A tradition established by the Near East Center's first director, Gustave E. von Grunebaum, to encourage research in the field of Islamic studies and to honor outstanding scholars in the field, beginning with the scholar for whom the award is named.
The Giorgio Levi Della Vida Award is given to outstanding scholars whose work has significantly and lastingly advanced the study of Islamic civilization. The scholar is selected by a committee appointed by the Chancellor of the University of California, Los Angeles, meeting under the chairmanship of the Director of the Center for Near Eastern Studies.
The award carries with it a bronze medal, together with the obligation to present a formal lecture as part of a conference held at the University. The recipient of the award chooses the theme of the conference and selects the other participants. The conference proceedings are published in the Giorgio Levi Della Vida Series in Islamic Studies.
RECENT CONFERENCES
Of Language and Identity in Early Islam, 2024
Perspectives on French Colonial and Late Ottoman Cultural History, 2019
Recipients of the Giorgio Levi Della Vida Award:
1. Robert Brunschvig, 1967
2. Joseph Schacht, 1969
3. Francesco Gabrieli, 1971
4. Gustav E. von Grunebaum, 1973
5. S.D. Goitein, 1975
6. Franz Rosenthal, 1977
7. Albert Hourani, 1979
8. W. Montgomery Watt, 1981
9. Fazlur Rahman, 1983
10. Charles Issawi, 1985
11. Annemarie Schimmel, 1987
12. André Miquel, 1989
13. Ehsan Yarshater, 1991
14. George Makdisi, 1993
15. Oleg Grabar, 1996
16. Josef van Ess, 1999
16. André Raymond, 1999
17. Mohammed Arkoun, 2002
18. Wilferd Madelung, 2007
19. C. Edmund Bosworth, 2010
20. Roger Owen, 2012
21. Patricia Crone, 2014
22. Zeynep Çelik, 2019 23. Michael Cook, 2024 24. Hossein Modarressi, 2024