Efe Murat BALIKCIOGLU

CURRICULUM VITAE

EFE MURAT BALIKÇIOĞLU, PhD

Ca’ Foscari University

Department of Philosophy and Cultural Heritage
Malcanton Marcorà, Dorsoduro 3484/D, 30123 Venice, Italy

efemurat.balikcioglu@unive.it

WORK

2025-2028 Ca’ Foscari University   Assistant Professor / Ricercatore A (Fixed Term) (Department of Philosophy and Cultural Heritage)

2024-2026 Harvard University       Associate at the Center for Middle Eastern Studies

2023-2024 New York University     Faculty Fellow in Islamic Studies (Department of Middle Eastern and Islamic Studies)      

2019-2023  Wellesley College        Visiting Lecturer in Islamic History & Writing (Department of Religion & Program in Writing)

EDUCATION

2012-2019 Harvard University    Ph.D. Degree in History and Middle Eastern Studies

Dissertation Title: “A Coherence of Incoherences: Graeco-Arabic Philosophy and the Ottoman Synthesis of Philosophy with Sharia.”

Fields: Islamic Intellectual & Religious History: Philosophy, Theology, and Sufism; Ottoman History; History of Islamic Sciences; Renaissance Intellectual History. Advisors: Cemal Kafadar, Khaled El-Rouayheb, Roy Parviz Mottahedeh, and James Hankins.

2010-2012 Harvard University     A.M. Degree in History and Middle Eastern Studies

2006-2010 Princeton University   B.A. Degree in Philosophy (2010)

Department of Philosophy; Advisors: Philip Pettit and Anthony Appiah

Minor in Public and International Affairs; Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Studies; Advisor: Robert Finn

Minor in Near Eastern Studies; Department of Near Eastern Studies

Minor in Judaic Studies; Program in Judaic Studies

ACADEMIC INTERESTS

History of philosophy and science; Islamic intellectual and cultural history; natural philosophy, theology, Sufism; the Ottoman Empire; religio-politics in Islamic societies; educational, institutional history; religious minorities; global history, world civilizations; intellectual history in early modern Europe and the Italian Renaissance.

LANGUAGES

Turkish (native), English (perfect fluency), Classical Arabic (advanced reading), Ottoman Turkish (advanced reading), Persian (advanced reading, intermediate speaking), German (advanced reading, intermediate speaking), and Latin/Italian (basic skills/lower intermediate).

DIGITAL HUMANITIES

May 29-June 8, 2018     Harvard University Center for Geographic Analysis Institute Certificate

RESEARCH RECORD

January 2024                 Süleymaniye Manuscript Library (Istanbul, Turkey)

January 2023                 Süleymaniye Manuscript Library (Istanbul, Turkey)

June 2022                     The University of Bologna Research Grant (Marsili Library, Bologna, Italy)

August 2019                  Süleymaniye Manuscript Library (Istanbul, Turkey)

August 2018                  Süleymaniye Manuscript Library (Istanbul, Turkey)

January 2018                 Süleymaniye Manuscript Library (Istanbul, Turkey)

August 2017                  Various Sufi lodges and graveyards (Bursa, Turkey)

June 2016                      El Escorial Library (Madrid, Spain)

November 2015              Österreichische Nationalbibliothek (Vienna, Austria)

2015-2016                     Archival Research at Süleymaniye Manuscript Library, Millet Manuscript Library, Bayezid Manuscript Library, The Center for          Islamic Studies (İSAM) and Marmara University’s Faculty of Divinity (Istanbul, Turkey)

Summer 2015                Qasid Institute (Amman, Jordan)

Summer 2014                Qasid Institute (Amman, Jordan)

RESEARCH POSITIONS

2023-2024     New York University Faculty Fellow in Islamic History

June 2022      The University of Bologna-Wellesley Faculty Research Fellowship

2022-2023     SALT Istanbul Research Fellow

2017- 2019    Research Assistant at Harvard Business School

2017- 2019    Graduate Student Coordinator at Harvard University’s Center for European Studies

FELLOWSHIPS, HONORS, AND GRANTS

* Young Researchers Funding Award 2025, The Italian Ministry of University and Research (MUR), Three-Year Research Funding of 250,000 (April 1, 2025-April 1, 2028).

* Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions (MSCA) Postdoctoral Fellowships Seals of Excellence 2024, Horizon Europe/European Union’s Research Executive Agency.

