Andy Hilkens

Andy Hilkens (PhD in History, Ghent University, 2014) is a cultural historian of pre-modern Europe, Western Asia and Northern Africa, specializing in intercultural interaction and its results, whether positive (transmission of knowledge, the translation of texts, multilingualism, and religious dialogue) or negative (religious and cultural debate and conflict). His research interests include Syro-Armenian and Graeco-Syriac studies, debates between Syriac orthodox and Apostolic Armenian Christians regarding orthodoxy and orthopraxy in the eleventh and twelfth centuries, Syriac-Armenian bilingualism, the reception of Jacob of Serugh and Ephrem in the Armenian tradition, historiography, hagiography, and parabiblical literature. His forthcoming book explores the Greek, Syriac and Arabic hagiographical and historiographical traditions about the Syriac-speaking anti-Chalcedonian poet-theologian Jacob of Serugh (d. 520).

Dr. Hilkens has previously held a Newton International Fellowship at the Faculty of Asian and Middle Eastern Studies at the University of Oxford (2022-2024). Previously he has held postdoctoral fellowships of the Research Foundation Flanders (FWO) at Ghent University (2016-2018, 2019-2020, 2021-2023) and of the Center for the Study of Christianity at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem (2018-2019), and he has been a scientific collaborator in LOEWE-Cluster Minority Studies: Language and Identity in the Department of Medieval History at the University of Frankfurt (2020-2021).