Mahdi Ganjavi, PhD

About

Mahdi Ganjavi (PhD/University of Toronto) is a scholar, lecturer, author, cultural entrepreneur and metadata specialist with a passion for preserving endangered histories and expanding access to global knowledge. With a background spanning law, Middle Eastern studies, Cold War knowledge production, resistance librarianship, and independent publishing, his work lives at the intersection of critical scholarship, book history, multilingual metadata, and public humanities. His research focuses on intellectual freedom, the transnational history of literature, books, education, print, and translation, AI and knowledge production as well as the politics of archives and counter-archiving practices in the contemporary Middle East.

Ganjavi’s book, Education and the Cultural Cold War in the Middle East: The Franklin Book Programs in Iran (2023), received the Middle East Librarians Association (MELA) 2023 Book Award. His second monograph (co-authored), titled Revolutionary Engineers: Learning, Politics, and Activism at Aryamehr University of Technology, is published by MIT Press in 2025. Ganjavi’s scholarly writings, essays, and reviews have appeared in The American Archivist, International Journal of Lifelong Education, Encyclopaedia Iranica, Iranian Studies, and Review of Middle East Studies.

Research

Research Areas:

• AI and Knowledge Production
• History of education and cultural policy in the Middle East
• Cold War-era cultural diplomacy and propaganda
• Print history, publishing, and censorship
• Political exile and revolutionary movements in the Middle East
• Intellectual freedom and knowledge production under authoritarian regimes

Publications: One of his significant works is Education and the Cultural Cold War in the Middle East (I.B. Tauris, 2023), which explores how the U.S. and other powers used educational and cultural programs as tools of influence in Iran, Egypt, and other parts of the region during the Cold War.

Revolutionary Engineers: Learning, Politics, and Activism at Aryamehr University of Technology (MIT Press, 2025): Co-written with Drs. Sepehr Vakil and Mina Khanlarzadeh, this book explores the cultural, political, and pedagogical history of Aryamehr University of Technology (AMUT)—now Sharif University of Technology—in the transformative years leading up to the 1979 Iranian Revolution.

Other contributions:

• Between 2016 and 2019, Ganjavi edited and oversaw the publication of six little-known Persian novels from the 1930s and 1940s. These novels shed light on the origins of science fiction, detective fiction, and utopian fiction in Persian.
• Ganjavi has successfully completed the first critical edition of “Henriyah Translation” (tarjumah hinrīyah), which represents the earliest Persian translation of “One Thousand and One Nights” (Maniahonar, 2022).
• A scholarly analysis on Malekeh Etezadi, an Iranian feminist poet, political activist, and seamstress, examining her activism and writings within the broader history of women’s rights movements in Iran.
• A study on Sadeq Mamquli, a foundational Persian detective novel, contextualizing its significance within Qajar-era Iran and early modern Persian prose.

Teaching

A former postdoctoral fellow at the School of Education and Social Policy at Northwestern University, he currently teaches at the Faculty of Information at the University of Toronto, as well as at the University of Alberta’s Faculty of Education.

LIS 541 - Library and Information Services in Culturally Diverse Society

Examines the central concepts of diversity and inclusion and a range of related issues and contributions with respect to specific populations and traditionally underrepresented groups, and their support systems, in library and information settings. Pre or corequisite: LIS 501 or consent of instructor.

LIS 592 - Intellectual Freedom and Social Responsibility in Librarianship

An examination of the central concepts of intellectual freedom and social responsibility and the range of related issues impacting librarians, library institutions, and library associations. Sections may be offered at an increased rate of fee assessment; refer to the Tuition and Fees page in the University Regulations sections of the Calendar. Prerequisite: LIS 501 or consent of instructor.

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