Ph.D., Ohio State University, History
M.A., Ohio State University, History
B.A. Koç University, History
B.A. Ankara University, School of Communication

Ayşe Baltacıoğlu-Brammer
Assistant Professor of History and Middle Eastern and Islamic Studies & Director of Ottoman and Turkish Studies Initiative (OTS-NYU)
Early Modern Middle East, Ottoman Empire, Iran, Sunni-Shiite Divide, Sects and Sectarianism in the Middle East, Empire and Identity Formation in the Middle East
I am a specialist in Middle Eastern history with a focus on early modern Ottoman and Safavid Empires. The questions surrounding the Sunni-Shi‘ite conflict during the early modern period and its enmeshment with issues of political, religious, and fiscal legitimacy in inter-confessional and inter-imperial contact zones is at the core of my research interests. By examining the religiosities of early modern Ottoman Anatolia, Kurdistan, and Safavid Iran, my research provides an accurate picture for a deeper understanding of both the religious transformation of the Ottoman and Safavid polities in the early modern era and the current geo-political and demographic make-up in the region today. My current book project, tentatively titled Politics of Sectarianism in the Middle East: Ottoman Sunnism, Safavid Shiism, and the Qizilbash, explores the Sunni-Shiite divergence in the early modern period, not merely as a religiously derived, but as a meticulously carried out geo-political and fiscal battle that formed the base of the sectarian configuration in the region today.
Fellowships and Honors
- 2020-2021 Andrew W. Mellon Foundation Fellowship at the Institute for Advanced Study
- 2020-2021 NYU Center for the Humanities Fellowship
- 2015-2016 Presidential Fellowship at Ohio State University
- 2015 Ruth Higgins Research Grant
- 2013-2014 Bradley Foundation Research Grant
- 2013 Mershon Center for International Security Studies, Graduate Student Research Grant
- 2010 Sydney N. Fisher Award, Ohio State University
Publications
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The Safavids, ed. Rudi Matthee, (London: Routledge, 2021), 15-31
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Berkley Forum, March 2021
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Neither Victim nor Accomplice: The Qizilbash as a Borderland Actor in the Early Modern Ottoman RealmRethinking “Sunnitization” in the Ottoman Empire, c. 1450-1700 (Leiden: Brill, November 2020), 423-450Tijana Kristic and Derin Terzioğlu (eds.)
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Beyond Orthodoxy and Heterodoxy: New Perspectives on Ottoman Sunnism (forthcoming, Edinburg: Edinburgh University Press, 2019), 47-70Vefa Erginbaş (ed.)
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Journal of Ottoman and Turkish Studies Association 6/1 (Spring 2019): 39-60
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International Journal of Turkish Studies Vol 20, Nos. 1&2 (2014): 21-48
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Origins: Current Events in Historical Perspective, November 2013
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Politics of Sect and Sectarianism in the Middle East: Ottoman Sunnism, Safavid Shiism, and the Qizilbash(book manuscript in preparation)