Alireza Korangy received his PhD from the Department of Near Eastern Languages and Civilizations at Harvard University. His field of research is classical Persian and Arabic philology with a special emphasis on poetics, rhetoric, folklore and linguistics.
Azadeh Vatanpour (Ph.D.) is the Director of Iranian Studies at the University of Austin. Her research focuses on ethno-religious minority groups in the Middle East, particularly among Iranian minority religions and their socio-political relationship with Islamic tradition. She examines the intersection of devotional musical practices, Literature, politics of translation, and performativity. Her current interdisciplinary research project explores the identity formation of the Yarsan through sacred music, religious text, divinity, and performance from the nineteenth century to the present.