The over-representation of Iranian Baha'i students at AUB from Shiraz, and especially from the Afnan family, provides a clue to the broader patterns of class formation in the Middle East. The Afnans were involved in transnational commercial activities spanning Iran, India and the Persian Gulf. Merchant families sending their children, particularly their sons, into higher education indicates an awareness of the shifting nature of the modern economy, and the perceived need for command over new forms of knowledge in order to thrive in it.
The main member of the Afnan family who lived in Beirut and
who sent many of his children to AUB was Sayyid ‘Ali Afnan.
(The Iranians of AUB and Middle Class Formation in the Early Twentieth-Century Middle East, Farzin Vejdani)
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