* SALT Istanbul Research Award, 2022-2023, Istanbul, Turkey.

* The University of Bologna-Wellesley College Faculty Research Fellow, June 2022, Bologna, Italy [for research at UniBo’s Marsili Islamic Manuscripts Collection].

* European Union Grant for Common Heritage in Literature and the Arts, Aşina Project, 2021-2022 [for the publication of the co-authored with the physicist Dr. Zeytinoğlu bilingual poetry book, Breaking of Symmetry, which combines research on quantum physics and Islamic philosophy].

* Oxford University, Centre for Islamic Studies Imam Bukhari Visiting Research Fellowship, 2020.

* Dissertation Research Scholarship, The Republic of Turkey, 2015-16.

* History Department, Summer Thesis Research Grant, Harvard University, 2015.

* Center for Middle Eastern Studies Summer Research Grant, Harvard University, 2015.

* Meral Divitçi Prize Turkish Poetry in Translation, for my co-authored translations Silent Stones (a selection from the modernist Turkish poet Melih Cevdet Anday’s poems), USA, 2014.

* History Department, Summer Thesis Research Grant, Harvard University, 2014.

* Center for Middle Eastern Studies Summer Research Grant, Harvard University, 2014.

* Kulturkontakt Writer-In-Residence, The Austrian Ministry of Culture, Vienna, Summer 2013.

* Center for Middle Eastern Studies Summer Language Grant, Harvard University 2012.

* Prince Alwaleed Bin Talal Fellow in Islamic Studies, Harvard University 2010-2012.

* Center for Middle Eastern Studies Summer Language Grant, Harvard University 2011.

* Dartmouth University Undergraduate Essay in Philosophy Prize, Second Place, 2009.

* The Liechtenstein Institute on Self-Determination Fellow, Princeton University, 2008-9.

* XIV International Philosophy Olympiad (IPO), Gold Medal, Cosenza, Italy, 2006 [I received the Gold Medal at the World Philosophy Olympiad, an annual international philosophy competition for high school students all around the world, which was organized in Italy in 2006; see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/International_Philosophy_Olympiad].

COURSES TAUGHT

New York University (2023-24)

MEIS-UA 640: The Making of the Muslim Middle East, 600-1258

MEIS-GA 1770: Sultans, Philosophers, and Heretics: Religious and Intellectual Movements in Early Modern Islam (Graduate Seminar)

MEIS-UA 616: Topics in Islamic History | Desire, Love & Illumination: Sufism and Poetry in the Islamic World

MEIS-GA Independent Study: Ibn ‘Arabī’s Fuṣūṣ al-ḥikam

Wellesley College (2019-23)

REL/PHI 366: Themes in Islamic Philosophy, Theology, and Mysticism (offered twice)

REL/MES 260: Religion and Culture in Early Muslim Societies (offered twice)

REL/MES 261: Religion, Politics, and Culture in Modern Turkey

REL/MES 263: Islam in the Modern World (offered twice)

REL/MES 265: Religious and Ethnic Minorities in Early Modern Islam

REL/HIS 266: Religion in Ottoman State and Society (1300-1923)

REL/MES 361: Love, Desire, and Illumination: Poetry in the Islamic World

WRIT 169: Dream Narratives: Writing Seminar (offered six times)

Harvard University (2012-2019)

TUR 130A: Advanced Turkish I (Course Instructor; offered three times)

TUR 150B: Advanced Turkish II (Course Instructor; offered three times)

HIS 120A: Byzantine Civilization (Teaching Assistant)

TUR AA: Intermediate Turkish I (Teaching Assistant)

TUR 120B: Intermediate Turkish II (Teaching Assistant)

HIS 1877A: Ottoman State and Society (1300-1550) (Teaching Assistant)

STUDENT ADVISING EXPERIENCE

2019-2023    Senior & Junior Student Advising, Wellesley College, Department of Religion

2022             Wellesley Library Research Prize (w/ a student paper advised)

2017- 2019   Graduate Student Coordinator at Harvard University’s Center for European Studies

2017-2019    Harvard College Junior Research Paper Advisor

2017             Harvard Distinction in Teaching Award

PROFESSIONAL POSITIONS

2023-                   Ottoman Turkish Studies Association (OTSA) Grant Committee Board Head

