Ahmed Yaqoub AlMaazmi studies overland and transoceanic mobilities across the Indian Ocean World. Working at the intersection of the environment and sharīʿa, he aims to investigate how legal pluralities around water, environmental infrastructures, and the politics of homemaking reflected and shaped transcultural networks within and between the Indo-Iranian Borderlands, Eastern Arabia, and East Africa in colonial times.
Born and raised in Sharjah, Ahmed graduated from Zayed University with a B.A. (Hons) in international studies. After interning with the United Nations World Food Programme and studying cultural anthropology at Rutgers University as a Fulbright fellow, he enrolled at Princeton University to pursue a doctorate in the Department of Near Eastern Studies.
Apart from his graduate academic interests, Ahmed developed an eclectic range of curiosities over the years that include: Arabic and Iranian linguistics; early and medieval Islamic theology and history; Arabic, Persian, Balochi, Brahui, Sindhi, Gujarati, Punjabi, Urdu, Pashto, Kurdish, and Swahili literatures; ethnic and cultural studies; folk music; culinary and gardening arts; youth culture in the United Arab Emirates and Oman.
Books
- Ahmed Y. AlMaazmi, The Baloch and Their Country in the Gulf Gazetteer 1515–1908. (Beirut: Arab Diffusion, 2012, 472 pp.).
Translated & Annotated (English to Arabic)
- Mir Mohammad A. Talpur, The Baloch Awakening: Essays On the Baloch Question. (Beirut: Arab Diffusion, 2015, 808 pp.).
- Taj M. Breseeg, Baloch Nationalism Its Origin and Development. (Beirut: Arab Diffusion, 2013, 478 pp.).
Papers and Presentations
- “Exploring the Hinterlands of the Indian Ocean: The Baloch in Colonial Expeditions to Australia and Africa,” American Historical Association Annual Meeting, New York, January 2020.
- “Oman as an Empire: Transoceanic Mobilites and Legacies in the Western Indian Ocean,” co-organizer and presenter, Mobility as Method: Mapping Entanglements Between the Gulf and the Indian Ocean Panel, Middle East Studies Association (MESA) Annual Meeting, New Orleans, November 2019.
- “Redefining Indian Ocean World Mobilities in Nationalist Times,” Arab Nationalism and its Legacy in the Gulf States Workshop, co-organizer and presenter, Transregional Institute (TRI), Princeton University, November 2019.
- “Making Time Liquid: Inscribing Legal Rights in the Omani Environment,” Ordering the Anthropocene: Law & the Environment in the Indian Ocean World Workshop, Drexel University, Philadelphia, October 2019.
- “Poetic Fieldnotes in the Battlefield: The Contours of Persianate Literary Culture in Balochistan through Nūrānī's Jang-nāma (1764),” Symposia Iranica’s Fourth Biennial Conference on Iranian Studies, University of St Andrews, U.K., April 2019.
- “Belonging Across the Omani Sea: De-Soldiering Baloch History in the Arabian Peninsula.” Middle East Studies Association (MESA) Annual Meeting, San Antonio, Texas, November 2018.
- “The Production of Tsunamic Memory: The 1945 Makran Tsunami in the Omani Sea.” Our World of Water: Histories of the Hydrosphere Conference, Georgetown University, Washington DC, November 2017.
Awards
- Inaugural Graduate Student Travel Grant, Association for Gulf and Arabian Peninsula Studies (AGAPS), 2018
- Sheikh Mohamed Bin Zayed Higher Education Grant, Emirates Foundation, 2017–2018
- Fulbright Fellow, 2016–2017
- Sheikha Fatima bint Mubarak Academic Excellence Award, 2016
- Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al-Maktoum Academic Excellence Award, 2015
- Abu Dhabi Fund for Development Academic Excellence Award, 2014