Iranian thinker
Mehrzad Boroujerdi
Mehrzad BoroujerdiPolitical Science and Iranian StudiesIranianb. 1962
Iran’s encounter with the West became one of the central sites in the formation of its modern intellectual and political identity.
In their times
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Life and Thought
Mehrzad Boroujerdi is an Iranian professor of political science and a scholar of Middle Eastern studies, Iranian politics, and modern intellectual history. He earned his PhD in International Relations from American University in Washington, D.C., and has held academic and administrative positions at Syracuse University, Virginia Tech, and Missouri University of Science and Technology. His landmark book Iranian Intellectuals and the West examines Iranian intellectuals’ engagement with the West, nativism, and the formation of modern Iranian political identity.
Mehrzad Boroujerdi was born in 1341 in Aghajari, Khuzestan Province, and spent his childhood and adolescence in Khuzestan. Shortly before the 1979 Revolution, he moved to the United States to continue his studies in political science and sociology. He earned his bachelor’s degree from Boston University, his master’s degree in political science from Northeastern University, and his PhD in International Relations from American University in Washington, D.C.
Boroujerdi taught at Syracuse University from 1992 to 2019, where he played an influential role in expanding Middle Eastern studies and the study of contemporary Iran. He subsequently held academic leadership positions at Virginia Tech and later served as a professor of political science and university administrator at Missouri University of Science and Technology. He has also served as president of the Association for Iranian Studies and has contributed expert analysis on Iranian and Middle Eastern politics to various institutions and media outlets.
Boroujerdi’s most important work, Iranian Intellectuals and the West: The Tormented Triumph of Nativism, examines Iranian intellectuals’ engagement with the West, modernity, identity, and the discourse of nativism. The book shows how encounters with the West became a central site for the formation of intellectual and political identity in modern Iran. His other works include I Carved, Worshipped and Shattered, Mirror for the Muslim Prince, and the co-authored Postrevolutionary Iran: A Political Handbook.
Boroujerdi’s importance lies in bringing together political science, intellectual history, Iranian studies, and the analysis of the contemporary Middle East. His work offers a valuable resource for understanding conflicts over identity, the role of intellectuals, the politics of the Islamic Republic, institutions of power, and Iran’s relationship with the West.