Curriculum Vitae

Martyn Smith
[email protected]
Education:
May 2006.
Ph.D. in Comparative Literature at Emory University in Atlanta, Georgia.
May 1999.
M.A. Fuller Theological Seminary, Pasadena, California.
May 1995.
B.Th. Prairie Bible College, Three Hills, Alberta.
Employment:
September 2006-present.
Associate Professor of Religious Studies, Lawrence University
classes taught:
Islam, Quran, Cairo: Islam in Context, Arabian Nights, Islam and
Globalization, Greek and Islamic Philosophical Tradition, Intro to Religious Studies,
Ancient Egyptian Religion, Hebrew Prophets, Apple Google Facebook, Seminar in
Methdology, Freshman Studies
tutorials and independent studies:
Culture & Religion in Saudi Arabia, Religion in West
Africa, Politics of Islamic NGOs, Women and Gender in Islam, Jerusalem, Sayyid Qutb and
the Quran, Al-Andalusia, Hieroglyphs, Quran in Arabic, Gender & Space in Cairo, History
of Mysticism, Gender & Space in Cairo, Social Media, Arabian Nights in Arabic
August 2005-May 2006.
Mellon Graduate Teaching Fellowship for Dillard University in New
Orleans, but transferred to Clark University in Atlanta after Hurricane Katrina.
Sep. 1999-May 2002, Sep. 2003-May 2005.
PhD student at Emory University
Publications:
March 2012.
Finding Meaning in the City: al-Maqrzs Use of Poetry in the
Khia
,
Mamluk
Studies Review
.
June 2011.
Between Book and Reality: The Guidebook in Melvilles
Redburn and Clarel
,
forthcoming in
Leviathan: A Journal of Melville Studies
.
October 2009.
First stage of Maqrizi.com goes live on Web, presenting translations of chapters
from the
Khitat
by al-Maqrizi along with my own photographs of medieval mosques and madrasas
in Cairo.
April 2009.
Pyramids in the Medieval Islamic Landscape: Perceptions and Narratives.
Journal of
the American Research Center in Egypt
43 (2007)

October 2008.
Religion, Culture, and Sacred Space
, published by Palgrave Macmillan.
February 2004.
Elusive Stones: Reading Posidippus
Lithika
through Technical Writing on
Stones. From
Labored in Papyrus Leaves: Perspectives on an Epigram Collection Attributed to
Posidippus (P.Mil.Vogl. VIII 309)
. Ed. Benjamin Acosta-Hughes, Elizabeth Kosmetatou, and
Manuel Baumbach. Washington DC: Center for Hellenic Studies, 2004.
Spring 2001.
My Tongues a Stone: Meditations on Yeats, Plotinus, and Christianity.
Yeats Eliot
Review: A Journal of Criticism and Scholarship
. Spring 17 (2): 11-31.
Presentations:
November 2012.
Noah and the Bee: Moderating Apocalyptic in the Quran, presented at 2012
annual meeting for AAR in Chicago, Illinois.
March 2012.
Fundraising, Youth Groups, and Sushi Muslims: The Formatting of Islam in
America. Talk given for Killeen Chair Lecture Series at St. Norbert College, on topic of religious
pluralism in America.
November 2011.
Ibn Khaldun and the Urban Context of the Soul, presented at 2011 annual
meeting for AAR in San Francisco, California.
April 2, 2011.
The Wandering Nile: Al-Maqrizis Khitat as Environmental History, presented at
the annual meeting for the American Research Center in Egypt in Chicago, Illinois.
November 2010.
Getting al-Maqrizis Khitat on the Web, presented at annual meeting for
Middle East Studies Association in San Diego, California.
June 2009.
A Philosophy of Guidebooks paper presented at the conference Melville and the
Mediterranean sponsored by Melville Society and the Association for the Study of Travel in Egypt
and the Near East. This conference was held in Jerusalem.
April 2008.
Screening of short documentary
Dearborn USA: Islam in the American Landscape
at
the Teaching the City faculty workshop at Lawrence University.
November 2007.
Representing Buildings and Society: Al-Maqrizi and His
Khitat
. Annual
Meeting of the American Academy of Religion, San Diego, California.
November 2001.
The Poetics of Park Design: Reading Olmsteds Mt. Royal. Paper delivered in
Halifax, Nova Scotia for the North East American Society for Eighteenth Century Studies.
Awards, Research, Travel:
June 2015-June 2017
NEH Enduring Questions Grant to develop religious studies course on The
Nature of Life.

