CV

EDUCATION

Yale University, New Haven, CT.  Ph.D., History (with Distinction). June, 2017.

• Dissertation: “Traversing the Oxus and the Indus: Trans-regional Islamic Revival in the Age of Political Fragmentation and the Great Game, 1747-1880.” 790 pp.
• Comprehensive Exams: Passed with Distinction (Fields: Persianate World 1747-1900; Late Ottoman Empire; Islamic Revivalism).
• Coursework: Completed May, 2012. (Honors in all courses)
• Advisor: Prof. Abbas Amanat.

Yale University, New Haven, CT. Master of Philosophy; Master of Arts, History. Dec., 2013.

Yale University, New Haven, CT.  Bachelor of Arts, Near Eastern Languages and Civilizations and Economics (Double Major).

• Major in Near Eastern Languages and Civilizations (Arabic and Islamic Studies focus). Thesis on ideological transformations in 20^th century Muslim religious movements. Advisor: Prof. Frank Griffel.
• Major in Economics. Concentration in political economy of development. Advisor: Prof. Ray Fair.

PROFESSIONAL EXPERIENCE

University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Assistant Professor & Dr. Ali Jarrahi Fellow in Persian Studies, Department of Religious Studies. 2019-2023

Habib University, Karachi, Pakistan. Assistant Professor (Comparative Liberal Studies), School of Arts, Humanities, and Social Sciences. 2017-2019

• Launched the core Comparative Liberal Studies major (History, Philosophy, Religious Studies)

Yale Law School, New Haven, CT.  Research Scholar in Law; Islamic Law and Civilization Research Fellow, Abdallah S. Kamel Center for the Study of Islamic Law and Civilization. 2016-2017.

Ernst & Young, Montreal, QC. Jan. 2009-Sep. 2010. Manager and Economic Consultant, International Transfer Pricing Group.

Deloitte and Touche, Economics Group, Washington, DC/Montreal, QC. April 2003-Nov. 2008. Manager, International Transfer Pricing Group.

Ernst & Young, Bucharest, Romania. Sept. 2002-April 2003. Senior Consultant.

HONORS

• Hidden Caliphate awarded the American Institute for Pakistan Studies 2023 Book Prize
• Hidden Caliphate shortlisted for the British Association for South Asian Studies 2023 Book Award (among 4)
• Hidden Caliphate awarded Albert Hourani Book Award, Middle East Studies Association, 2022 (most prestigious book award in the field)
• Hidden Caliphate shortlisted for Bloomsbury Pakistan Book Prize, 2022 (among 4)
• Recipient of Schwab Academic Excellence Award from the Institute for the Arts and Humanities, 2021
• Recipient of the Yale University Theron Rockwell Field Prize awarded for “a poetic, literary, or religious work” of scholarship. (One of two highest university wide dissertation awards, awarded to two students across all disciplines), 2017
• Recipient of “honorable mention for superior scholarship, originality, clarity, and the significant contribution it makes to the field of Iranian Studies” as part of Foundation for Iranian Studies’ Best Dissertation Award, 2017
• Yale Graduate School of Arts and Sciences, Profiled Student, with accompanying article entitled “Journeying into a War Zone to Study the History of Sufism”, 2013.
• Deloitte & Touche Outstanding Achievement Award, 2005. For work on China’s foray in the global IT market.
• Heinrich von Staden Cup, 2002. Presented at Yale graduation for the student “who most consistently challenged the social and intellectual consciousness of the College.”

BIBLIOGRAPHY AND PRODUCTS OF SCHOLARSHIP

Books

• In the Treasure Room of the Sakra King: Votive coinage from Gandharan Shrines. American Numismatic Society. 2022. 232 pp
• Hidden Caliphate: Sufi Saints Beyond the Oxus and Indus. Harvard University Press. 2021.354 pp.

Book reviews of this monograph

• FRANK, ALLEN. Journal of Islamic Studies (2023).
• SIDDIQUI, ALI GIBRAN. Review of Middle East Studies (2023), 1–3.
• El-ASHRY, LULIE. Religious Studies Review, Vol. 48, No. 4, December 2022.
• MORRISSEY, FITZ. Asian Affairs (2022): 1-4.
• FARID, MAZHAR. The Nation (July 5, 2022).
• HAROON, SANA. Journal of Social History (Summer, 2022): 1-2.
• HUSAIN, FARRUKH, The Friday Times (Feb. 24, 2022).

