Project Staff

Project Director: M. Hakan Yavuz

OSH 152 B

801-585-7986

M. Hakan Yavuz is professor of political science at the University of Utah. His current projects focus on transnational Islamic networks in Central Asia and Turkey; the role of Islam in state-building and nationalism; and ethno-religious conflict management.

Yavuz received his earlier education in Ankara, Turkey, graduating with a B.A. from Siyasal Bilgiler Fakultesi, Ankara. He received his M.A. from the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee and spent a semester at the Hebrew University, Israel (1990) and received his Ph.D. from University of Wisconsin-Madison, 1998 in political science. M. Hakan Yavuz wrote his dissertation on "The Construction of Political Islam, 1960-1996)."

Yavuz also carried out an extensive fieldwork in Fergana Valley, Uzbekistan to examine the relationship between Islam and nationalism, and the preservation and dissemination of Islamic knowledge under socialism. He is an author of more than 20 articles on Islam, nationalism, the Kurdish question, and modern Turkish politics. He has been published in Comparative Politics, Critique, SAIS Review, Journal of Muslim Minority Affairs, Central Asian Survey, Journal of Islamic Studies, and the Journal of Palestine Studies. Some of his articles have been translated into Arabic and Bosnian from English. He is also a columnist in the Turkish weekly Aksiyon and an editorial member of Critique, Silk Road, and the Journal of Muslim Minority Affairs.

He has lectured in Taskent, Ankara, Istanbul, Amsterdam, Leiden, Koln, Berlin, and Sarajevo, Copenhagen, Bochum; and has been featured by Voice of America, the BBC, the New York Times, the Guardian and many other media outlets.