She holds a PhD in History and Middle Eastern Studies from Harvard University, and her research interests focus on the social and cultural history of mediaeval and early modern Islamicate societies, particularly in regards to gender, borderlands, and nonconformist religious movements. She is the author of the Turkish work Rethinking Alevi-Bektashi History: Sources and Historiography (Istanbul, 2015), and has contributed articles to journals including Turcica, the International Journal of Turkish Studies, and the British Journal of Middle Eastern Studies. Professor Ayfer Karakaya-Stump has been a Fellow of the Shīʿah Institute since January 2016.