The Division of Arts & Humanities at UC Berkeley is pleased to welcome Professor Nora Jacobsen Ben Hammed as of July 1, 2023. Jacobsen Ben Hammed is an assistant professor in the Department of Middle Eastern Languages & Culture with a specialization in the continued life of Islamic philosophy as it was absorbed and transformed in Islamic theology and mysticism.
With a concentration on medieval Islamic philosophy, Jacobsen Ben Hammed holds a particular interest in the ways post-classical Muslim thinkers posited original and creative philosophical views in response to Greek systems of epistemology and metaphysics as interpreted through the Islamic philosophical movement (falsafa). Her work has been published in Oriens, Arabic Sciences and Philosophy andthe Journal of Persianate Studies. Currently, she is working on a book project that addresses 12th-century Muslim theologian Fakhr al-Dīn al-Rāzī’s engagement with the Islamic philosophical movement.
Jacobsen Ben Hammed earned her B.A. from Yale University and M.A. from the Yale Divinity School before completing her doctorate at the University of Chicago Divinity School. Before coming to UC Berkeley, she had been an assistant professor of Islamic studies at Bard College since 2019.