Selim Deringil
Dr. Selim Deringil is professor of history in the Department of Humanities. He is also the program lead for the BA in History. His interests are in cultural and intellectual history, and he is currently involved in research on religious conversion and apostasy in the late Ottoman Empire. He is also interested in teaching and research on comparative themes in Ottoman/European history. He has written and taught on such topics as citizenship, the relationship of religion and nationalism, nomadism and modernity, the occult in Muslim and Christian societies, and piracy in the Mediterranean.
He has held various teaching positions in the U.S, Britain, Hungary, and France. He has published in Turkish, English, French, Greek and Japanese.
Academic positions
- Visiting professor at the Department of Sociology, University of Michigan at Ann Arbor, January-April 2001.
- Visiting senior fellow at the Collegium Budapest 2001-2002
- Visiting faculty at the Central European University (CEU), Budapest 2002
- Recurrent visiting faculty in the Department of History, CEU since 2007
- Chairman of the Department of History, University of the Bosphorous 2003-2006.
- Fernand Braudel fellow at the European University Institute 2008-2009.
- Elected member of Academia Europaea 2012.
Selected publications
- Selim Deringil, The Ottoman Twilight in the Arab Lands. Turkish Memoirs and Testimonials of the Great War. Academic Studies Press Boston 2019.
“A Tale of two colleges, Syrian Protestant College and Robert College. Convergent and Divergent Histories,” In the House of Understanding; Essays in the Honor of Kamal Salibi. AUB Press. 2017.
- Conversion and Apostasy in the Late Ottoman Empire. (Cambridge University Press 2012). Winner of MESA Fuad Koprulu Book Prize 2013.
- “‘The Armenian Question is Finally Closed’. Mass Conversions of Armenians during the Hamidian Massacres of 1894-1897.” Comparative Studies in Society and History. Vol 51. (2009) 344-371.
- “The Turks and Europe: Uninvited Guests or Sharers of a Common Destiny?” Middle Eastern Studies September 2007 Vol 43 pp 709-723.
- I Kala Prostatevomeni Epikratia. (Greek translation of The Well Protected Domains) translator: Stefanos Papageorgiu. Papazisi Press, Athens 2003.
- “‘They Live in a State of Nomadism and Savagery’: The Late Ottoman Empire and the Post-Colonial Debate.” Comparative Studies in Society and History Vol 43. July 2003.
- The Well Protected Domains. Ideology and the Legitimation of Power in the Ottoman Empire 1876-1909. I.B Tauris Publishers, Oxford & New York 1998 (pb. edition 2000).
- The Ottomans, the Turks, and World Power Politics. Collected articles. ISIS Press Istanbul 2000.
- Winner of MESA Fuad Koprulu Book Prize 1999.

Selim Deringil
Professor of History
Program Lead - BA in History
Office: Nicol 310
Beirut campus
Extension 1264
selim.deringil@lau.edu.lb