Books in progress

• Sufi Masters of the Afghan Empire: Bibi Sahiba and Her Spiritual Network (in contract with Harvard University Press, to be submitted Winter, 2023)
• Beyond Khutba and Sikka: Sovereignty and Coinage in Sindh, 1300-1700. 200+ pp. (proposal under consideration by the American Numismatic Society).
• Mir Izzatullah’s Travels (critical edition, title undecided). Brill series Sources in Persianate History. Exp. 2023, with Abbas Amanat and Arash Khazeni.
• Epistles and Poetry of ‘Abdullah Jan Faruqi (critical edition, title undecided). At the request of Afghan Sufi community members, I have started work on a critical edition of the newly discovered epistles and poetry of the last great Sufi saint of North Waziristan (1950-2006), on the Afghan-Pakistan frontier.

Book Chapters (Peer reviewed)

• “Hazrat Jeo Sahib Peshawari: How Durrani Peshawar Helped Revive Bukhara’s Sanctity.” In Sufism in Central Asia: New Perspectives on Sufi Traditions, 15^th-21^st Centuries, edited by Jo-Ann Gross and Devin DeWeese, 119-161. Leiden: E.J. Brill, 2018.
• “From Yarkand to Sindh via Kabul: The Rise of Naqshbandi-Mujaddidi Sufi Networks in the Eighteenth and Nineteenth Centuries.” In The Persianate World: Rethinking a Shared Sphere, edited by Abbas Amanat, 125-168. Leiden: E.J. Brill, 2018.
• “Transporting Knowledge in the Afghan Empire: A Case Study of two Naqshbandi-Mujaddidi Sufi Manuals.” In Afghanistan’s Islam, edited by Nile Green, 105-126. Los Angeles: University of California Press, 2016.
• “Sufism.” In The Wiley-Blackwell Encyclopedia of Race, Ethnicity and Nationalism (Wiley Blackwell Encyclopedias in Social Sciences), edited by A.D. Smith, X. Hou, J. Stone, R. Dennis and P. Rizova, 1-3. Chichester, West Sussex: Wiley-Blackwell, 2016.
• with Aman ur Rahman, “Coinage and Monetary System.” In The Magnificent Mughals, edited by Zeenut Ziad, 281-301. Karachi: Oxford University Press, 2002.

Refereed Papers / Articles

Book Chapters – in progress

• “Introduction” to critical edition of Malfuzat al-Akabir.” To be published in Sindh, Pakistan, Persian with Sindhi translation, 2024.
• “Writing Imami Sunni Sufism and Female Sainthood in the Afghan Empire”. In Genealogical History in the Persianate World, edited by Jo-Ann Gross and Daniel Beben. Leiden: E.J. Brill, 2024. (currently being edited for publication)

Refereed Papers / Articles – in progress

• “Competing Orthodoxies in early 19th Century Peshawar: How ‘Wahhabis’ became Heretics.” (to be submitted for publication to Iranian Studies)

