanding social cohesion and difference in divided societies.