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ABOUT THIS SITEI began working on this website in April of 2008. At the most basic level, I wanted to create a place where people who know me could find out what I'm up to and look at my photos, particularly during those periods when I am outside the United States.
On this site you will also find a number of photos and links. The links are mostly of use to specialists in the fields of Russian and Middle Eastern Studies, but the photos will hopefully be of more general interest. There are also pages devoted to my research and professional activities. Finally, there is also a blog, where I mostly write about current events in Turkey and the former USSR, academic treatment of these regions, and my own research activities and travels.
About me: From 1992 to 1999, I was a resident of Istanbul, where I worked as an English teacher and freelance journalist. During that time, I studied Turkish, Russian, and Hungarian, and also traveled extensively in Russia, Central Europe, the Balkans, the Middle East, India, and the Far East. In 1999, I returned to the United States, completing a master's degree in Near Eastern Studies from Princeton University in 2001 and a PhD in History from Brown University in 2007. My areas of specialization are Russia and the USSR, the Middle East, and the Turkic communities of Eurasia. In 2007-2008 I worked as a research fellow at the Harriman Institute and Columbia University as part of the institute's yearlong project on Russia, the Ottoman Empire, and Islam.
In 2008 and 2009, I conducted post-doctoral research in libraries and archives in Turkey, Russia, and Georgia. My work in Turkey was sponsored by a fellowship paid for by the National Endowment for the Humanities and the American Research Institute in Turkey (ARIT), while my research in Russia and Georgia was subsidized by a grant from NCEEER.
In August of 2009 I began working as an assistant professor of Islamic World History at Montana State Universty in Bozeman, where I teach classes on the Middle East, the Ottoman Empire, Turkey, and Russia.
Thank you for visiting and please check in again soon!
Jim Meyer
jim@jhmeyer.net