Gelvin obtuvo su licenciatura de la Universidad de Columbia en 1983, Master de la Escuela de Estudios Internacionales de la Universidad de Columbia en 1985 y el doctorado de la Universidad de Harvard en 1992.

Antes de incorporarse a la facultad en la UCLA, enseñó en el Instituto Tecnológico de Massachusetts (MIT), el Boston Collegey la Universidad de Harvard.

Ha sido socio del Centro Internacional para Académicos Woodrow Wilson (1999–2000) y recibió la beca U. C. presidencial de investigación en humanidades de (1999–2000). Entre 2002 y 2003 fue profesor invitado Sheikh Zayed bin Sultan Al Nahyan de historia en la Universidad Americana de Beirut.^[2]​

In 2015, la Asociación de estudios de Medio Oriente honró a Gelvin con su premio de enseñanza universitaria, citando su "sobresaliente compromiso con la práctica y contenidos de enseñanza universitaria, a través de la ejecución de sus clases, su formación de generaciones futuras de profesores universitarios, y su buena acogida de libros de texto universitarios... Los logros de James Gelvin, como profesor y en los materiales de enseñanza que ha creado para otros, ejemplifica el tipo de profesor universitario que este tipo de premio quiere reconocer".^[3]​

Libros^[4]​

• The Contemporary Middle East in an Age of Upheaval (editor, Stanford University Press, 2021).
• The New Middle East: What Everyone Needs to Know (Oxford University Press, 2017).
• Global Muslims in the Age of Steam and Print, 1850-1930 (co-editor, University of California Press, 2013).
• The Arab Uprisings: What Everyone Needs to Know (Oxford University Press, 2012, 2015).
• Israel Palestine Conflict: One Hundred Years of War (Cambridge, ENG: Cambridge University Press, September 2005, 2007, 2013, 2021).
• The Modern Middle East: A History (New York: Oxford University Press, 2004, 2007, 2010, 2015, 2020).
• Divided Loyalties: Nationalism and Mass Politics in Syria at the Close of Empire (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1998).

Artículos

• “The Arab Uprisings: Lessons to be Learned (and Unlearned),” Forum: “Arab Springs,” Il Mestiere di Storico 5:1 (March 2013).
• “‘Modernity,’ ‘Tradition,’ and the Battleground of Gender in Early Twentieth-Century Damascus,” Die Welt Des Islams (Winter 2012).
• “‘Coup-Proof?” History Today (August 2011).
• “Nationalism, Anarchism, Reform: Understanding Political Islam from the Inside Out,” Middle East Policy XVII, 3 (Fall 2010).
• “‘Arab Nationalism’ Meets Social Theory,” “Pensée: ‘Arab Nationalism’: Has a New Framework Emerged?," International Journal of Middle East Studies 41 (2009).
• “Al-Qaeda and Anarchism: A Historian’s Reply to Terrorology,” and “Al-Qaeda and Anarchism: A Historian’s Reply to Terrology: Response to Commentaries,” Terrorism and Political Violence 20:4 (2008).
• “The Politics of Notables Forty Years After,” Middle East Studies Association Bulletin, 40:1 (June 2006).
• “Globalization, Religion, and Politics in the Middle East: The Current Crisis in Historical Perspective,” Global Development Studies (Winter 2004/Spring 2005).
• “Islamism and Nationalism: Common Roots, Common Destinies,” Beiruter Blaetter: Mitteilungen des Orient-Institutes Beirut, 10-11 (March 2004).
• “Zionism and the Representation of ‘Jewish Palestine’ at the New York World’s Fair, 1939-1940” The International History Review XXII:1 (March 2000).
• "Modernity and Its Discontents: On the Durability of Nationalism in the Arab Middle East," Nations and Nationalism 5:1 (January 1999).
• "The League of Nations and the Question of National Identity in the Fertile Crescent," in World Affairs (Summer 1995).
• "The Social Origins of Popular Nationalism in Syria: Evidence for a New Framework," in International Journal of Middle East Studies (November 1994).
• "Demonstrating Communities in Post-Ottoman Syria," in The Journal of Interdisciplinary History XXV:I (Summer 1994).

Capítulos en volúmenes editados

• “A New Middle East?” in James L. Gelvin (ed.), The Contemporary Middle East in an Age of Upheaval (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2021).

