Iago Gocheleishvili

Full Teaching Professor, Persian Studies

Overview

Iago Gocheleishvili is a Teaching Professor of Persian Studies in the Department of Near Eastern Studies. He is a recipient of the Sophie Washburn Teaching Excellence Award and is a Stephen and Margery Russell Distinguished Teaching Award nominee in the College of Arts and Sciences at Cornell University. Iago is the author of Beh Farsi Begoo: Modern Persian, Elementary Level (2nd ed., 2024) and Like a Nightingale: Modern Persian for Elementary Level (1st ed., 2020). Since joining Cornell University in 2005, he has designed and taught courses on modern Iranian state and society, the medieval and ancient history of Iran, as well as Persian language courses across all proficiency levels.

Iago holds a PhD in History, specializing in Iran and the Caucasus, and a BA in Political Science and Middle Eastern Studies. His current research focuses on the Iranian–Russian imperial relations in the Caucasus, the Transcaucasian dimensions of the Iranian Constitutional Revolution of 1906-1911, and Russo–Iranian relations in popular and political discourse in Iran and the Caucasus during the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. His earlier research focused on the medieval period, particularly the Mongol Empire, and examined the relations between Ilkhanid Iran and the Caucasus, Central Asia, and the Golden Horde during the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries. Iago is the author of a dozen scholarly articles and book chapters on the histories of Iran, the Caucasus, and Central Asia, published in edited volumes and peer-reviewed journals in the fields of Iranian, Middle Eastern, and Central Eurasian Studies. He has served as a Cornell Faculty-in-Residence and Cornell Faculty Fellow, during which time he hosted a weekly Iran Discussion Table that brought together undergraduate and graduate students, and Cornellians interested in Iran and the Middle East. Iago teaches Arts and Sciences Advising seminar for the college and advises Near Eastern Studies department majors. He also serves as faculty advisor to several student organizations on campus. He is a Cornell institutional trustee at the American Institute of Iranian Studies. Iago's current book project examines the involvement of revolutionary organizations from Russian imperial Transcaucasia in the Iranian Constitutional Revolution and seeks to understand the extent of the conflict between Transcaucasian revolutionary groups and Russian imperial military forces operating in Iran, as well as the impact this conflict had on the course of the Iranian revolution of 1906-1911.

Research Focus

Russo-Iranian Imperial Relations in the Caucasus and Central Asia in the late 19th - early 20th centuries.
Transcaucasian Connections of the Iranian Constitutional Movement in the early 20th century.
Religious and Political Histories of the Mongol state of Ilkhanate in the Middle East and Caucasus in the 13th-14th centuries.
Cross-Cultural and Interfaith Relations in the Nineteenth-Century Russian Imperial Caucasus.
USA-Iranian Relations.
Political Elites and Prospects for Democracy in Modern Iran.

Professional Experience

Courses Designed and Taught

State and Society in Modern Iran.
History of Ancient and Medieval Iran.
Elementary Persian/Farsi I.
Elementary Persian/Farsi II.
Intermediate Persian/Farsi I.
Intermediate Persian/Farsi II.
Advanced Persian.

Publications

"Regional Crosscurrents and Resonances of the Iranian Revolution: Transcaucasia", Gocheleishvili I., in The Cambridge Companion to the Iranian Constitutional Revolution of 1906-1911, ed. Mansour Bonakdarian, Cambridge University Press (forthcoming).
Beh Farsi Begoo, Modern Persian, Elementary Level, 2nd edition, Iago Gocheleishvili (Anthem Press, London, New York, 2024)
Like A Nightingale, Modern Persian for Elementary Level, Iago Gocheleishvili (Anthem Press, London, New York, 2020)
'The Caucasus Before 1500 CE', The Encyclopaedia of Islam, Third Edition, Part 2014-4, Leiden-Boston, Brill, 2014.
‘Georgian Sources on the Iranian Constitutional Revolution (1905-1911): Sergo Gamdlishvili’s Memoirs of the Gilan Resistance’. Reprinted in Iranian-Russian Encounters: Empires and Revolutions Since 1800, ed. Stephanie Cronin (London: Routledge, 2012)
Introducing Georgian Sources for the Historiography of the Iranian Constitutional Revolution (1905-1911), in: Iran's Constitutional Revolution, Popular Politics, Cultural Transformations and Transnational Connections, eds. H.E. Chehabi and Vanessa Martin, I.B.Tauris, 2010
Georgian Sources on the Iranian Constitutional Revolution (1905-1911): Sergo Gamdlishvili's Memoirs of the Gilan Resistance, in: "Iranian Studies", vol. 40, number 1, 2007.
Georgian Connections of the Iranian Constitutional Revolution of 1905-1911, in: "Central Eurasian Studies Review", vol. 5, 1, 2006.
From the History of Relations between the Ilkhanate and the Golden Horde, in: "Near East and Georgia", IV, Tbilisi, 2005.
From the History of South Caucasus during the Ilkhanid reign, in: Orientalist II, Tbilisi, 2003-2004.
Domestic policies of the Ilkhan Ahmad-Tekudar (1282-1284), in: "Near East and Georgia", III, Tbilisi, 2002.
The first Georgian Newspaper - "Sakartvelos Gazeti", in: "Perspective-XXI", 4, Tbilisi, 2002 (Paper published with the support of INTAS).
From the History of the Interrelation between Iran and Georgia in the 13th century, in: Bulletin of the Georgian Academy of Sciences, v. 165, 3, Tbilisi, 2002.
Status of Religions in the Ilkhanate under the first Ilkhans, in: "Perspective-XXI", 2, The Georgian Academy of Sciences, Center for the Research of the Democratic and Regional Development, Tbilisi, 2001.
Qiiam-e Tekudar-Oghul, Az Tarikh-e Ravabet-e Iran va Gorjestan dar Qarne Sizdahom-e Miladi, in: "Az Diiar-e Ashna", Bulletin of the papers of the Faculties of Persian Language and Literature of the Universities of Georgia, vol. 2, Tbilisi, 2001. (Persian)

In the news

Senior wins Fulbright to teach in country of Georgia

Iago Gocheleishvili

Full Teaching Professor, Persian Studies

Education

Links