Suche

qualified as an architect from the American University of Beirut (B.Arch, 1998) before pursuing her graduate studies in cultural and social History at the University of Amsterdam (M.A., 2002) and at the University of Chicago (Ph.D., 2010). During her graduate studies, she taught at the American University of Beirut and at the University of Chicago. Supported by a Mellon fellowship, Toufoul Abou-Hodeib’s research for her dissertation, “Authentic Modern: Domesticity and the Emergence of a Middle Class Culture in Late Ottoman Beirut” investigates the home's role in mediating the experience of modernity and in formulating cultural "authenticity" for an emerging middle class in Beirut. Paying particular attention to the materiality of the home, the approach focuses on turn-of-the-century transformation of categories such as "public," "class," and "taste" and their formation across three key domains of inquiry: urban politics, intellectual discourse, and domestic consumption. She also has a forthcoming article on taste and class in late Ottoman Beirut in the International Journal of Middle East Studies.