Hanan Hammad was a Visiting Fellow at the Woolf
Institute from May to July 2015. Hanan is an assistant
professor of history of the Middle East at Texas Christian
University.
Her primary research focuses on the socio-economic and cultural development of the
modern Middle East with special emphasis on gender, sexuality and popular culture
in modern Egypt. She is currently writing a book on the late Egyptian starlet Layla
Murad (1918-1995).
Murad, who has been one of the most remembered celebrities in 20th century Arab
musical cinema, was born Jewish and announced her conversion to Islam in 1948.
She prematurely retired in the mid-1950s, against the backdrop of the Arab-Israeli
conflict and the consolidation of power of the Nasser regime shortly thereafter.
Dr Hammad co-organised the Minorities and Popular Culture in Modern Middle East
workshop (12-13 June 2015) with Dr Shana Cohen. The Workshop was-hosted by the
Woolf Institute in conjunction with the Centre for Cultural Literary and Postcolonial
Studies, SOAS, University of London.