September 2014-
Participant in planning committee for Teagle Foundation grant to the Midwest
Hybrid Learning Consortium. In June 2015 I became joined one of the first teams and began to
develop a hybrid version of my Islam course.
June-September 2009.
NEH Summer Stipend for travel to Egypt to gather materials for
Maqrizi.com website.
May-August 2006.
Awarded a post-doctoral fellowship by the American Research Center in Egypt
for study in Cairo, Egypt during summer 2006. My project was a translation and commentary on
Maqrizis chapter on the pyramids in his
Khitat
.
September 2004-June 2005.
Deans Teaching Fellowship at Emory University, one year stipend
awarded for excellence in teaching.
Summer 2004.
Spent in Damascus, Syria, living in the old city and working on a translation project.
May 2004.
Fellow in Teaching and the Environment at Emory University, a seminar to promote
the inclusion of environmental topics in undergraduate teaching.
Summer 2003.
Internationalization grant from the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences at Emory
University, allowing me to spend the summer in Greece as a visiting associate at the American
School for Classical Studies in Athens. I also traveled to Turkey to visit Istanbul and ancient sites.
June 2002-May 2003.
Year-long fellowship at the Center for Arabic Study Abroad for intensive
study of Arabic at the American University in Cairo. During this time I had the opportunity to
travel to many sites in Egypt and around the Middle East. My trips outside Egypt included a
month-long trip to Ethiopia, a weeklong trip into Jordan, and a visit to Jerusalem for Easter 2003.
April 2002.
The Excellence Award for Arabic, presented by the Department of Middle Eastern and
South Asian Studies.
Summer 2001.
Intensive Arabic program, Arabic Language Institute, Fez, Morocco.
Summer 2000.
Intensive Arabic program, Middlebury College, Middlebury, Vermont.
June 1999.
American Bible Society Scholarly Achievement Award for study of the Old Testament.
Fall 1998.
member of planning committee for ecumenical retreat sponsored by National
Conference for Community and Justice, bringing together divinity students from the Protestant,
Catholic, and Jewish faiths.
Service
August 2011.
Participation in Seminar on King Arthurs Britain for Lawrence Summer Seminars. I
will lead one of the three days for this seminar, treating the subject of pilgrimage to Jerusalem in the
medieval era.

November 2008.
Lecture Islam in America: Dearborn USA delivered at the Winchester
Academy
June 2008.
Two lectures on Islam in America: Dearborn USA presented for Lawrence Alumni
College.
June 2008.
Attendance at the al-Musharaka 2008 Summer Seminar Border Crossing (sponsored
by NITLE). I screened my documentary
Dearborn USA: Islam in America
and gave a presentation
on using Google Maps in the classroom.
June 2008.
Invited presenter on using Google Maps in the classroom at the Cities in Transition
Workshop at Beloit College.
April 2008.
Teaching the City faculty workshop, funded by the Associated Colleges of the Midwest
(ACM). This workshop facilitated dialogue between faculty members from various disciplines who
teach classes focused on the city.
May 2008.
Invited by Multi-Cultural Affairs Committee (MCAC) to screen
Dearborn USA
documentary for Lawrence community.
March and April 2008.
Multi-media lectures to Lawrence alumni in Denver and Milwaukee Islam
in America: Dearborn USA.
November 2007.
Invited speaker at Get-Inforumed colloquium at St. Norbert College on the
American occupation of Iraq.
September 2007.
Presenter at Freshman Studies Symposium at Lawrence University.
April 2007.
Talk for Wednesday Club in Barber Room at Lawrence University on Understanding
Religious Themes in Literary Works.
April 2007.
Paper presented for the GLOW (Gay, Lesbian, Other, Whatever) conference at
Lawrence University in April, 2007. My paper was entitled: The Orient and the Fundamentalist:
From Flaubert to Andrew Sullivan.
December 2006.
Two part series on Islam at St. Pauls Lutheran Church in Appleton, Wisconsin.