Contesting  Third World Liberation in Modern Iran: Translation, Resistance, and Revolution | Eskandar Sadeghi-Boroujerdi

This talk examines the contested and protean legacies of Third Worldism in modern Iran, focusing on the role of translation, intellectual networks and exchange, and revolutionary activism during the socalled "long sixties". It explores how Iranian intellectuals and opposition movements engaged with global anti-colonial and leftist thought, particularly through the translation of key revolutionary texts. Figures such as Hassan Habibi and Ali Shariati played crucial roles in translating and disseminating works by Frantz Fanon, Julius Nyerere, among others, recasting and incorporating their ideas into the heuristic and practices of militant opposition to the Pahlavi regime. The discussion highlights the intersection of intellectual history and political activism, tracing the influence of these texts on student organizations, underground revolutionary groups, and the broader struggle against monarchical dictatorship at home and imperialism abroad.

Dr. Eskandar Sadeghi Boroujerdi is a Senior Lecturer (Associate Professor) in the Modern History of the Middle East at the University of York. He specializes in modern Iranian intellectual and political history, Shi'i Islam, and the broader Middle East. His book Revolution and its Discontents (2019) examined Iran's post revolutionary reform movement in the context of the intellectual history of the Cold War. A Fellow of the Royal Historical Society, he is also a series editor for Radical Histories of the Middle East. He contributes to publications such as New Left Review, Jacobin, Jadaliyya, Al Jazeera, and The Guardian.