Dr. Patricia Nabti, PhD

Dr. Patricia Nabti has a PhD in Cultural Anthropology from the University of California, Berkeley, with a focus on the Arab World. Dr. Nabti also holds a BA in Political Science and MA in Education from Stanford University. Her thesis International Emigration from a Lebanese Village: Bishmizzinis on Six Continents studied Lebanese migration over a 100-year period, taking the village of Bishmizzine, al-Kourah in Lebanon as a case study.
She was a Lecturer in the Cultures, Ideas, and Values Program of Stanford University from 1989 to 1992, and a Professor of Cultural Anthropology at the American University of Beirut from 1992 to 1998. Dr. Nabti was the coordinator of the Arab Initiative to Foster a Culture of Volunteering in 2010-2011.
Dr. Nabti is currently the Founder and Director of the Learning to CARE Institute S.A.R.L. which was established in 2012. LTCI is a social venture that provides consulting and training on all aspects of volunteerism, as well as quality EcoVolunTours of Lebanon, particularly for those of Lebanese heritage. She is also the Regional Representative to the Arab Nations for the International Association for Volunteer Effort (IAVE).
Dr. Nabti is the Founder and former Director of the Association for Volunteer Services which was established in 1998 ‘to promote, facilitate, and improve volunteering and community service throughout Lebanon and beyond’. She is also the former Coordinator of the Arab Initiative to Foster a Culture of Volunteering.
She is the author of the book Learning to CARE: Education, Volunteering, and Community Service Arabic edition: علم الاهتمام: التربية والتطوع وخدمة المجتمع) ), a manual for developing and improving school service programs.
At LERC, Dr. Nabti will be working on the genealogy of the people of Bishmizzine to a) update previously collected information through reviewing government records and interviewing people in the village; b) keying in the data into modern genealogical software; and c) conduct advanced analysis of kinship, patterns of migration and return, and the extent that those in the Lebanese diaspora keep contact with Lebanon and maintain their official registration and citizenship.