Mahdi Ganjavi is a lecturer, scholar, writer and publisher. He specializes in Middle Eastern studies, Cold War history of knowledge, history of education, and the history of print culture. A former postdoctoral fellow at the School of Education and Social Policy at Northwestern University, he currently teaches at the Faculty of Information at the University of Toronto, as well as at the University of Alberta’s Faculty of Education. He also works in academic librarianship, particularly focusing on metadata, modern endangered materials, and digital access. Ganjavi blends the roles of publisher, historian, and public intellectual, working both within academia and in broader civic spaces. His work not only contributes to scholarship but also to efforts aimed at democratizing access to Middle Eastern historical materials.
Ganjavi is also an author, with notable works including Education and the Cultural Cold War in the Middle East (I.B. Tauris, 2023), which explores how education and cultural diplomacy intersected during the Cold War in the Middle East. He is involved in research related to intellectual freedom, revolutionary movements, and the history of publishing in Iran and the broader region. Additionally, he has published scholarly articles and book chapters on topics such as student activism, archival theory, and Persian fiction.
Research Areas:
- History of education and cultural policy in the Middle East
- Cold War-era cultural diplomacy and propaganda
- Print history, publishing, and censorship
- Political exile and revolutionary movements in Iran
- Intellectual freedom and knowledge production under authoritarian regimes
- Persian literature, including early detective and science fiction and memoirs of activism
Publications:
One of his significant works is Education and the Cultural Cold War in the Middle East (I.B. Tauris, 2023), which explores how the U.S. and other powers used educational and cultural programs as tools of influence in Iran, Egypt, and other parts of the region during the Cold War.
Revolutionary Engineers: Learning, Politics, and Activism at Aryamehr University of Technology (MIT Press, 2025): Co-written with Drs. Sepehr Vakil and Mina Khanlarzadeh, this book explores the cultural, political, and pedagogical history of Aryamehr University of Technology (AMUT)—now Sharif University of Technology—in the transformative years leading up to the 1979 Iranian Revolution.
Other contributions:
- Between 2016 and 2019, Ganjavi edited and oversaw the publication of six little-known Persian novels from the 1930s and 1940s. These novels shed light on the origins of science fiction, detective fiction, and utopian fiction in Persian.
- Ganjavi has successfully completed the first critical edition of “Henriyah Translation” (tarjumah hinrīyah), which represents the earliest Persian translation of “One Thousand and One Nights” (Maniahonar, 2022).
- A scholarly analysis on Malekeh Etezadi, an Iranian feminist poet, political activist, and seamstress, examining her activism and writings within the broader history of women’s rights movements in Iran.
- A study on Sadeq Mamquli, a foundational Persian detective novel, contextualizing its significance within Qajar-era Iran and early modern Persian prose.
Current Projects:
- Researching intergenerational political education.
- Working on translation projects of early modern Persian novels.
- Advancing digitization and metadata initiatives for Middle Eastern and Islamic Studies collections.
Scholarly Approach:
Ganjavi’s work combines archival research, critical theory, and interdisciplinary methods. He often examines how knowledge, books, and education intersect with power structures, especially under authoritarian or imperialist conditions.
Public Humanities & Outreach:
- Ganjavi is actively involved in promoting access to marginalized voices and histories.
- He engages with Iranian diaspora communities in Toronto and beyond, helping to create bridges between academic libraries and grassroots history initiatives.
- He has organized archival workshops, community memory projects, and oral history programs that document the experiences of activists, and exiled/excluded intellectuals.
Editorial Work & Professional Service:
- Ganjavi is the editor-in-chief of Asemana Magazine: Published by Asemana Books, Asemana Magazine features multilingual, and radical voices. We amplify underrepresented and diasporic writers engaging with resistance, memory, decolonial thought, and literary experimentation.
- He is part of editorial teams that promote critical Middle Eastern studies, including MELA Notes, where he serves as Book Review Editor, contributing to the visibility of new works on Middle East history, librarianship, and publishing.
- Ganjavi has also contributed to shaping metadata and cataloging standards for Middle Eastern-language collections, particularly Arabic, Persian, and Kurdish materials.
Public Scholarship & Media Appearances:
- His insights on intellectual freedom, cultural repression, and Cold War cultural programs have been cited in interviews and media discussions, especially relating to Iranian history, U.S.-Iran relations, and cultural policy.
- He advocates for the importance of open access, digital preservation, and ethical digitization in the context of rare and politically sensitive archives.
Teaching and Instructional Roles:
- Ganjavi has taught courses in areas related to Cold War History of Books, Intellectual Freedom, Diversity in Libraries, and AI in Library world.
- He currently teaches at the Faculty of Information at the University of Toronto, as well as at the University of Alberta’s Faculty of Education.
- In the context of public humanities, he often collaborates with community organizations to deliver educational programs aimed at preserving and interpreting marginalized histories.
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