Anna Akasoy

GC profile default image

Research Interests

  • Islamic intellectual history
  • history of philosophy and science
  • history of falconry
  • hunting and veterinary medicine
  • cultural and religious contacts
  • entangled and global history

Education

  • M.A. and Ph.D., Johann Wolfgang Goethe-University, Frankfurt

Anna Akasoy’s area of expertise is pre-modern Islamic intellectual history, especially the intersection of philosophy and mysticism as well as the transmission of knowledge across cultures. She is also interested in European cinematic and literary representations of Islam.
 
She is currently working on two research projects. One is a cultural history of falconry in the Middle East until the Ottoman period. The other is an exploration of the classical heritage of the Middle East and Asia, focusing the religious dimensions of the legend of Alexander the Great.

Publications

  •  Anna Akasoy, ‘Falconry in Arabic Literature: from Its Beginnings to the Mid-9th Century’, in Karl-Heinz Gersmann and Oliver Grimm (eds), Raptor and Human: Falconry and Bird Symbolism Throughout the Millennia on Global Scale (Kiel, 2018), 243-265.
  • ‘Muhammad’s Movement and Leadership’, in Armando Salvatore et al (eds), The Wiley Blackwell History of Islam (Chichester, 2018), 97-113.
  • ‘Chick-Lit in the Hijaz. Why Historians Should Sometimes Be More Frivolous’, in Albrecht Fuess and Stefan Weninger (eds), A Life with the Prophet? Examining Hadith, Sira and Qur’an. In Honor of Wim Raven (Berlin, 2017), 45-67.
  • ‘Moral Philosophy in the Medieval Islamicate World’, in Jens Timmermann and Sacha Golob (eds), The Cambridge History of Moral Philosophy(Cambridge, 2017), 153-167.
  • ‘Geography, History and Prophecy: Mechanisms of Integration in the Islamic Alexander Legend’, in Nikolas Jaspert and Reinhold Glei (eds),Locating Religions. Contact, Diversity and Translocality (Leiden, 2016), 16-36.
  • ‘Iskandar the Prophet. Religious Themes in Islamic Versions of the Alexander Legend’, in Sonja Brentjes and Jürgen Renn (eds), Globalization of Knowledge in the Mediterranean World of Post-Antiquity, 700-1500 (Burlington, 2016), 167-204.
  • ‘Al-Ghazālī’s Veil Section: Comparative Religion before Religionswissenschaft’, in Frank Griffel (ed.), Islam and Rationality. The Impact of al-Ghazālī, vol. 2 (Leiden, 2015), 142-167.
  • Rashīd al-Dīn, Agent and Mediator of Cultural Exchanges in Ilkhanid Iran, Edited with Charles Burnett and Ronit Yoeli-Tlalim (Warburg Institute Colloquia, 24; London: The Warburg Institute, 2013).
  • Renaissance Averroism and its Aftermath: Arabic Philosophy in Early Modern Europe, Edited with Guido Giglioni (International Archives of the History of Ideas, 211; Dordrecht: Springer, 2013).
  • ‘Was Ibn Rushd an Averroist? The Problem, the Debate, and its Philosophical Implications’, in Anna Akasoy and Guido Giglioni (eds), Renaissance Averroism and its Aftermath (Dordrecht, 2013), 321-347.
  • ‘Paganism and Islam. Medieval Arabic Literature on Religions in West Africa’, in John Marenbon, Carlos Steel and Werner Verbeke (eds),Paganism in the Middle Ages. Threat and Fascination (Leuven, 2012), 207-238.
  • ‘What is Philosophical Sufism?’, in Peter Adamson (ed.), In the Age of Averroes: Arabic Philosophy in the Sixth/Twelfth Century (London, 2011), 229-249.
  • Islam and Tibet. Interactions along the Musk Routes, Edited with Charles Burnett and Ronit Yoeli-Tlalim (Farnham, 2010).
  • ‘Ibn Sīnā in the Arab West: the Testimony of an Andalusian Sufi’, in Documenti e Studi sulla Tradizione Filosofica Medievale 21 (2010), 287-312.
  • Anna Akasoy, ‘The Influence of the Arabic Tradition of Falconry and Hunting on European Culture’, in Anna Akasoy, James Montgomery and Peter Pormann (eds), Islamic Crosspollinations (Oxford, 2007), 46-64.
  • Philosophie und Mystik in der späten Almohadenzeit. Die Sizilianischen Fragen des Ibn Sabʿīn (Islamic Philosophy, Theology and Science; Texts and Studies, 59; Leiden: Brill, 2006).
  • Muhammad ibn Abdallah al-Bazyar, Das Falken- und Hundebuch des Kalifen al-Mutawakkil. Ein arabischer Traktat aus dem 9. Jahrhundert, Edited and translated by Anna Akasoy and Stefan Georges (Berlin, 2005).

Books