Today, the UVM History Department is elated to share in the celebration of Professor Boğaç Ergene, as he is inducted as a UVM University Scholar! The University Scholars Awards, presented annually, honor and recognize distinguished UVM faculty members for their sustained excellence in research, creative and scholarly activities.

This is well-deserved recognition for Ergene, who is an award-winning and internationally-recognized scholar of the Ottoman empire, an inspiring and dedicated teacher, and an outstanding public intellectual.

Combining meticulous attention to archival materials and historical context with an abiding interest in the forces shaping our world, Ergene brings past events to life, demonstrating their relevance to understanding where we are today. Best known for his work in Ottoman and Islamic legal history, Ergene has sought to root legal systems in their socio-cultural environments, asking how legal developments emerged in the context of — and then helped to shape — changes in the distribution of wealth, employment, and status.

An enormously productive historian, Ergene has published six books since his arrival at UVM in 2001 (with another currently in production), along with 31 peer-reviewed journal articles and book chapters, and another 11 non-peer reviewed articles, book chapters and encyclopedia entries. He received the Association for the Study of Food and Society Book Award for his 2018 book written with Febe Armanios, Halal Food: A History. Honoring his teaching, Ergene has been nominated for UVM’s Kroepsch-Maurice Award for Excellence in Teaching four times (2006, 2011, 2014, and 2018);

At UVM Ergene has been committed to engaging and informing the broader community about major developments in the Middle East. His efforts have sustained the community’s understanding of global developments and fostered robust critical engagement, going well beyond his formal faculty responsibilities.

We congratulate Professor Ergene on his induction today as University Scholar.