December 04, 2024Program, PublicationsProfessor Farzin Vejdani Publishes New Book on Crime and Punishment in 19th-Century Iran
Vejdani's new work is a pathbreaking study of the legal and social history of crime and punishment in Iran during the Qajar period.
Dr. Farzin Vejdani, Associate Professor of history at Toronto Metropolitan University and former Visiting Fellow at the Program on Law and Society in the Muslim World, recently released his new book, titled Private Sins, Public Crimes: Policing, Punishment, and Authority in Iran, a pathbreaking study of the legal and social history of crime and punishment in Iran during the Qajar period.
Drawing on a rich array of primary sources in multiple languages, Vejdani argues that the ambiguity in defining the boundaries between private and public in Qajar Iran often corresponded with the jurisdictional friction between government authorities and religious scholars regarding who had the authority to police and punish public crimes. The book offers a nuanced exploration of these dynamics within their broader context, particularly the interaction between Islamic law and Iranian imperial traditions, to shed light on the realities of how law was lived and experienced in everyday life.
The book was published by Yale University Press in 2024.
Read more about the book and Professor Vejdani’s research and scholarship.