2022-2023            Ottoman Turkish Studies Association (OTSA) Grant Committee Board Member

2023-                   Nesir: Edebiyat Araştırmaları Dergisi Peer Review Committee Member

2021-                   Founding Editor of the Online Academic Initiative Artichoke: Ottoman & Turkish Literature in English Translation (along w/ Roberta MiCallef (Boston University), Nilüfer Hatemi (Princeton) & Esra Özdemir (Brown)), https://sites.bu.edu/artichoke/

2019-                   American Association of Teachers of Turkic Languages (AATT) Member

2019-                   Middle East Studies Association (MESA) Member

ACADEMIC PUBLICATIONS

Books

* Verifying the Truth On Their Own Terms: Ottoman Philosophical Culture and the Court Debate Between Mollā Zeyrek (d. 903/1497-8?) and Ḫocazāde Muṣliḥuddīn (d. 893/1488) (Venice: Edizioni Ca’ Foscari, 2023). Open Access: https://edizionicafoscari.unive.it/en/edizioni4/libri/978-88-6969-644-2/

* Natural Sciences and Religion in Post-Classical Islam, 1450-1600: Ottoman Perspectives on Causality and Nature (draft expected by Edinburgh University Press in September 2026).

Peer-Reviewed Articles

Early Modern Islamic Intellectual History

* “‘Beholding the orbit of the beloved’s face within the chain of locks / One sees embodied the absurdity of infinite regress and vicious circularity alike’: The Convergence of Theologico-Philosophical Referencing and Poetic Subjecthood Among the Early Ottoman Learned Elite.” In Routledge History of the Ottoman Empire, ed. Meltem Toksöz (New York: Routledge, 2025). Forthcoming.

* “Book Review: Routledge Handbook on the Sciences in Islamicate Societies: Practices from the 2nd/8th to the 13th/19th Centuries, ed. Sonja Brentjes, 2 vols. (London: Routledge, 2023).” Centaurus: Journal of the European Society for the History of Science 66.1-2 (2024/2025): 245-250.

* “In the Crucible of Ottoman Taḥqīq: A Fifteenth-Century Case of Verifying Philosophy and Theology under Sufi Agnosticism.” The Journal of Early Modern History 27.4 (2023): 321-337.

* “İrânzemîn’den Rûm’a Erken Modern Dünyada İlliyet Anlayışları: On Beşinci Yüzyıl Osmanlı Tahkîki Bağlamında Arapça Felsefenin Yorumlanışı ve İkincil İlletler” [Perspectives on Causality in the Early Modern Iran to Rum: Secondary Causes and the Interpreration of Arabic Philosophy in Regard to Verification (Taḥqīq)]. In Osmanlı’da İlm-i Kelâm [Handbook of Ottoman Theology], eds. Osman Demir, Murat Kılavuz, and Kadir Gömbeyaz, second edition (Istanbul: İSAR, 2023). 301-329. [Turkish]

* “A Travel Guide to India for Ottoman Merchants: On Meḥmed Emīn Efendi’s Taḳrīr.” International Review of Turkish Studies 2.1 (Spring 2012): 30-49.

* “Experiencing the Experience: Seydī ‘Alī Reis and the Indo-Muslim World.” Journal of Turkish Literature 8 (Winter 2011): 26-40.

* “Doğada Fâillik mi? Tanrı’da Seçicilik mi? 15. Yüzyıl Tehâfüt’leri Bağlamında İlliyet veDeterminizm.” [Agency in Nature? Or Omnivolence of God? Causality and Determinism in the Fifteenth-Century Ottoman Tahāfuts] In Osmanlı’da İlm-i Kelâm [Handbook of Ottoman Theology], eds. Osman Demir, Murat Kılavuz, and Kadir Gömbeyaz (Istanbul: İSAR, 2016). 349-409.

WORK-IN-PROGRESS

* “Negotiating Avicennism in Postclassical Ottoman Philosophy: The Treatment of Hylomorphism in Ḫocazāde’s (d. 893/1488) Gloss on Mullāzāde’s Hidāya al-ḥikma Commentary.” Draft submission.

* “Defending Natural Philosophy and Its Demarcation: Hocazāde’s (d. 893/1488) Prolegomenon to Mullāzāde’s Hidāya al-ḥikma Commentary on the Subject Matter of Ḥikma.” Draft submission.