• “The Syrian Civil War and the New Middle East,” in James L. Gelvin (ed.), The Contemporary Middle East in an Age of Upheaval (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2021).
• “The Arab Uprisings of 2010-11,” in David Motadel (ed.), Revolutionary World: Political Upheaval in the Global Age (Cambridge University Press, 2021).
• “Religion, State, and Society in the New Middle East,” in Catalin-Stefan Popa (ed.), From Polarization to Cohabitation in the New Middle East (Harrassowitz Verlag, 2020).
• “Nationalism in the Arab Middle East: Resolving Some Issues,” in Larbi Sadiki (ed.), Routledge Handbook on the Politics of the Middle East (Abingdon, Oxon, UK: Routledge, 2020).
• "Comprendiendo las insurrecciones árabes," in G. Conde et al. (eds.), Mundo árabe: Levantamientos populares, contextos, crisis y reconfiguraciones (Ciudad de México: El Colegio de México/CIDE, 2015).
• “Was There a Mandates Period? Some Concluding Thoughts,” in Cyrus Schayegh and Andrew Arsan (eds.) The Routledge Handbook of the History of the Middle East Mandates (New York: Routledge, 2015).
• “Reassessing the Recent History of Political Islam in Light of the Arab Uprisings,” in Fahed Al-Sumait et al. (eds.), Conceptualizing the Arab Uprisings: Origins, Dynamics, and Trajectories (New York: Rowman & Littlefield, 2014).
• “The Arab World at the Intersection of the Transnational and National,” in David W. Lesch and Mark Haas (eds.), The Arab Spring: Change and Resistance in the Middle East (Boulder, CO: Westview Press, 2012)
• “American Global Economic Policy and the Civic Order in the Middle East,” Michael Bonine et al., Is There a Middle East? (Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 2012).
• “The Middle East Breasted Discovered,” in Geoff Emberling and John Larson (eds.), Pioneers to the Past: American Archaeologists in the Middle East, 1919-20 (Chicago: Oriental Institute, 2010).
• “Resolution of the Syrian General Congress—1919,” in Neil Schlager (ed.), Milestone Documents in World History (Dallas: Schlager Group, 2010).
• “Post Hoc Ergo Propter Hoc?: Reassessing the Lineages of Nationalism in Bilad al-Sham,” in Thomas Philipp and Christoph Schumann (eds.), From the Syrian Land to the State of Syria (Würtzburg: ERGON Verlag, 2004).
• “T.E. Lawrence and Historical Representation,” in Charles Stang (ed.), The Waking Dream of T.E. Lawrence: Essays on His Life, Literature, and Legacy (New York: St. Martin’s Press, 2002).
• “Secularism and Religion in the Arab Middle East: Reinventing Islam in a World of Nation States,” in Derek R. Peterson and Darren Walhof (eds.), The Invention of Religion: Rethinking Belief and Politics in History (New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press, 2002).
• “Developmentalism, Revolution, and Freedom in the Arab Middle East: The Cases of Egypt, Syria, and Iraq,” in Robert H. Taylor (ed.), The Idea of Freedom in Asia and Africa (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2002).
• "(Re)Presenting Nations: Demonstrations and Nationalisms in Pre-Mandate Syria," in F. Moge Gocek (ed.), Social Constructions of Nationalism in the Middle East (Albany: SUNY Press, 2002).
• “Napoleon in Egypt as History and Polemic,” in Irene Bierman (ed.), Napoleon in Egypt (Reading, ENG: Ithaca Press, 2003).
• “The Other Arab Nationalism: Syrian/Arab Populism in Its Historical and International Contexts" in James Jankowski and Israel Gershoni (eds.), Rethinking Nationalisms in the Arab World (New York: Columbia University Press, 1997).
• "The Ironic Legacy of the King-Crane Commission," in David W. Lesch (ed.), The United States in the Middle East: A Historical Reassessment (Boulder: Westview Press, 1995).

Audiolibros

• “Palestine, Zionism, and the Arab-Israeli Conflict,” 24-part lecture series, The Teaching Company, 2002. Según la página web^[5]​ del autor en UCLA, es ahora distribuido oficialmente como un archivo torrent