Products of Engaged Scholarship

Op-Eds and Editorials

• “Untapped Potential: Afghanistan’s Traditional Civil Society. Foreign Policy, Apr. 16, 2015.* (Photo Essay)
• “Equipping Pakistan’s Civil Society Against the Taliban.” The Hill, Dec. 24, 2014.
• “Six Things about Afghanistan that May Surprise You.” Foreign Policy, Oct. 27, 2014.*
• “Afghans Get Busy Helping Themselves.” Wall Street Journal, Sept. 2, 2014.*
• “Pakistan’s Bid for Tolerance.” Foreign Policy, Sept. 26, 2012.* (Photo Essay)
• “Out-recruiting Pakistan’s Extremists.” Foreign Policy, Feb. 29, 2012.*
• “Evicting the Taliban from Swat.” Foreign Policy, Nov. 2, 2011.*
• “Pakistan’s Most Powerful Weapon.” Foreign Policy, Oct. 21, 2011.*
• “The Battle for Pakistan’s Soul.” Foreign Policy, Sept. 1, 2011.*
• “Defeating the Taliban in Pakistan.” The Hill, Nov. 3, 2009.*
• “Repatriation of Crimean Tatar Youth: The Experience of Ali Chabuk.” International Committee for Crimea (Washington, DC), May, 2008.
• “Reasonable Accommodation: Imam Omar Kone on the Bouchard-Taylor Commission.”  Alternatives International Journal (Montreal), May, 2008.
• “Islamic Organizations and Challenges in Crimea.” International Committee for Crimea (Washington, DC). Apr., 2008. Co-authored with Laryssa Chomiak.
• “In Pakistan, Islam needs Democracy.” New York Times, Feb. 16, 2008. Reprinted in the International Herald Tribune.
• “A Lesson in Stifling Violent Extremism.” Christian Science Monitor, Feb. 20, 2007. On the Crimean Tatar experience. Co-authored with Laryssa Chomiak.
• “An Interview with Mustafa Jemilev.” International Committee for Crimea (Washington, DC). Dec., 2006. Co-authored with Laryssa Chomiak.
• “Jihad’s Fresh Face.” New York Times, Sept. 16, 2005. Reprinted in the International Herald Tribune.
• “Against All Odds: How Karachi’s Orangi Welfare Project Transformed a Community.” Chowrangi Magazine (New York), Winter, 2004.
• “Rising to the Challenge: Former Pakistani Ambassador to the U.S., Ashraf Jahangir Qazi, Discusses his New Mandate as the Special Representative of the U.N. Secretary General in Iraq.” Chowrangi Magazine (New York), Winter, 2004.
• “How the Holy Warriors Learned to Hate.” New York Times. June 18, 2004. Referenced in the 9/11 Commission Report and reprinted as “The Shallow Roots of the Mujahideen” in the International Herald Tribune.
• “Madaris in Perspective.” The News (Pakistan’s leading English Daily), Feb. 2004.
• “Ideologies for Sale.” The News, Feb., 2004.
• “The Jihad Industry.” The News, Feb., 2004.

* co-authored with M. Farooq

Television and Radio

• Wilson Center – Countering Violent Extremism in Pakistan: Opportunities and Obstacles for Civil Society, Feb. 2015.
• CSPAN – Leveraging Civil Society in Afghanistan, Feb. 19, 2014.
• Voice of America – Pushtu. Afghanistan Beyond 2014. TV interview, 2014.
• Voice of America – Radio Ashna, Afghanistan. TV interview on the development and potential of Pakistan civil society, and religious politics in South Asia, 2012.
• Voice of America – Serbian. TV interview on Sunni ideological rifts in South Asia, 2011.

Products of creative activity such as performances and exhibitions

• Podcast episode, “Hidden Caliphate”, Muslim Focus, May 2023 (not yet published)
• Podcast episode, “Pax Pamir with Waleed Ziad”, Table Top, May 2023.
• Podcast episode, “Hidden Caliphate – A Conversation with the Author”, Coffee with Friends Podcast, December, 2022.
• Podcast episode, “In the Treasure Room of the Sakra King”, American Numismatic Society’s The Planchet, host Andrew Reinhard, November 2022.
• Podcast episode, “Hidden Caliphate: Sufi Saints beyond the Oxus and the Indus”, New Books Network, host Shahnaz Haqqani, September 2022.
• Podcast episode From ‘Failed States’ to ‘Hidden Caliphs’: How Muslim Scholar-Saints became Pillars of Social Order, host Nile Green’s Akbar’s Chamber – Experts Talk Islam, December 2021.
• “The Guide: Bibi Sahiba” in collaboration with leading Pakistan-Afghan musicians Zeb Bangash and Shamali Afghan. What’s Her Name Podcast on Women in History, https://www.whatshernamepodcast.com/bibi-sahiba/ , Feb. 2021. (over 10,000 independent downloads)

Digital, and other forms of scholarship

• the30birds.com. Photography and informational website for a general audience focused on sacred spaces and historical sites in Pakistan, Uzbekistan, and Afghanistan (under renovation)
• ziadnumis. On Central and South Asian numismatics and ancient history, focusing on the Kashmir Smast (under renovation)

