Research
My research has a global focus, primarily on the Middle East. It contributes to the debates on the political economy of urbanism in developing cities, thereby establishing a connection between their geopolitical histories and urban present. Specifically, I examine the inflow of refugees to Amman, Jordan, from the Circassians of 1890 and the Palestinians of 1948, to the Iraqis of 2002, revealing the impact each influx had on the development of the city. My research exposes the State as using the disruption caused by each migration of refugees to rewrite systems of planning, creating a new modernist vocabulary for the city’s development. Planning in Amman has been and remains unregulated, dominated by systems of nepotism and political clout. As a result, the city is being unplanned, run by an informal system that ultimately serves the State and its oligarchic network. From this perspective, we can understand state power and capital as forces directly related to the remaking of the built environment.
Publications
Books
2023 Manuscript in Review
Unplanning the City: Refugees and Development in Amman, 1880-2020.
Cambridge University Press
2023 Book Proposal in Review
The Unnoticed Mosque: Islamic Architecture in Hiding
Routledge Press, Middle Eastern Studies
Special Issues Edited
2021 Co-editor with Bulent Batuman, “Displacement”, International Journal of Islamic Studies, 10.2 (London: Intellect, 2021). Double blind review.
Contributed Chapters in Edited Volumes
2023 “Jordan is Palestine?: Rewriting History Through Pedagogy and Space” in Making of a Field: Architectural Education in the MENA, edited by Mohammad Gharipour and Farhan Karim, Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press (forthcoming). Double-blind review.
2019 “Legitimizing the Jordanian State Through Social Housing” in Social Housing in the Middle East: Architecture, Urban Development and Transnational Modernity, edited by Mohammad Gharipour and Kivanc Kilinc, Bloomington: Indiana University Press (2019) 37-63. Double-blind review.
2017 “The Processes of Neoliberal Governance and Urban Transformations in Amman” in Order and Disorder: Urban Governance and the Making of Middle Eastern Cities, edited by Luna Khirfan. Montreal: McGill-Queens University Press (2017) 132-156. Double-blind review.
Journal Articles
2023 “Forms of Protest: Political Art in the Digital and Urban Realm.” International Journal of Islamic Architecture, 13.1 (2023). Double-blind review.
2018 “Amman: Ruination and the City of Lost Nations.” Middle East Report, 48: 287 (2018) 18- 21. Single-blind review.
2016 “The Jordan Gate Towers of Amman: Surrendering Public Space to Build a Neoliberal Ruin,” International Journal of Islamic Architecture, 5.1 (2016) 73–101. Double-blind review.
2016 “Bureaucratizing the City: Moderated Governance, Regime Security, and Urban Transformation in Amman, Jordan.” Traditional Dwellings and Settlements Review, 26.11 (2016) 23-37. Double-blind review.
2016 “Neoliberalism as a Site-Specific Process: The Aesthetics and Politics of Architecture in Amman, Jordan.” Cities, 60 (2016) 102-112. Double-blind review.
Articles and Reviews
2021 Review of Superhumanity: Design of the Self, Co-edited by Nick Axel, Beatriz Colomina, Nikolaus Hirsch, Anton Vidokle, and Mark Wigley, Design and Culture (2021): 435. Single-blind review.
2019 “Urban Enclaves: On Neoliberal Urbanism in Amman,” 7iber.com (2019). Peer review.
2018 Review of Builders, Housewives and the Construction of Modern Athens, by Ioanna Theocharopoulou, Buildings and Landscapes: Journal of the Vernacular Architecture Forum, XXV, (2018): 116-117. Single-blind review.
Conference Proceedings
2021 “Jordan is Palestine? Rewriting History Through Pedagogy and Space”, Proceedings of the 74th Annual Conference of the Society of Architectural Historians, Virtual (2021). Double-blind review.
2018 “Park51 and the Precarity of Muslim-American Religious Spaces”, Proceedings of the 70th Annual Conference of the Society of Architectural Historians, St. Paul, MN (2018). Double-blind review.
2016 “Neoliberalism as a Site-Specific Process: The Aesthetics and Politics of Architecture in Amman, Jordan”, Proceedings of the Southeast Chapter of the Society of Architectural Historians Conference, New Orleans, LA (2016). Double-blind review.
2012 Traditional Dwellings and Settlements Review, The Myth of Tradition: Biennial Conference of The International Association for The Study Of Traditional Environments, October 4-7, 2012, University Of Oregon, Portland, Oregon 24.1 (2012), 84. Double blind review.
2010 Traditional Dwellings and Settlements Review, The Utopia of Tradition: Twelfth Conference of the International Association for the Study of Traditional Environments, December 15-18, 2010, American University of Beirut (AUB), Beirut, Lebanon: Conference Abstracts 22.1 (2010), 47. Double blind review.Review of Superhumanity: Design of the Self, (2021) Co-edited by Nick Axel, Beatriz Colomina, Nikolaus Hirsch, Anton Vidokle, and Mark Wigley, Design and Culture, DOI: 10.1080/17547075.2021.1935553.
Select Presentations
“Re-spatializing Exclusion: Transnational Narratives of Resistance,” Session Co-Chair, Society of Architectural Historians Annual Conference (SAH). Pittsburgh, April 2022.
“Jordan is Palestine? Rewriting History Through Pedagogy and Space,” Presenter, Society of Architectural Historians Annual Conference (SAH). Montreal, QC, April 2021.
“Public Housing as Social Transformation in Amman, Jordan,” Presenter, European Association for Urban History (EAUH). Antwerp, Belgium. September 2021.
“Global Visions on Cities and Historical Pandemics in the 20th Century,” Virtual Roundtable Organizer. July 2020.
“GAHTC ZOOM-POSIUM,” Virtual Symposium Organizer and Moderator. July 2020.
“What is an Antiracist Architectural History?” Virtual Symposium Organizer and Moderator. July 2020.
“Decolonizing Architectural History,” Session Chair and Presenter, World History Association. San Juan, Puerto Rico, June 2019.
“The Untold Histories of Peripheral Architecture and Cities,” Session Chair, Society of Architectural Historians Annual Conference (SAH). Providence, RI, April 2019.
“Globalizing Architectural History Education,” Roundtable Moderator, Society of Architectural Historians Annual Conference (SAH). Providence, RI, April 2019.
"Pedagogical Challenges of a Global Architectural History Education," Presenter, Architectural Research in Europe Network Association (ARENA). London, UK, November 2018.
"Pedagogical Approaches to Re-Centering the Architectural Canon," Round Table, Vernacular Architecture Forum. Alexandria, VA, May 2018.
“Park51 and the Precarity of Muslim-American Religious Spaces.” Presenter, Society of Architectural Historians Annual Conference (SAH). St. Paul, MN, April 2018.
“Are We Teaching Global Yet?” Roundtable, Society of Architectural Historians Annual Conference (SAH). St. Paul, MN, April 2018.