* “Tāceddīn Ibrāhīm b. Ḫıżır Aḥmedī (his Iskendernāme),” “Mullā ʿIzārī,” “Khaṭībzāde,” and “Mullā Zeyrek.” In Philosophy in the Islamic World, vol. 2/2, edited by Ulrich Rudolph, Marinos Sariyannis, and Cüneyt Kaya (Leiden: Brill, 2026). Draft submission.

* “Knowledge as a Form Occurring to the Mind: Mollā Zeyrek’s (d. 903/1497-8?) Unedited Treatise on the Nature of Epistemology.” In preparation.

* “On the Ottoman and Turkish Perceptions of the Tahāfut Debate.” In preparation.

* Ḫocazāde Muṣliḥiddīn Muṣṭafā, Tahāfut al-falāsifa, co-trans./ed. Professor Hasan Hacak of Marmara University (Istanbul: Turkey Yazma Eserler Kurumu Başkanlığı, 2025). [The Arabic edition and Turkish translation of Ḫocazāde’s autographed copy from the Topkapı Palace Collection] (in progress/under contract).

Early Modern Islamic Literary History

* “Quatrains of Many Receptions: A Survey of ‘Omar Khayyām’s Perceptions in Ottoman and Turkish Translations.” Journal of Iranian Studies 57.2 (2024): 1-29.

* “Şair, Feylesûf ve Şüphe: Ömer Hayyâm Rubailerinde İbn-i Sînâcı Düşünceye Gönderme ve Eleştiriler” [Poet, Philosopher, and Doubt: Avicennan Referencing in ‘Omar Khayyām’s Quatrains]. Şarkiyat Mecmuası [Journal of Oriental Studies] 41 (2022): 99-121. [Turkish]

* “Poetry in the Text: The Use and Function of Poetry in Rāwandī’s Rāḥat al-ṣudūr and Yazıcızāde ‘Alī’s Translation of the Same Work in Tevārīkh-i Âl-i Selçūḳ.” The Journal of Ottoman Studies 42 (Winter 2013): 349-372.

Political Islam in Late Ottoman Empire/Turkey

* (w/ Kristin E. Fabbe) “When Fifth Columns Fall: Religious Groups and Loyalty-Signaling in Erdoğan’s Turkey.” In Enemies Within: The Global Politics of Fifth Columns, eds. Harris Mylonas and Scott Radnitz (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2022). 248-270.

* (w/ Kristin E. Fabbe and Ümit Özlale) “Islamic Capitalism in Turkey.” In Business, Ethics and Institutions: The Evolution of Turkish Capitalism in Global Perspective, eds. Asli M. Colpan and Geoffrey Jones (New York: Routledge, 2019). 97-122.

* (w/ Kristin E. Fabbe) “Political Islam in Turkey.” In Routledge Handbook of Turkish Politics, eds. Alparslan Özerdem and Matthew Whiting (New York: Routledge, 2019). 55-68.

Global Modernism in Middle Eastern Poetry

* (w/ Sidney Wade) “The Garip Preface (1941).” In Global Modernists on Modernism, eds. Alys Moody and Stephen J. Ross (London: Bloomsbury, 2020). 199-204.

* “Şi‘r-i Nev ile Şi‘r-i Sefîd Arasında: Çağdaş Farsçada Şiir, Garip ve Türkçe Şiirde Farsça Etkisi Meselesi” [Between She‘r-e Now and She‘r-e Sepīd: Contemporary Poetry in Persian, Garip, and the Question of Persian Influence in Turkish Poetry]. Şarkiyat Mecmuası [Journal of Oriental Studies] 25 (2014): 187-226.

LECTURES & PRESENTATIONS

Early Modern Islamic Intellectual History

* “Ca’ Foscari Book Talk: Verifying the Truth on Ḫocazāde’s and Zeyrek’s Terms,” Center for Middle Eastern Studies, Harvard University, Cambridge, MA, USA: February 29, 2024.

* “Referencing Scholarship: Philosophical Reflections in 15th Century Ottoman Poetry,” AATT Panel in Memory of Walter G. Andrews, Middle Eastern Studies Association Conference, Montréal, Canada: November 4, 2023.

* “Cultures of Taḥqīq from the Ottomans to the Mediterranean,” ECCO Visiting Fellow Lecture, Department of History, Cultures, and Civilization, University of Bologna, Italy: June 8, 2022.

