after the islamic revolution, in 1981, twelve institutions in various disciplines of the humanities, including the iranian institute of philosophy and hikmat, the foundation of shahnameh of ferdowsi, the iranian cultural foundation, the iranian foundation of culture and arts, the institute for communication and development, the institute for humanities, the iranian academy of literature and arts, the iranian academy of language, the iranian academy of science, asia's cultural documents center, the iranian center for historical research, and the iranian centre for the study of cultures, were merged into a new institute, the center for cultural research and studies, which was affiliated to the ministry of culture and higher education. in 1990, following organizational changes, the council for extending higher education changed this center into a research institute. the organizational structure of this institute was finally approved by the organization for administrative and employment affairs in june 1993. in 1994, the supreme council of the research center, giving prominence to humanities in research studies, named this institute «the institute for humanities and cultural studies», which was approved by the council for extending higher education. following the approval of the law of organizing boards of trustees in the ministry of higher education and the formation of the board of trustees of universities and research centers in 1992, the institute became a member of the board of trustees of tehran's fourth district. since then, all of the affairs of this institute have been carried out under the supervision and direction of the board of trustees. the institute is a research institute, mainly responsible for performing research in humanities – literature, linguistics, social sciences, history, philosophy, law, religion, quranic studies, theosophy, comparative economics, political science.