Dr. Aomar Boum

Professional Background

Professor Aomar Boum received a Ph.D. in socio-cultural anthropology from the University of Arizona, an M.A. in applied humanities from Al-Akhawayn University (Morocco), and a B.A. in English language and literature from Cadi Ayyad University (Morocco). During his fellowship at the Center, he was Assistant Professor of International Studies and Islamic Studies at Portland State University. For his Judith B. and Burton P. Resnick Fellowship for the Study of Antisemitism, Professor Boum conducted research on “Media Influences and the Reproduction of Antisemitic Ideology in the Islamic World: Generational Differences.”

Professor Boum is the recipient of such awards as the Charles and Gertrude Gordon Foundation Fellowship and Jack and Irene Sarver Scholarship from the The Arizona Center for Judaic Studies; Centre d’Etudes Maghrebines de Tunis/Tangier American Legation Museum Fellowship for Maghrebi Scholars; Tauber Institute Graduate Research Award; UCLA-Maurice Amado Foundation Research Grant; and an award from the Memorial Foundation for Jewish Culture, among others. He has published a number of academic papers on ethnic folkdances and nationalism, al-Jazeera and the discourse on terrorism, as well as the history and historiography of rural Moroccan Jewry. Professor Boum has coauthored with Dr. Thomas Park the Historical Dictionary of Morocco (Scarecrow Press, 2006), and has written a number of encyclopedic entries on the Jews of southern Morocco for the Encyclopedia of Jews in the Islamic World (Brill). His dissertation was titled Muslims Remember Jews in Southern Morocco: Social Memories, Dialogic Narratives, and the Collective Imagination of Jewishness.

Fellowship Research

While in residence at the Center, Professor Boum conducted a focused study and analysis of Muslim narratives about Jews and the dissemination of anti-Semitic discourse and material through satellite media and the internet. He used apparent-time sampling technique contextualized within historical, anthropological, and sociological perspectives to understand how four cohorts of contemporary Moroccans (great-grandparents, grandparents, parents, and young adults) think of and represent Jews.

Professor Boum was in residence at the Mandel Center from July 1 to September 30, 2007.