Invited Talks
“Spiritual Capital: Islamic Education, Development and Social Change in a Zanzibari Madrasa,” Harvard Divinity School, Islam in Africa lecture series, Jan. 2020.

“Modernizing the Madrasa: Islamic Education, Knowledge and Tradition in Zanzibar,” Harvard University, Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study, New Directions in the Study of Islamic Scholarship in Africa seminar, Oct. 2017.

Conference Presentations & Seminars

“’Development is People’: Kuwaiti Aid, Islamic Development, and Spiritual Reward in Zanzibar.” Paper presented at the American Anthropological Association, Nov. 2021.

“The Blue Economy’s Black Gold: Climate Change, Islam, and Zanzibar’s Search for Oil.” Paper presented at International Convention of Asia Scholars: Climate Change in Coastal Cities, Aug. 2021, with Mary Khatib and Issa Ziddy.

“Spiritual Capital in Zanzibar: Islamic Education in the Time of Primitive Accumulation.” Paper presented at the African Studies Association conference, Nov. 2019

“Wame-taṭawwur Zaidi:” Education, Development and Politics in Zanzibar and Oman.” Paper presented at Africa-Asia: A New Axis of Knowledge, University of Dar Es Salaam, Tanzania, September 2018.

“Modernizing the Madrasa: Islamic Education, Knowledge and Development in Zanzibar,” Paper presented at Texts, Knowledge, and Practice: The Meaning of Scholarship in Muslim Africa, Harvard University, Feb. 2017.

“Kusomekesha Afrika: Kiswahili cha Kiarabu na Herufi za Kirumi Katika Zanzibar ya Kikoloni,” Paper presented at the New York African Studies Association (NYASA) Conference, April 2016.

“Colonizing Curriculum: Modernity, Morality and Islamic Education in Colonial Zanzibar.” Paper presented at the Middle East Studies Association conference, Nov. 2015.

“Making Africa Legible: Kiswahili Arabic and Orthographic Romanization in Colonial Zanzibar.” Paper presented at the Mazrui Seminar for Scholars, International Institute for Islamic Thought, Oct. 2015.

“‘Negro Education’ from the American South to 1920s East Africa.” Paper presented at the Early Research and Scholarship Conference, Advanced Research Collaborative, Graduate Center of the City University of New York, Sept. 2015.

“Modernity and Morality in Colonial Islamic Education in Zanzibar.” Paper presented at MESAAS Graduate Student Conference, Columbia University, March 2015.

Panels Organized

“Patronage and Dependency in Islamic Ethics & Economies of Care: Ethnographic Inquiries from Africa and the Middle East,” American Anthropological Association, with China Sajadian, Nov. 2021.

“Questioning the Moral in Islamic Education: Modernity and the Reconfiguration of Islamic Knowledge,” Middle East Studies Association, Nov. 2015.