Ahmad Gunny started his academic career as a specialist in the French Enlightenment. He taught French at Liverpool University for many years, becoming Reader there before being appointed Fellow and Senior Associate at the Oxford Centre for Islamic Studies. Among his many works are: Voltaire and English literature, critical editions of miscellaneous texts of Voltaire, including ‘De Mahomet et de l'Alcoran' in the Complete Works of  Voltaire, the article on Islam in the Dictionnaire général de Voltaire , Images of Islam in Eighteenth-Century Writings  and Perceptions of Islam in European writings, dealing mainly with the nineteenth century. The final volume of his study of Islam and the West entitled Prophet Muhammad in French and English literature, 1650 to the present is due for publication in spring 2010.

Dr Gunny was invited to give lectures on Islam in European literature from the seventeenth to the nineteenth century in the ‘Chaire de l'IMA' series at the Institut du Monde Arabe, Paris, in 2004. In March/April 2009 he was Visiting Professor at Qatar University. In May 2009, along with other Oxford scholars, he was presented with the award of ‘Chevalier dans l'Ordre des Palmes Académiques' by the French Ambassador on behalf of the French government.