Amir Hassanpour

Amir Hassanpour (* 1943 in Mahabad / Iran), is a Kurdish scholar and scientist from Iran. He received his bachelor 's degree in English language in 1964 at the University of Tehran. He taught from 1965-1966 at schools in Mahabad.

In 1968 he began studying linguistics in Tehran in 1970 and received his master's degree. In 1972 he finished his PhD thesis. Later he went to the University of Illinois in the United States and studied the technical communication. In 1989 he received his Ph.D. in the fields of sociolinguistics and Present history of the Middle East. His doctoral thesis dealt with for the unification of the Kurdish language from 1918-1985 ( "The language factor in national development: The standardization of the Kurdish language, 1918-1985 ").

Since 1986 he lives where he taught at various universities in Canada. He is currently a lecturer of the Faculty of civilizations of the Near and Middle East at the University of Toronto. He focuses on the influences of media, conflict and democracy to nationalism, ethnic conflict, genocide and social movements.

Amir Hassanpour is with Shahrzad Mojab, the Director of the Women and Gender Studies Institute, University of Toronto, married.

Works

Selection:

• Nationalism and Language in Kurdistan, 1918-1985, Mellen Research University Press, San Francisco 1992.
• Witûwêjêk sebaret be zimanewanî w edebi Kurdewarî ( An interview about linguistics and Kurdish literature ), published in the Journal Gzing No.1, Sweden 1993.
• The Nationalist Movements in Azarbaijan and Kurdistan, 1941-1946, published in A Century of Revolution, edited by John Foran, Univ. of Minnesota Press, Minneapolis 1994.
• The Creation of Kurdish Media Culture in Kurdish Culture and Identity, edited by Philip Kreyenbroek and Christine Allison, Zed Books, 1996.
• The Politics of A- political Linguistics: Linguists and Linguicide, published in Rights to language: equity, power, and education, edited by Robert Phillipson, 2000.
• The Making of Kurdish Identity: Pre- 20th Century Historical and Literary Discourses, published in Essays on the Origins of Kurdish Nationalism, edited by Abbas Vali, Mazda Publishers, 2003.

Swell