Houchang E. Chehabi was educated at the University of Caen, Sciences Po in Paris, and Yale University, where he received his PhD in political science in 1986. He taught at Harvard University and UCLA before joining the faculty of Boston University as a professor of international relations and history in 1998. He is the author of Iranian Politics and Religious Modernism: The Liberation Movement of Iran under the Shah and Khomeini, principal author of Distant Relations: Iran and Lebanon in the last 500 years, and editor of over ten books, most recently (with Grace Neville), Erin and Iran: Cultural Encounters between the Irish and the Iranians. Dr. Chehabi's lecture discusses the close relationship Iran and South Africa have had since the 1970s and the evolution of this relationship, touching on politics, economics, and religion.