Refereed Unpublished Oral Presentations &/or Abstracts

• “Book Talk: In the Treasure Room of the Sakra King”, Silsila: Center for Material Histories lecture series, New York University, April, 2023.
• “Sufism and Sacrality”, Between Wilayah & Waqf: Sacrality, Sovereignty, and Society in Early Modern Central Asia, Princeton University, March, 2023.
• “Post-Custodial Archives from Sufi Shrines of the Afghan-Pakistan Frontier”, Middle East Librarians Association Social Justice Lecture Series, December, 2022.
• “The Enchanted Journey of Bibi Sahiba: Scholar-Saint of the Afghan Empire”, Alhamra Lecture Series, Lahore Arts Council, Lahore, December, 2022.
• “Book talk: Hidden Caliphate”, Allama Iqbal Open University, Faculty of Arabic & Islamic Studies, Islamabad, December, 2022.
• “Bibi Sahiba: The Female Scholar-Saint of the Afghan Empire”, Asian Study Group, Islamabad, December, 2022.
• “The Enchanted Journey of Bibi Sahiba: Scholar-Saint of the Afghan Empire”, introduced by Dr. Sayed Shafqat Ali Shah, former Sindh Education Minister, Mohatta Palace, Karachi, November, 2022.
• “Book talk: Hidden Caliphate”, UCLA CISA Speakers Series, October, 2022.
• “Book talk: In the Treasure Room of the Sakra King: Votive Coinage from Gandharan Shrines”, U.C. Irvine Interpreting Afghanistan Conference, October, 2022.
• Lecture: “The Extraordinary, Enchanted Journeys of a Female Sufi Saint from Kabul to Matiari”, University of Art, Design, and Heritages, Jamshoro, Sindh, June 2022.
• Keynote speaker for 19^th Annual Duke-UNC Middle East & Islamic Studies Graduate Student Conference, Space and Place: Religion, Politics, and Power in the Middle East. Introduction to Hidden Caliphate, March 2022.
• Book Launch: In the Treasure Room of the Sakra King: Votive Coinage from Gandharan Shrines”, UNC Persian Studies, December, 2021.
• “Writing Imami Sunni Sufism and Female Sainthood in the Afghan Empire”.  Genealogical History in the Persianate World – An International Symposium, The College of New Jersey and The Sharmin and Bijan Mossavar-Rahmani Center for Iran and Persian Gulf Studies, Princeton University. April, 2021.
• Book Launch: Connected Histories in Central Asia: 18^th-20^th centuries. Pre-publication book launch for Hidden Caliphate, hosted by the Sharmin and Bijan Mossavar-Rahmani Center for Iran and Persian Gulf Studies at Princeton University and the Association for the Study of Persianate Societies. March, 2021.
• “The extraordinary, enchanted journey of a Female Scholar-Saint in the Persianate World.” Persian Studies Program at UNC-Chapel Hill, Duke Islamic Studies. Online, July, 2020.
•  “Women’s Leadership in Sufi Orders of the Persianate World.” Sulook Series, May, 2020.
• “Brahmi on Umayyad Coppers, Kufic on Hindu Shah Coppers: Interpreting Numismatic
  Transculturation in 8^th-9^th Century Gandhara & the Kabul Valley.” Boris Kochnev Memorial Seminar on Iranian and Central Asian Numismatics, Hempstead, NY, March 2020.
• “From Qandahar to Mazar-i Sharif – Bibi Sahiba and the Women Scholar-Saints of the Mujaddidi Order.” University of Michigan, February, 2020.
• “Bibi Sahiba, ‘The Second Fatima’: Female Religious Leadership in 18th-19th Century Afghanistan.” University of North Florida, February, 2020.
• “Competing Orthodoxies in early 19th Century Peshawar.” American Anthropological Association, Vancouver, BC, November, 2019.
• “Re-Centering Las Bela: New Pedagogical Approaches to the Study of Sacred Space.” European Conference of Iranian Studies, Freie Universität Berlin, September, 2019.
• “The Doors of Perception: Accessing the Unseen in the Islamic Tradition.” Adab Festival Pakistan, Karachi, February, 2019.
• Director and presenter at “Re-centering Las Bela” symposium, Karachi, March 2018.
• “Bibi Sahiba at Qandahar, Kabul, Sindh, and Bukhara: Conceptualizing Female Religious Leadership in the Naqshbandi-Mujaddidi Sufi Order.” Association for the Study of Persianate Societies conference, Tblisi, Georgia, March, 2018.
• “Navigating Sindh and Central Asia through Kabul.” International Conference on Makli, Endowment Trust Fund, Makli, Sindh, January, 2018.
