# Roy Mottahedeh

Roy Parviz Mottahedeh (born July 3, 1940 in New York City) is Gurney Professor of History, Emeritus at Harvard University, where he taught courses on the pre-modern social and intellectual history of the Islamic Middle East and is an expert on Iranian culture. roy mottahedeh served as the director of Harvard's Center for Middle Eastern Studies from 1987 to 1990, and as the inaugural director of the Prince Alwaleed Bin Talal Islamic Studies Program at Harvard University from 2005 to 2011. == Life == Roy Parviz Mottahedeh was born in New York City on July 3, 1940 and received his primary and secondary education in Quaker schools in New York and Pennsylvania.