Hadi Jorati

Hadi Jorati is a historian of Pre-modern Islamic societies, with a focus on Intellectual History and History of Science. A former research mathematician, trained in the philology of Classical languages of the Islamic tradition, with extensive work experience in Islamic manuscripts, Jorati earned his PhD in the History of Culture of the Islamic Societies, from Yale. Winner of the Julian J. Oberman award for his dissertation, Professor Jorati's other accolades include awards and fellowships from the European Research Council, University of Tübingen, and the Max Planck Institute for the History of Science, Berlin.

Jorati's research is broadly concerned with the interaction between scholar and society. Topics within this genre include education, institutions of learning, and scholarly patronage. His current book project is a micro study of the social background to the intellectual career of one of the most influential Medieval Islamic scholars, the mathematician and philosopher Nasir al-Din Tusi, who also served in the administration of Mongol Iran. Through examining and critical analysis of the plethora of accounts of the life and career of Tusi, as well as evidence from Tusi's scholarly works, Jorati's book offers a coherent understanding of a puzzling career for the first time, and sets to situate Tusi's scholarship in the background of the World he lived in. It also provides new insights into the changing nature of scholarly patronage during a volatile period in the history of the Middle East which corresponds to the collapse of the post-Seljuq World order and the rise of the Mongol Empire. Jorati's other recent and ongoing research projects include Ilkhanid historiography in light of textual criticism, the roots of Ilkhan-Mamluk military engagement during the Bahri period, and the Persian secretarial families of greater Khurasan.

Professor Jorati has taught in Princeton University, Yale University, and the Ohio State University prior to arriving at Massachusetts. At Amherst he teaches courses in History of Science and Philosophy, Islamic History, and the Classical Arabic and Persian literary traditions.