15 episodes
History of the Modern Middle East - Casual Historian Grant Hurst
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- Society & Culture
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4.0 • 45 Ratings
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This is the story of the Modern Middle East, from the Young Turks to ISIS.
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Episdoe 10: The Balkan Wars
The Ottomans are blindsided by the Christian states of the Balkans while still fighting a war against Italy, and the Great Powers don’t seem to care to much about maintaining the old balance of power.
Bibliography
The Young Turks: The Committee of Union and Progress in Turkish Politics, 1908-14, Feroz Ahmad
The Emergence of Modern Turkey; Third Edition, Bernard Lewis
The Ottoman Endgame: War, Revolution, and the Making of the Modern Middle East, 1908-1923, Sean McMeekin
The Fall of the Ottomans: The Great War in the Middle East, Eugene Rogan
The Decline and Fall of the Ottoman Empire, Alan Palmer
The Balkans: Nationalism, War, and the Great Powers, 1804-1999, Misha Glenny
A History of the Balkans, Ferdinand Schevill
The Serbs: The Guardians of the Gate, R.G.D. Laffan -
Episode 9: A Damn Fool Thing in the Balkans
The History of the Balkans from 1876 to 1912
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Episode 8: The Age of Liberation
The history of the Ottoman Balkans, from the 18th century up to the 1870s.
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Episode 7: The Tripolitanian War
Italy declares war on the Ottomans while the CUP struggles to survive.
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Episode 6: Ottomans and Sanussis
We look at the history of Libya between the end of the Qaramanli Dynasty in 1835 and the Tripolitanian War in 1911.
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Episode 5: Qaramanlis and Corsairs
In this episode we backtrack the narrative two centuries to when the Qaramanli Dynasty came to power in Tripoli, and how they engaged in a campaign of piracy that eventually lead to their demise.
Bibliography
Captives: Britain, Empire, and the World, 1600-1850, Linda Colley
Libya, John Wright
North Africa 1800-1900: A Survey from the Nile Valley to the Atlantic, Magali Morsy
A History of Modern Libya, Dirk Vandewalle
Power, Faith, and Fantasy: America in the Middle East 1776-Present, Michael B. Oren
Thomas Jefferson’s Quran: Islam and the Founders, Denise A. Spellberg
Thomas Jefferson and the Tripoli Pirates, Brian Kilmeade and Don Yaeger
Customer Reviews
Good overview but too fast
I only listened to one episode, so maybe others are different, but in the one I heard, your information is great but you narrate too quickly and mechanically. You tell us what happened, but I’d like to understand more of the *why*, at a pace that I can absorb. I could probably slow it down — but what I mean by a slower pace is not just rate of speech but actually more expanding on the events, persons, motivations, geographies, etc. Still, I appreciate your putting this together!
Intriguing and Impressive, If Flawed
Overall, this is a very interesting podcast about a very fascinating subject. As others have mentioned, the speed of the presentation is rather quick, and I find myself rewinding quite a bit. However, the solid writing makes the episodes enjoyable.
Another area of improvement is on the scope and subject of the podcast. While it is about the history of the modern Middle East, it’s very focused on the Ottoman Empire and closely related topics. Of course, you can’t discuss the modern Middle East without devoting a significant amount of attention to the Turks, but the area is incredibly diverse and the history incredibly rich. More focus on other ethnic groups and states would offer a more holistic view as to how West Asia became what it is today.
Four stars is a fair rating for this show because, in the end, it is both educational and involving in a way that many other shows are not. If you like Middle Eastern history, I would recommend it for your library.
Perhaps just listen to an audiobook on Middel East history
The podcasater apparently has a rep for having a far-right political axe to grind & cherry picking his facts--see his YT 'hoover was a good president' lecture where one can imagine him wearing clown shoes while spouting out pompous twaddle. Add to that his inability to correctly pronounce some Arabic words--in a history of the Middle East mind you--and you essentially have some dude with a history degree from a toilet-tier college reading out loud and giving his drunk-at-4am opinion. Hard pass.