• “Hindustan or Mawarannahr kay Naqshbandi-Mujaddidi Hazarat.” Principle presenter (in Urdu) at Imam Rabbani conference, Lahore, Pakistan, November 2017. (With several hundred religious scholars and Sufis in attendance from Pakistan, Afghanistan, and Turkey.)
• “Mediating Bukhara’s 18th Century Revival through Peshawar.” Central Asian Renaissance in the History of World Civilization conference, Samarkand, Uzbekistan, August, 2017.
•  “Disturbances at Bareilli: Inter-Communal Moral Economy and Juristic-Saintly Authority in Early Colonial India.” Yale Law School Kamel Center, April 2017.
• “Revisiting the Kashmir Smast: Problematics of Circulation, Minting, Political Authority, and Evidence.” Boris Kochnev Memorial Seminar on Iranian and Central Asian Numismatics, Hempstead, NY, March 2017.
• “How Peshawar Revived Bukhara’s Sanctity.” Yale South Asian Studies Council, New Haven, CT, Feb. 2016.
• “Hazrat Fazl Ahmad of Peshawar.” Middle East Studies Association, Denver, CO, Nov. 2015.
• “The Remarkable Story of Hazrat Jio Sahib Peshawari (d. 1816).” SOAS, London, Invited Lecture, New Research on Central Asia and the Persianate World, Nov. 2015.
• “Jeo Sahib Mujaddidi: Mediating Bukhara’s 18th Century Revival through Peshawar.” Central Eurasian Studies Society Annual Conference, Washington, DC, Oct. 2015.
• “Latest Methods of Research in Oriental Studies.” Invited talk, Punjab University and Imam Rabbani Foundation, Lahore, May 2015.
• “The Transmission of Sufi Popular Authority in the Great Game Buffer States.” Middle East Studies Association Annual Conference, Washington, DC, Nov. 2014.
• “Hazrat Jeo Sahib: How Durrani Peshawar Revived Bukhara’s Sanctity.” From Sufis to Taliban: Trajectories of Islam in Afghanistan Conference, UCLA Program on Central Asia, Los Angeles, CA, Oct. 2014.
• “The Naqshbandi-Mujaddidiyya of Afghanistan and the Development of their Transregional Networks in the early 19th century.” The Persianate World: A Conceptual Inquiry Conference, Yale University, New Haven, CT, May 2014.
• “From Yarkand to Sindh via Kabul: The rise of Naqshbandi-Mujaddidi Sufi Networks amidst Political Fragmentation in 18th-19th Century Afghanistan.” Invited talk, NYU Hagob Kevorkian Center Research Workshops, New York, NY, Apr. 2014.
• “Of Lions, Elephants, Swans, and other Chronological Conundrums.” Boris Kochnev Memorial Seminar on Iranian and Central Asian Numismatics, Hempstead, NY, 2014.
• “Rethinking the Ghaznawid Invasion Narrative through New Numismatic Discoveries from the Pakistan-Afghanistan Frontier.” Invited lecture, Department of Religious Studies, Yale University, New Haven, CT, Nov. 2013.
• “Emerging Transregional Authority Amidst Political Fragmentation: The Mujaddidi Hazarat of Shor Bazaar, Kabul.” Middle East Studies Association Annual Conference, New Orleans, LA, 2013.
• “The Nezak – Turk Shahi Transition: Evidence from the Kashmir Smast (mid 7th c.).” Boris Kochnev Memorial Seminar on Iranian and Central Asian Numismatics, Hempstead, NY, 2013.
• “The Treasures of the Kashmir Smast: Reconstructing Gandhara and the Kabul Valley in Late Antiquity through Numismatic Evidence from a Saivate Cave Temple.” Center for South Asian Studies Lecture, Yale University, New Haven, CT, 2013.
• “Turk Shahi AE Fractionals from the Kashmir Smast: Political Geography and Numismatic History of Kapisa-Gandhara in the 7th-9th” Oriental Numismatic Society Annual Meeting, New York, NY, Jan. 2013.
• “Mosques, Madrasas, and Khaniqahs: Countering ‘Talibanization’ in Pakistan within a Religious Paradigm,” on the evolution of the Ahl-e Sunnah wa al-Jama’ah. Invited talk, Center for Middle East Studies, Yale University, New Haven, CT, Oct. 2012.
•  “‘The Disturbance at Bareilly’: Shared Religious Authority and Collective Action in Pre-Communal Hindustan.” Middle East Studies Association Annual Conference, Washington, DC, Dec. 2011.
• “Islamic coins from a Hindu Temple: Habbarid and Ghaznawid AE Fractionals from the Kashmir Smast, Gandhara.” Boris Kochnev Memorial Seminar on Iranian and Central Asian Numismatics, Hempstead, NY, Mar. 2011.
• “Deconstructing Fundamentalist Politics in South Asia.” Columbia Political Union, Columbia University, New York, NY, Apr. 2006.
• “The Ideological Metamorphosis of the Deoband movement.” Islam in the Modern Day Colloquium Lecture, Yale University, New Haven, CT, Apr. 2002.

