Semnani Family Foundation Gives Gift to the UCI Samuel Jordan Center for Persian Studies and Culture
Office of the Dean
June 12, 2015
Gift establishes lecture series in memory of Richard Nelson Frye, renowned American scholar of Iran
A gift from the Semnani Family Foundation to UCI’s Samuel Jordan Center for Persian Studies and Culture will establish a lecture series in memory and honor of Richard Nelson Frye, a renowned American scholar of Iran and Harvard professor who dedicated his life to studying Iran and Central Asia’s history and languages. Frye passed away in March 2014 at the age of 94. The Semnani Family Foundation is a Utah-based charitable foundation that supports humanitarian efforts across the globe.
“Richard Frye's scholarship, marked as it was by his enduring love for the Iranian people and by his boundless dedication to the history, art and civilization of Iran, is a monument to the spirit of friendship binding the Iranian and American people,” said Khosrow B. Semnani, founder of the Semnani Family Foundation. “It is an honor to celebrate his memory by supporting this lecture series.”
Every two years, the Semnani Family Foundation Lectures in Memory of Richard Nelson Frye will present a lecture from a scholar in Iranian Studies. The lecture series kicks-off next year with Richard Foltz, professor of religion and founding director of the Centre for Iranian Studies at Concordia University in Canada. The theme for these lectures is “On the Margins of Greater Iran,” with the first talk focusing on Tajikistan and the second on Kurdistan.
“Richard Frye was one of the great scholars of Iranian Studies who not only studied the greater Iranian world, but who also had an emotional attachment to Iran and the Persianate world,” said Touraj Daryaee, Maseeh Chair in Persian Studies & Culture. “We are grateful to the Semnani Foundation for this generous gift so that we may continue to share Frye’s legacy and to showcase the world’s top scholars in Iranian studies.”
To learn more about The Semnani Family Foundation Lectures in Memory of Richard Nelson Frye, please contact Touraj Daryaee at tdaryaee@uci.edu.
About the Semnani Family Foundation
The Semnani Family Foundation focuses primarily on promoting the health, education and disaster relief for marginal communities in the United States and around the world.
The philosophy of the Foundation is guided by a desire to empower the most vulnerable members of society, wherever they may be. The Semnani Family Foundation seeks to leverage its resources in a cost effective and efficient manner that delivers the maximum benefit to help the most marginal of communities—those who would otherwise be left out, forgotten or neglected, or those who would risk serious and irreversible damage and injury from exposure to natural or man-made disasters such as famine, floods, earthquakes and war.
The Semnani Family Foundation partners closely with organizations and individuals with a demonstrated record of delivering significant, sustainable and lasting change in the field. Over the years, the Foundation has worked with the major international and national as well as local charities to advance its mission. The Foundation’s partners over the past twenty years have included the American Red Cross, UNICEF, LDS Humanitarian, Globus Relief, Global Health Alliance, Special Olympics, the American Cancer Society, the Huntsman Cancer Institute, Habitat for Humanity, High Road for Human Rights, Faith Voices for the Common Ground, the League of Women’s Voters and others.
About the Samuel Jordan Center for Persian Studies and Culture
The Samuel Jordan Center for Persian Studies and Culture serves as an umbrella organization for various activities related to the study of Iran and the Persianate world at the University of California, Irvine.
Courses, offered by the affiliated faculty, are the backbone of Center’s academic and pedagogical mission. These include courses on language, literature, history, music and culture at undergraduate and graduate levels.
The academic courses are administered through different Departments. The Humanities Language Learning Program offers courses on Persian language. Courses in ancient, medieval, and modern Persian history are administered by the Department of History. Courses on modern Persian literature and the literature of Iranian diaspora are offered through the Department of Comparative Literature, and courses on Persian music are housed within the Department of Music. There will also be occasional offerings in Avestan, Old Persian, Parthian, Middle Persian (Pahlavi) languages. The Center serves as the institutional home for the Digital Archive of Brief Notes and Iran Review.
Pictured: Khosrow B. Semnani, founder of the Semnani Family Foundation