Dalia al-Nashar

Dalia al-Nashar is a PhD candidate in the Department of Art History at the University of Toronto. Her research examines the transformation of the spatial and built environment in nineteenth- and twentieth-century North African and Eastern Mediterranean cities, with a particular focus on Cairo.

Prior to joining the PhD programme, al-Nashar served as Assistant Director (2019–2021) and Executive Director (2021–2025) of the Islamic Manuscript Association (TIMA), where she organised codicology courses on Arabic and Arabic-script manuscripts, convened conferences and lectures, supervised the publication of proceedings, and contributed to establishing standards and best practices for manuscript collections. She also taught as a lecturer in the Department of Arab and Islamic Civilizations at the American University in Cairo (2019–2023). Earlier in her career, she practiced as an engineer–architect (2009–2019) on major projects across the Arab world, including New York University Abu Dhabi and the expansion of the Prophet’s Mosque in Medina, Saudi Arabia.