Research Fields

• Iranian history

• History of Children and Childhood

• Masculinity studies

• Gender and sexuality

About

Dr. Balslev is a historian of modern Iran, focusing on cultural and social history of the 19th and 20th centuries. Her fields of interest include gender, sexuality, childhood studies, and everyday life. Her current project focuses on the history of children and childhood in Iran, circa 1870-1970. This project is being funded by the Israel Science Foundation (grant no. 743/21).

Since 2018, Dr. Balslev has been a facultymember of the Department of Islamic and Middle Eastern Studies, where she teaches courses on modern Iran, its history, politicsand culture, as well as on social and cultural history of the modern Middle East.

Selected Publications

Review Article: Claus V. Pedersen. “Rise of the Persian Novel: From the Constitutional Revolution to Reza Shah 1910-1927. Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz Verlag, 2016.” In Jerusalem Studies in Arabic and Islam, 50, 2021, pp. 473-480.

 "Population Crisis, Marriage Reform and the Regulation of Male Sexuality in Interwar Iran", British Journal of Middle Eastern Studies, August 2016

 "Dressed for Success: Hegemonic Masculinity, Elite Men, and Westernisation in Iran, c. 1900-1940" - Gender & History 26 (3), November 2014, pp. 545-564

"Shifting Sexual Norms in Nineteenth Century Iran" in The Global Encyclopedia of Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, and Queer History (Farmington Hills, Michigan: Scribner Macmillan, 2019), pp.1491-1494.

Selected Awards

2021-25 ISF individual grant – “A History of Children and Childhood in Modern Iran (circa 1870-1970),” grant no. 743/21, 4 year grant, 120,000 NIS per year. 

Teaching

2020: "History of Children and Childhood in the Middle East" – MA

2018: "Visual Culture in Modern Iran", Graduate Tutorial Reading.

2018-2020: "The Objects That Changed the Middle East", Undergraduate elective course.

2018-2020: "Culture and Resistance in Modern Iran" Undergraduate elective course.

2017-20: "Modern Iran" Undergraduate seminar.

2016, 2018, 2020: "Masculinity, Society and Politics in Modern Iran" – Undergraduate elective course.