Sabrina DeTurk

Lecturer in Honors

Email: sabrina.deturk@maine.edu
Estabrooke 148

Education: B.A. (1992) History of Art, Wellesley College
M.A. (1996) and Ph.D. (1998) History of Art, Bryn Mawr College

Biography: Sabrina DeTurk is a Lecturer in the Honors College. Her research centers on art as a form of
social commentary and on cross-cultural currents between the art of the Middle East and the
West from the early modern period to the present day. Prior to joining the University of Maine,
Dr. DeTurk held faculty and administrative positions at La Salle University and Saint Joseph’s
University in Philadelphia, Salem College in Winston-Salem and Zayed University in Dubai,
UAE.

Why I teach in Honors: The heart of education is the process of asking questions and engaging in critical discussion and
reflection about ideas that have shaped our global past and present and will impact our shared
future. Honors classes facilitate and support that kind of rigorous and sustained inquiry, in
conversation with great texts and works of art from around the world.

Publications: My two recent books are Women and Contemporary Art in the Gulf, published by Routledge (2022) and Street Art in the Middle East, published in I.B. Tauris (2019). I am co-editor of the book series “Cultural Heritage, Art and Museums in the Middle East,” also with Routledge, and have published numerous articles, exhibition reviews and book chapters on topics related to visual culture.

Honors Courses: I teach in the Civilizations sequence and occasionally teach an Honors Tutorial.