* “Conceptions of Nature in Perso-Islamic Early Modernity: Theories of Causality and Greaco-Arabic Philosophy in the Fifteenth-Century Ottoman Context,” Department of History, Boğaziçi University, Istanbul, Turkey: March 15, 2023; Asian & Middle Eastern Studies, Duke University, Durham, NC, USA: March 28, 2022; Encounters in Iran and the Persianate World, Ca’ Foscari University, Venice, Italy: April 21, 2021.

* “A Synthesis of Graeco-Arabic Philosophy with Sharia: The Case of the Fifteenth-Century Ottoman Adjudications on al-Ghazālī’s Tahāfut al-falāsifa,” Princeton University’s Near Eastern Studies Department Lecture Series, Princeton, USA: October 21, 2019.

* “The Fifteenth-Century Ottoman Culture of Verification: Ḫocazāde (d. 893/1488) and ‘Alā’ al-Dīn al-Ṭūsī (d. 887/1482) on Occasionalism and Secondary Causes in al-Ghazālī’s (d. 505/1111) Tahāfut al-falāsifa,” Shared Practices, Common Legacies: Ottoman Science from a Global Perspective at the University of Pennsylvania (UPenn), Philadelphia, USA: April 5-6, 2019.

* “Tehâfütü’l-felâsife Odağında II. Mehmed Dönemi Osmanlı Âlimlerinde İlliyet Meselesi,” Osmanlı’da İlm-i Kelâm: Âlimler, Eserler ve Meseleler, 29 Mayıs University, İstanbul, Turkey: December 25-27, 2015.  

Other Academic Lectures

* “Ezra Pound Amid Turkey’s Cultural Wars: Authority, Epic, and Word Choice in the Turkish Cantos,” Program in Translation and Intercultural Communication Lecture Series, Asian & Middle Eastern Studies, Duke University, Durham, NC, USA: March 27, 2022; Princeton University, Princeton, USA: November 6, 2020.

 * “On Translating Ezra Pound’s Cantos,” The American Association of Teachers of Turkic Languages (AATT) Conference, Tulane Unviersity, New Orleans, USA: November 13, 2019.

* “Visual and Concrete Poetry in Contemporary Literature,” Boston University’s Literatures of the Middle East Series, Boston, USA: November 13, 2018.

 * “Poetry in the Text: The Use and Function of Poetry in Rāwandī’s Rāḥat al-ṣudūr and Yazıcızāde ‘Alī’s Translation of the Same Work in Tevārīkh-i Âl-i Selçūḳ,” 2014 Middle Eastern Studies Association (MESA) Annual Meeting, Washington DC, USA: November 22-25, 2014.

* “Poetry in the Text: The Use and Function of Poetry in Rāwandī’s Rāḥat al-ṣudūr and Yazıcızāde ‘Alī’s Translation of the Same Work in Tevārīkh-i Âl-i Selçūḳ,” Society for Textual Studies (STS) International Interdisciplinary Conference, University of Washington, Seattle. Seattle WA, USA: March 20-22, 2014.

 * “A Travel Guide to India for Ottoman Merchants: On Meḥmed Emīn Efendi’s Taḳrīr,” 27th Annual Middle Eastern History and Theory Conference at the University of Chicago, Chicago, IL, USA: May 4-5, 2012.

REFERENCES

Professor Cemal Kafadar

Vehbi Koç Professor of Turkish Studies

Harvard University, History Department

kafadar@fas.harvard.edu

Professor Khaled El-Rouayheb

James Richard Jewett Professor of Arabic and Islamic Intellectual History

Harvard University, Near Eastern Languages and Civilizations Department

kel@fas.harvard.edu

Professor Harun Küçük

Associate Professor / Director of Center for Middle Eastern Studies

Department of History and Sociology of Science

University of Pennsylvania

kucuk@sas.upenn.edu

OTHER REFERENCES

Professor James Hankins

Professor of Renaissance History

Harvard University, History Department

jhankins@fas.harvard.edu

Professor Barbara Geller (Teaching Reference)

Professor of Religion

Wellesley College, Department of Religion

bgeller@wellesley.edu

Professor Arang Keshavarzian (Teaching Reference)

Associate Professor and Department Chair

New York University, Department of History & Middle Eastern and Islamic Studies

arang.keshavarzian@nyu.edu