Brown University's Watson Institute for International and Public Affairs underwent a leadership change for the first time in eight years on July 1, 2024.
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Nadje Al-Ali
Robert Family Professor of International Studies, Professor of Anthropology and Middle East Studies
111 Thayer Street, Room 211
Areas of Expertise
Environmental Justice, Ethnic Conflict & Civil War, Gender, Human Rights, Immigration, Displacement & Borders, Religion & Politics, Social Movements
Areas of Interest
Middle East; gender; feminism; war and conflict; migration and diaspora studies
Biography
Nadje Al-Ali is Robert Family Professor of International Studies and Professor of Anthropology and Middle East Studies. Her main research interests revolve around feminist activism and gendered mobilization, mainly with reference to Iraq, Egypt, Lebanon, Turkey and the Kurdish political movement. Her publications include What kind of Liberation? Women and the Occupation of Iraq (2009, University of California Press, co-authored with Nicola Pratt); Women and War in the Middle East: Transnational Perspectives (Zed Books, 2009, co-edited with Nicola Pratt); Iraqi Women: Untold Stories from 1948 to the Present (2007, Zed Books), and Secularism, Gender and the State in the Middle East (Cambridge University Press 2000. Her co-edited book with Deborah al-Najjar entitled We are Iraqis: Aesthetics & Politics in a Time of War (Syracuse University Press) won the 2014 Arab-American book prize for non-fiction. More recent publications include (jointly with Deniz Kandiyoti and Kathryn Spellman Poots) Gender, Governance & Islam (University of Edinburgh Press, 2019) and Resisting Far-Right Politics in the Middle East and Europe: Queer Feminist Critiques (ed. With Tunay Altay and Katharina Galor, University of Edinburgh Press, 2024).
Research
My research to date has focused on women’s and gendered mobilizations in the Middle East (Egypt, Iraq, Lebanon, Turkey and the Kurdish regions) as well as the gendered dimensions of transnational migration and diaspora mobilization (with reference to Bosnia-Herzegovina, Iraq and the Kurdish political movement).
Recently I have researched for and co-edited a book entitled "Resisting Far-Right Politics in the Middle East and Europe: Queer Feminist Critiques" (ed. With Tunay Altay and Katharina Galor, University of Edinburgh Press, 2024). The book provides an empirically grounded exploration of different case studies on anti-LGBTQ and anti-gender mobilizations of the far-right in Europe and the Middle East.
Currently, I have started to work on a new project, provisionally entitled “Subversive Aesthetics: Creative Resistance in Authoritarian Contexts in the Middle East and North Africa.” This initiative explores how artists, writers, and activists in the MENA region mobilize creative, embodied, and often risky aesthetic practices to critique authoritarianism, navigate censorship, and build alternative political and social imaginaries.
Publications
2024 (Co-edited with Tunay Altay and Katy Galor) Resisting Far-Right Politics in the Middle East and Europe: Queer Feminist Perspectives. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press.
2023. (co-authored with Mashuq Kurt) “From Islamists to Religious Patriots: Intersectional Identities of Religious Kurdish Women”. Journal of Middle East Women's Studies 1 November 2023; 19 (3): 357–378. doi: https://doi.org/10.1215/15525864-10815511
2022. ‘COVID-19 and Feminism in the Middle East: Challenges, Initiatives, and Dilemmas’, in COVID and Gender in the Middle East, ed. Rita Stephan, University of Texas Press.
2022. ‘Women’s Movements in the Middle East’, Routledge Handbook on Women in the Middle East, eds. Suad Joseph and Zeina Zaatari, Routledge, pp. 212-220.
2022 (co-authored with Isabel Kaeser) "Beyond Feminism? Jineolojî and the Kurdish Women's Freedom Movement", Politics & Gender, vol. 1, no. 18, 212-243. doi:10.1017/S1743923X20000501.
2019. (Co-edited with Deniz Kandiyoti & Kathryn Spellman) Gender, Governance & Islam. Edinburgh: University of Edinburgh Press.
2019. ‘Feminist dilemmas: how to talk about gender-based violence with reference to the Middle East?’, Feminist Review; Issue 122: 16– 31.
Teaching
Transnational Feminist Knowledge Production and Practices: Perspectives from East and West Asia
Anthropological methodology & methods
Gender & Sexuality in the Middle East
Transnational Feminist Mobilization & Knowledge Production
Gendering Migration & Diasporas
Recent News
In TIME, Nadje Al-Ali discussed the history of Iraq's 1959 Personal Status law, which prohibits marriage for individuals under the age of 18.
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This year, five Watson research proposals were awarded a total of $100,000 in Birkelund Funds. The funds support faculty research, especially in the early stages, and encourage student engagement in research.
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The Watson Institute's Diversity and Inclusion Plan committee funded three faculty members in their efforts to create a greater focus on diversity and inclusion in the institute's teaching and learning.
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Eight Watson Institute Master of Public Affairs students were named Director's Fellows in September. Fellows spent the fall semester working on projects in faculty-led research groups at Watson and in Watson centers.
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News from Watson
Current events in Israel and Gaza
There will be a variety of events across the Brown community addressing the current situation in Israel and Gaza.
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