She was a fellow at the Institute for Social Policy and Understanding (ISPU) and the Primary Investigator for ISPU’s American Muslims Elections Project 2016. She has a PhD in American Studies and Ethnicity from the University of Southern California (USC). Her research interests cover the intersections of race, power, and geography to explore how historically marginalized peoples and communities produce systems of knowledge, practice, and social movements. Her current research explores the ways in which racial, ethnic, social, gender, and religious identities are activated, managed, and manipulated for a broad range of political behaviors in the contexts both of the contemporary political activity of American Muslims and of the historical political activity of Black Americans.