Emily Teeter received her PhD in Near Eastern Languages and Civilizations from the Oriental Institute of the University of Chicago. Her academic specialty is ancient Egypt, including its interconnections with other cultures of the ancient Middle East. She also has a deep interest in the later periods of Egyptian history and in Islamic culture throughout the Middle East and Iberia. Emily has traveled widely through the Middle East, and she has developed and led many tours to Oman, Bahrain, the UAE, Yemen, and Saudi Arabia as well as to Turkey, Syria, Lebanon, Iraq, and Libya.

Emily has written a wide variety of popular and scholarly articles and published many books dealing with ancient Egyptian culture, among them The Presentation of Maat: Ritual and Legitimacy in Ancient Egypt; Religion and Ritual in Ancient Egypt; and Egypt and the Egyptians (which has appeared in Arabic and Turkish editions). Her most recent publication is Chicago on the Nile: A Century of Work by the Epigraphic Survey of the University of Chicago (2024). She has conducted fieldwork in Alexandria, Giza, and Luxor, and she has appeared on many television programs. She also has curated many permanent and temporary exhibits at major museums in the United States.

After retiring from a long career as a curator in the Oriental Institute Museum, Emily consults for museum projects, and she is presently co-curator for the Field Museum of Chicago’s new African galleries projected to open in 2027.

She is the past President of the American Research Center in Egypt, and she is the editor of the Journal of the American Research Center in Egypt. She is an Associate of the Oriental Institute of the University of Chicago, a Research Associate of the Polish Centre for Mediterranean Studies, a Research Associate of the Negaunee Integrative Research Center at the Field Museum in Chicago, and she sits on the editorial boards of several prominent academic journals. 

Language spoken: English