My primary area of study is the American Muslim community. From my perspective, there is a dearth of political science research that privileges the views and experiences of American Muslims. While we have a pretty good understanding of how other Americans view their Muslim compatriots (and unfortunately, it isn’t great…), we have yet to fully explore how Muslims see their place in American politics.
To fill the hole in this research, my dissertation is an ethnographic account of three Muslim communities across the United States that explores the nuanced and complex ways Muslims understand themselves as one of many communities vying for representation.
Other projects I’m currently working on include a paper entitled “Legislating Islamophobia,” which examines who votes for anti-Sharia legislation and what role the presence of a Muslim community has on voting behavior. Along a similar vein, I’m also transcribing and coding anti-Sharia legislation committee hearings to systematically capture the ways in which Sharia is demonized and anti-Muslim sentiment is fomented by state legislators.
My Published Work
“Ranked-Choice Voting Delivers Representation and Consensus in Presidential Primaries” (2021), with Baodong Liu & Nadia Mahallati, SSRN.
“Forever Foreign: Islamophobia throughout American History” (2019), The Yaqeen Institute for Islamic Research.