Noor Zaidi

Prof. Zaidi is a scholar of the Middle East and South Asia. She specializes in the history of gender, sectarianism, and Shi’a Islam in national and transnational spaces. Her research explores “sites of sectarianization” through the 20th century, tracing the development and evolution of pilgrimage to two female shrines in Syria and Pakistan and prisons in Iraq as sites of memory and identity construction. Based on oral interviews, fieldwork and archival research in Syria, Pakistan, and Iraq, Prof. Zaidi’s work explores the physical and imaginative spaces in which identity is made and contested and shows how transnational narratives become embedded in local contexts.

At UMBC, Prof. Zaidi teaches a wide range of classes, from Hist 312 (The Modern Middle East) to Hist 386 (Hindus, Muslims, and their Others) and Hist 379 (Women, Gender, and Islam). She also teaches courses on Islamic empires, Islamic movements, the Arab-Israeli conflict, and more.

Prof Zaidi looks forward to bringing more new courses to the department and highlighting underrepresented voices in historical scholarship, using her research experience in various regions and topics.