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John Jason Thompson
Visiting Associate Professor of History
History


Office: Miller Library 254
Phone: 207-859-5341
Fax: 859-5340
Email:
jjthomps@colby.edu

Mailing Address:
5320 Mayflower Hill
Waterville, Maine 04901-8853

Office Hours:
Tu: 10:30 a.m.-12 p.m. and Th: 9:30 a.m.-11 a.m.

Semester Schedule

Education

Ph.D., History, University of Chicago, 1987

M.A., History, University of Texas at Austin, 1982

B.A., History, University of Texas at Austin, 1977

Areas of Expertise:
  • Middle East
  • East-West Encounter
  • British History
  • British Empire
  • Ancient Egypt
  • Publications

    Books:

    Dear Ancharsis: Queen Caroline and Sir William Gell, A Study in Royal Patronage and Classical Scholarship. Submitted for publication to the American Philosophical Society.

    Egyptology: A History. Contracted with the American University in Cairo Press. Publication date: May 2009.

    Edward William Lane: A Biography. At press. Publication date: December 2008. Oxford, Oxbow Press.

    A History of Egypt: From Earliest Times to the Present. Cairo: American University in Cairo Press, 2008.

    An edition of Edward William Lane. An Account of the Manners and Customs of the Modern Egyptians. Cairo: American University in Cairo Press, 2003.

    Egyptian Encounters, an issue of Cairo Papers. Vol. 23, no. 3 (Fall 2000).

    An edition of Edward William Lane. Description of Egypt. Cairo: American University in Cairo Press, 2000.

    Sir Gardner Wilkinson and His Circle. Austin: University of Texas Press, 1992.

    Articles, Chapters of Books, and Introductions:

    “Western Scholars, Artists, and Travelers in Egypt during the First Half of the Nineteenth Century,” the Introduction to volume two of The Collected Works of Georg August Wallin, Kaj Öhrnberg, ed. Forthcoming from the Swedish Literary Association in Finland.

    “An Account of the Journeys and Writings of the Indefatigable Mr. Lane,” Saudi Aramco World 59 (March/April 2008):30-39.

    “Small Latin and Less Greek: Expurgated Passages from Edward William Lane’s Manners and Customs of the Modern Egyptians,” Quaderni di Studi Arabi, n.s. 1 (2006):7-28.

    The following articles in the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2004): “Lady (Isabel) Burton,” vol. 9, pp. 23-24. “Sir Richard Francis Burton,” vol. 9, pp. 34-40. “Sir William Gell,” vol. 21, pp. 733-735. “Edward William Lane,” vol. 32, pp. 418-420. “Osman Effendi (William Thompson),” vol. 42, pp. 56-57. “William Gifford Palgrave,” vol. 42, pp. 458-460. “Sir Gardner Wilkinson,” vol. 58, pp. 1013-1015.

    “’Purveyor-General to the Hieroglyphics’: Sir William Gell and the Development of Egyptology,” Views of Egypt since Napoleon Bonaparte: Imperialism, Colonialism and Modern Appropriations David Jeffreys, ed. (London: University College London Press, 2003):77-85.

    “Egyptian Encounters,” Cairo Papers. vol. 23, no. 3 (Fall 2000):1-10.

    "Frederick Catherwood in the Middle East." With Angela T. Thompson. In Travellers in Egypt eds. Paul and Janet Starkey (London: I. B. Tauris, 1998):130-139.

    "Frederick Catherwood: Between Two Lost Worlds." With Angela T. Thompson. Minerva 8 (Summer 1997):17-25. Reprinted in The Codex 6 (June 1998):17-25.

    "Edward William Lane in Egypt." Journal of the American Research Center in Egypt 34 (1997):243-261.

    "Edward William Lane's 'Description of Egypt.'" International Journal of Middle East Studies 28 (1996):565-583.

    "Sir Gardner Wilkinson's House at Sheikh Abd el Qurna." KMT 7 (Summer 1996):52-59.

    "'Of the `Osma'nlees, or Turks': An Unpublished Chapter from Edward William Lane's Manners and Customs of the Modern Egyptians." Turkish Studies Association Bulletin vol. 19, no. 2 (Fall 1995):19-39.

    "Sir Gardner Wilkinson in Gower." With Robert Lucas. Journal of the Gower Society 46 (1995):6-14.

    "Edward William Lane as Egyptologist." Minerva 6 (Fall 1995):12-17.

    "A Reassessment of Edward William Lane." Newsletter of the American Research Center in Egypt No. 166 (Fall/Winter 1994-95):1-5.

    "Osman Effendi: A Scottish Convert to Islam in Early Nineteenth-Century Egypt." Journal of World History 5 (1994):99-123.

    "Edward William Lane as an Artist." Gainsborough's House Review (1993/94):33-42.

    "'I Felt Like an Eastern Bridegroom': Edward William Lane's First Trip to Egypt, 1825-1828." Turkish Studies Association Bulletin 17 (1993):138-141.

    "The Sir Gardner Wilkinson Papers: An Update." Journal of Egyptian Archaeology 78 (1992):273-274.

    "Queen Caroline: A Subject for Feminist Biography?" The Maine Scholar 1 (1988):157-170.

    Reviews of Books:

    Janice Deledalle-Rhodes, L’Orient représenté: Charles Montagu Doughty et les Voyageurs anglais du XIXe Siècle, in the International Journal of Middle East Studies, August 2003 John Davis, The Landscape of Belief: Encountering the Holy Land in Nineteenth-Century American Art and Culture, in the Palestine Exploration Quarterly, January-June 1998

    Thierry Hentsch, Orient imaginaire: la Vision politique occidentale de l'Est Méditerranéen, in the International Journal of Middle East Studies, November 1996

    Jehan S. Rajab, Invasion Kuwait (An Englishwoman's Tale), in the Middle East Studies Association Bulletin, July 1995

    Abd al-Rahman al-Jabarti, Napoleon in Egypt: Al-Jabarti's Chronicle of the French Occupation, 1798, trans. Shmuel Moreh, in the Journal of World History, Spring 1995

    Laila Abou-Saif, A Bridge through Time, in the International Journal of Middle East Studies, November 1994

    Patricia B. Craddock, Edward Gibbon, Luminous Historian, in History: Review of New Books, Summer 1989

    Electronic Publications:

    A Catalogue of the Edward William Lane Collection in the Griffith Institute, Ashmolean Museum, Oxford. Can be seen at: http://www.ashmolean.museum/gri/4lane.html