2024 - Ph.D. in Anthropology; New York University
2018 - B.A. in International Comparative Studies (concentration: Middle East), Linguistics; Duke University
I am a cultural anthropologist that studies the connections between race, capital, and consumerism, with a current focus on the material culture of the Iranian diaspora. My current research focuses on the role of transnational commercial spaces in creating and maintaining racialized notions of Iranianness. I explore the discourses of race, nation, and identity that circulate within commercial and communal spaces, showing how the objects that we love, buy, and use everyday become vessels for diasporic ideas of heritage and culture, presenting a very particular narrative of "Iran" and "Iranianness" for consumption. My work is particularly interested in the intersections between racialization, capitalism, and nationalism in diasporic and transnational settings in light of neoliberal multicultural ideologies of belonging, superpowered global supply chains, and ever-increasing heights of mass consumerism.