About the Author

Iraj Bashiri holds a Ph.D. in Iranian linguistics from the University of Michigan. Dr. Bashiri is a professor in the Department of History at the University of Minnesota. He has taught numerous courses including Persian fiction and poetry, Islam and the West, contemporary Iranian society, and cultures of the Silk Road. A prolific writer, he has published works such as The Ishraqi Philosophy of Jalal-al-Din-Rumi, The Fiction of Sadeq Hedayat, Prominent Tajik Figures of the Twentieth Century, and The Samanids and the Revival of the Civilization of Iranian Peoples. Currently Dr. Bashiri is involved in research on the history of the Civil War in Tajikistan.