Congratulations to NESA graduate students Gamze Akbas and Zari Mahmoudi, who successfully completed their PhD defenses in April!

Gamze's dissertation is entitled “For They Are Deficient in Intelligence”: The Portrayal of Women’s Intellectual Capacity in Medieval Islamic Literature.” Her work examines the ways in which women’s intelligence is depicted in medieval Islamic literature. She argues that the genre of each work plays a significant role in how women’s intelligence is represented.

Zari's dissertation is entitled “Mystic Women and Chivalric Spirituality: Gendered Piety and Spiritual Authority in the Writings of Farīd al-Dīn ʿAṭṭār (ca. 1145–1221) and Jāmī (1414–1492).” 

Thank you to the NESA and OSU faculty members who advised Gamze and Zari and served on their dissertation committees.

Gamze and Zari, congratulations and best of luck with your next steps!