Welcome to ASMEA

ASMEA is a new academic society dedicated to promoting the highest standards of research and teaching in Middle Eastern and African studies, and related fields. It is a response to the mounting interest in these increasingly inter-related fields, and the absence of any single group addressing them in a comprehensive, multi-disciplinary fashion.

ASMEA is, first and foremost, a community of scholars concerned to protect academic freedom and promote the search for truth to reach new heights in inquiry. The Association will advance the discourse in these fields by offering its members new opportunities to publish and present ideas to the academic community and beyond.

ASMEA will offer its assistance to established and new scholars, including un-tenured faculty, graduate students, and those in related fields to expand the body of scholars and knowledge.


Professor Bernard Lewis ▪ Professor Fouad Ajami

Association News

ASMEA Announces First Recipients of Research Grants

The Association for the Study of the Middle East and Africa (ASMEA) is pleased to announce the winners of the first awards from the Association’s research grants program. Grants of up to $2,000 were awarded to support the scholarly work of members in the fields of Middle Eastern studies, African studies, and their related fields.

Scholars Explore Africa's Strategic Challenges at ASMEA-AFRI Symposium


Montgomery, AL—The Association for the Study of the Middle East and Africa (ASMEA) and the U.S. Air Force Research Institute (AFRI) presented a day-long symposium on the conflicts in Africa to a sold-out crowd of scholars, military officers, and policymakers at Maxwell Air Force Base today. The symposium, entitled Africa: Security Challenges and Strategic Perspectives, featured speakers who addressed strategic concerns on the continent including the spread of militant Islam in Africa; the ongoing crisis in the Democratic Republic of Congo; the rise of piracy off the coast of Somalia; the regional effects of conflict in Sudan; and foreign investment in Africa. Read more...

In the News

Western Sahara: Time to Move Ahead, Realistically
(06/11/2009) J. Peter Pham, World Defense Review
A sparsely-populated, wind-scorched desert land about the size of Colorado, with virtually no water, barely 50 square kilometers of arable land, and whose primary export commodity, phosphates, has seen its price continue to plummet to below half of what it was only a year ago, the Western Sahara would seem an unlikely candidate to be the object of Africa's longest territorial disputes, one with profound implications for both regional security and economic development in the Maghreb as well as United States interests.

Somalia's Persistent Violence Threatens Regional Security, U.S. Interests
(05/28/2009) J. Peter Pham, World Defense Review
In recent months while attention has been riveted on the predations on merchant shipping by increasingly emboldened Somali pirates (see my most recent analysis on Somali piracy, published April 30), the cycle of conflict and violence onshore in Somalia which gives the maritime marauders the opportunity needed to carry out their attacks has continued and, indeed, has intensified in recent weeks.

Pakistan's Struggle for Modernity
(05/26/2009) Fouad Ajami, The Wall Street Journal
The drama of the Swat Valley -- its cynical abandonment to the mercy of the Taliban, the terror unleashed on it by the militants, then the recognition that the concession to the forces of darkness had not worked -- is of a piece with the larger history of religious extremism in the world of Islam.