Omar Cheta

• 2025 Spring
  • HST 495 Distinction Thesis in History

Omar Cheta is a historian of the modern Middle East. His primary research interests are the histories of law and capitalism in nineteenth-century Egypt. His book, How Commerce Became Legal: Merchants and Market Governance in Nineteenth-Century Egypt, is forthcoming with Stanford University Press.

Cheta’s academic publications have appeared in Past & Present, International Journal of Middle East Studies and History Compass. His research has been supported by the National Endowment for the Humanities, the American Philosophical Society, the Social Science Research Council, among others.

Prior to joining Syracuse University, he taught at Bard College, and was among the team that founded the Economic and Business History Research Center in Cairo. Cheta earned a B.A. in economics from the American University in Cairo, an A.M. in Middle Eastern studies from the University of Chicago, and a Ph.D. in Middle Eastern and Islamic studies, and history from New York University.

• Journal Articles
  • Cheta, O., Schwartz, K., "A Printer’s Odd Plea to Reform Legal Pluralism in Khedival Egypt." Past and Present, 2021.
  • Cheta, O., "A Prehistory of the Modern Legal Profession in Egypt, 1840s-1870s." International Journal of Middle East Studies , 2018.
  • Cheta, O., "The Economy by Other Means: The Historiography of Capitalism in the Middle East." History Compass , 2018.
• Book Chapter
  • Cheta, O., "Hostages of Credit: The Imprisonment of Debtors in the Khedival Period." In The Oxford Handbook of Modern Egyptian History. Baron, B., Culang, J. (eds.) Oxford University Press, 2024.

Teaching Recognition Award (Middle Eastern Studies Program), Syracuse University (2025)

Appleby-Mosher Grant, Syracuse University (2024 - 2025)

SU Art Museum Faculty Fellowship, Syracuse University (2023 - 2024)

Appleby-Mosher Grant, Syracuse University (2022 - 2023)

Franklin Research Grant, American Philosophical Society (2016)