Research

My scholarship interrogates the relationship between gendered labor organizations, political sociology, and transnational migratory networks that have shaped recent waves of migrations from the Middle East and North Africa. My research is based on field interviews, archival research, comparative political analysis, and statistical analysis of economic and immigration data and has been funded by several campus-wide awards and grants and has won a UC Presidential award. Over the next few years, I will prepare my first monograph for publication, publish several articles, and work on my second book project.

Publications and Future Projects

  • • The Imperial Draw: MENA Labor Migrations in the 21st Century - Manuscript in Preparation

    • “The SecondWave of MENA Academic Migration: Migration of Academics from Iran, Egypt, and Turkey in the 21st Century” - Peer-Reviewed Article in Progress in International Journal of Middle Eastern Studies

    • ”Review of Temporary Marriage in Iran by Claudia Yaghoobi” - Peer-Reviewed Book Review Mar 2021 in Journal of Middle Eastern Women’s Studies

    • ”Intergenerational Conflicts: Experiences of Discrimination & Racialization in Iranian Diasporic Novels” - Chapter in a Peer-Reviewed Edited Volume forthcoming in Routledge Handbook of Persian Literature, edited by Kamran Talattof

    • ”The War on Terror Paradigm and Intersecting Contemporary Civil Uprisings” - Article Sep 2020 in 21st Century Global Dynamics Electronic Journal

  • • “MENA Technocrats: How 1970s Return Migrants Became Agents of Neoliberal Restructuring”

    • “From Dissent to Migration: Youth and the Winter of Democracy”

    • “The Origins of MENA ”Brain Drain”: Youth and Student Movements of the 1990s and 2000s”

My first book manuscript, The Imperial Draw: MENA Labor Migrations in the 21st Century, offers an in-depth analysis of class and migration politics, and compares gendered labor mobilizations and emigrations from Iran, Egypt, and Turkey to the U.S. and Canada. In it, I depart from dominant approaches to Middle East migration that focus primarily on refugee displacement to center on a surprising but crucial demographic: middle-class women. I argue that scholars of Middle East migration select on the dependent variable by focusing exclusively on authoritarianism or civil conflict as a ‘push’ factor for refugee migration, reifying portrayals of the Middle East as a region of ‘failed states’ and vulnerable civilians. This focus misses crucial context for how economic and social class—a category largely absent from existing literature—affects both migration patterns and prospects for democratization in the Middle East. By focusing on middle-class women intellectuals, I show that outflows of such women from their home countries are a significant factor in delaying processes of democratization, because it depletes the labor supply of journalists, academics, and educators who play a key role in providing access to international media platforms for social movements in Iran, Egypt and Turkey. Therefore, their migration impacts global awareness of the liveliness of protest in the Middle East, and, in turn, leads to lessened media coverage that would put global pressure on authoritarian regimes to democratize. As such, I argue, focusing on the class dimensions of migration sheds light on what I term the “imperial draw” of Western host countries, whose histories of imperialism in the Middle East contribute to the further re-entrenchment of authoritarianism. Combining interviews with recent migrants with in-depth analysis of local, regional, and global policies in three Middle East countries, this work insists on a deeper analysis of the effects of globalization and imperialism on domestic politics, broadening the study of comparative politics to account for how political repression and migration outflows occur in Iran, Egypt and Turkey not solely due to internal factors of authoritarian regimes, but also in relation to the imperial draw of North America. My research contributes to the fields of Middle Eastern Studies and global migration, and brings an interdisciplinary lens to the study of comparative politics by integrating political sociology with ethnography. I am submitting my book proposal to Stanford University Press and University of Texas Press in summer 2024.

Fellowships, Grants, and Certificates

  • • Politics of the Middle East Seminar Series: Feb 2022 – Dec 2022

    Serving as a presenter in a year-long seminar series on Middle Eastern politics.

    • Center for Middle Eastern Studies 2021-22 Fellows Program, UCSB Santa Barbara, CA: Jun 2021 – Apr 2022

    Serving as a research fellow in the ”Making, Breaking, and Transgressing the State” research cluster.

    • Mellichamp 21st Century Global Dynamics Graduate Research Fellowship, UCSB Santa Barbara, CA: Sep 2020 – Dec 2020

    Serving as a research fellow in the ”Gender and Islam” cluster, assisting with media research, content development, and student interaction for a digital internship program.

    • Orfalea Center for Global and International Studies, UCSB Santa Barbara, CA: Jun 2020 – Jun 2021

    Serving as a research fellow in the ”Transnationalizing the Study of the United States” cluster, creating archives and databases, conducting research and publishing original content, and coordinating events and conferences.

  • • University of California President’s Dissertation Year Fellowship: May 2022 – Aug 2023

    • Global Studies Department Field Grant, UCSB: May 2022

    • Global Studies Department Conference Grant, UCSB: May 2022

    • Association for Iranian Studies Conference Grant: May 2022

    • Middle Eastern Studies Association Wadad Kadi Fellowship: May 2022

    • Global Studies Department Field Grant, UCSB: May 2022

    • The American Rescue Plan Emergency Relief Grant: Mar 2022

    • UCSB Graduate Division CARES Act MSI Summer Grant: Sep 2021

    • Global Studies Department Block Grant, UCSB: Aug 2021

    • Global Studies Department Field Grant, UCSB: Mar 2021

    • The American Rescue Plan Emergency Relief Grant: Mar 2021

    • Center for Middle Eastern Studies Summer Scholarly Project Award, UCSB: Aug 2020

    • UNC Chapel Hill Conference Honorarium: Sep 2020

    • Center for Middle Eastern Studies Conference Travel Grant, UCSB: Sep 2020

    • Center for Middle Eastern Studies Conference Travel Grant, UCSB: Aug 2020

    • Humanities and Social Sciences Research Grant, UCSB: May 2020

    • The American Rescue Plan Emergency Relief Grant: Mar 2020

    • Global Studies Department Field Grant, UCSB: Mar 2020

    • Center for Middle Eastern Studies Conference Travel Grant, UCSB: Nov 2019

    • Mellichamp Chair in Iranian Studies Travel Award, UCSB: Nov 2019

    • Graduate Student Association Conference Travel Grant, UCSB: Nov 2019

    • Academic Senate Conference Travel Fund, UCSB: Oct 2019

    • Iranian Studies Conference Travel Grant, UCSB: Oct 2019

    • Middle Eastern Studies Association Graduate Conference Travel Fund: Oct 2019

    • Global Studies Department Field Grant, UCSB: Apr 2019

    • Center for Middle Eastern Studies Conference Travel Grant, UCSB: Mar 2019

    • Global Studies Department Conference Grant, UCSB: Feb 2019

    • Center for Middle Eastern Studies Conference Travel Grant, UCSB: Nov 2018

    • Graduate Student Association Conference Travel Grant, UCSB: Nov 2018

    • Mellichamp Chair in Iranian Studies Travel Award, UCSB: Apr 2018

    • Graduate Student Association Conference Travel Grant, UCSB: Mar 2018

  • • Supervised Machine Learning: Regression and Classification, Coursera Jul 2022

    • 2017 STARTALK/National Heritage Language Resource Center Teacher Workshop, UCLA Jun 2017

    • Certificate in College and University Teaching, UCSB Apr 2017 – Present

    • Concentration in the Teaching of Writing, Chatham University, Pittsburgh, PA May 2016

    • University of Iowa Summer Writing Festival, Iowa City, Iowa Apr 2015

    • Diplome d´etudes en Langue Francaise (DELF) - A2, Tehran, Iran Dec 2013