Carole is Professor Emerita of Islamic History at the University of Edinburgh and an Honorary Fellow of Somerville College, Oxford. She is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Edinburgh and a Fellow of the British Academy. In 2009 she was awarded the OBE for Services to Higher Education. She has written several books. In 2005 she was awarded the King Faisal International Prize in Islamic Studies, the first time this highest scholarly prize in the Arab world was given to a non-Muslim.