This is the most comprehensive and analytical account of educational reform in 19th century Iran. This book locates educational reform within the broader context of the process of modernization in a non-Western society. It is based on a wide variety of sources and is the only history of the New schools and Anjoman-e Ma’aref. Topics include: the Nezam-e Jadid, the Dar al Fonun, the New schools, foreign, missionary and minority schools, students abroad, the Anjoman-e Ma’aref. It emphasizes the evolving attitudes of proponents and opponents of educational reform towards its benefits and dangers. The book describes modernizati at posed by educational reform to the ulama. It charts the dialectic between competing visions of Iranian polity, society and culture.

• Acknowledgements
• Editor's Preface
• Introduction 1
• Genesis: The Nezam-e Jadid Under 'Abbas Mirza and Mohammad Shah 15
• Early Qajar Travel Literature and the Perception of "Deficiency" 53
• The Dar al Fonun, 1851-71 67
• Missionary and Foreign Schools in Iran, 1830-1906 109
• The "New" School Movement, 1870-1906 145
• The Anjoman-e Ma'aref 187
• Modernization, Cultural Integrity and the Battle for Iran, 1860-1906 207
• Conclusion: Crisis and Translation 251
• Bibliography 273
• Index 303

"Monica Ringer's book provides a perspective essential to understanding the deep-seated religious, cultural and political tensions in Iran's centuries-long attempts at modernization. Her study of the nature, impact, and legacy of modernization in Qajar Iran, the pivotal role of educational reforms and the reactions of the religious establishment, is critical to understanding many of the forces unleashed in the Iranian Revolution of 1978-79".

John L.Esposito, , Georgetown University.

"Monica Ringer's book unlocks the process of modernization and reform in Qajar Iran. The study is especially valuable for its focus on the institutional and ideological threat of "new" education to the religious establishment, as its nuanced treatment of the proponents' and opponents' own changing understanding of the benefits and dangers of educational reform problematizes the response to modernization in nineteenth century Iran. This is essential reading for anyone interested in understanding the stumbling blocks associated with modernization in non-Western countries."

Houchang. E. Chehabi, Boston University

"This important contribution to the study of Qajar Iran seeks the roots of the country's tortuous struggle with modernity in the educational debates of the nineteenth century. Arguing that modernization in the Qajar period cannot be seen as a cumulative and undifferentiated process, Ringer shows how even the ulama could endorse reform, including the sending of students to Europe, as long as they believed that change was a matter of remedying a deficiency and compatible with cultural and religious integrity. Over time the traditionalists were challenged, though not entirely eclipsed, by secular reformers who saw Iran as backward and who advocated importing Western educational models as the best guarantee for a strong nation. The echo of both arguments can be heard in Iran until today."

Rudolf P Matthee, University of Delaware

"Modern education has long been deemed the single most critical force working to transform the Muslim societies found between North Africa and Iran. Yet, education is never an innocent enterprise. Dr. Ringer's fine analysis of Qajar Iran on the brink of modernity reveals the agonizing religious and cultural adjustments as well as the socio-ideological challenges posed by the gradual introduction of European educational institutions from the 1830s until the Constitutional Revolution of 1906-1911."

Julia Clancy-Smith, University of Arizona.