Selected Lectures on Contemporary Issues

• “Promoting Peace and Stability in Afghanistan and Pakistan.” Christopher Newport University, Newport News, VA, Apr. 2015.
• “Countering Violent Extremism in Pakistan: Opportunities and Obstacles for Civil Society.” Woodrow Wilson Center, Washington DC, Feb. 2015.
• Co-chaired roundtable discussion with senior US policymakers and academics on roadmap for engaging civil society in peacebuilding. Brookings, Washington, DC, Feb. 2015.
• Co-convener and co-chair, Empowering Pakistan’s Civil Society to Counter Violent Extremism Working Group. 2014 Brookings U.S.-Islamic World Forum, Doha, Qatar, Jun. 2014.
•  “Civil Society in Afghanistan: Spark or Stumbling Block for Stability?” Woodrow Wilson Center, Washington DC, Feb. 2014.
• “Leveraging Civil Society in Afghanistan.” Center for Strategic and International Studies, Washington, DC, Feb. 2014.
• “Developing the Federally Administered Tribal Areas.” USAID, Washington, DC, Dec. 2009.
• with Director General for Peace Now, Yariv Oppenheimer. Muslim-Jewish Relations from a Historical Perspective.  McGill University / Concordia University, Montreal, QC, Nov. 2006.
• “Analyzing the Relationship between Muslims, the West and the Jewish People.” Islam’s Global Impact Conference, Palm Beach, FL, Jan. 2006.

Other, including book reviews and other products of scholarship

• “Review of the Peshawar University Library, Pakistan.” Dissertation Reviews, 2016.
• “Review of the Iqbal Mujaddidi Collection, Punjab University.” Dissertation Reviews, 2016.
• Review of The Divine Flood: Ibrahim Niasse and the Roots of Twentieth-Century Sufi Revival, by Rudiger Seesemann. Comparative Islamic Studies Vol. 9, No. 1 (2015), 122-125.
• “A Review of the National Archives, Kabul, Afghanistan.” Dissertations Reviews, 2015.
• “A Review of the Ganj Bakhsh Library, Iran-Pakistan Institute of Persian Studies, Islamabad, Pakistan.” Dissertation Reviews, 2014.
• Review of Revealed Grace: The Juristic Sufism of Ahmad Sirhindi, by Arthur Buehler. Der Islam Volume 89 1/2 (2012), 188-193.

GRANTS (as principal investigator)

• Recipient of Institute for the Arts and Humanities Faculty Fellowship for Fall, 2022
• Primary Investigator for “Endangered Archives from Sufi Shrines of the Afghan-Pakistan Frontier,” with UNC Religious Studies, and UNC Library. 2020-2021 Modern Endangered Archives Program, through UCLA. Accepted July, 2021. $50,000 for 2-year project. 20% Effort.
  • Grant to catalogue and digitize endangered archives of Sufi monasteries and shrines within the Pashtun tribal regions on the Pakistan-Afghanistan frontier. These are unexplored collections revealing a rich sacred tradition in a region embroiled in one of the most brutal conflicts in recent history. We are working at four religious sites in Waziristan, Peshawar, and Malakand. Using a post-custodial model, the project empowers local stakeholders to preserve their collections, trains them in digitization and cataloguing, and builds preservation infrastructure for sustainable community-driven archiving.
  • Featured article: (Preserving endangered manuscripts – College Arts & Sciences Magazine (unc.edu)
• International Dissertation Research Fellowship, Social Science Research Council, For archival research in US, UK, Uzbekistan, Pakistan (Sindh, Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa). 2014-2015. $19,500.
• MacMillan Dissertation Fellowship, 2014-15. $19,000.
• American Institute of Pakistan Studies, For research at al-Beruni Institute of Oriental Studies, Tashkent. 2014. $15,000.
• Smith Richardson World Politics and Statecraft Fellowship, For research in UK, Uzbekistan. 2014. $7,500.
• MacMillan Center South Asian Summer Research and Language Study Award, For historical research in eight provinces of Afghanistan, 2013. $5,000
• MacMillan Pre-Dissertation Grant, 2012. Research at Afghanistan Archives; British Library. $5,000.
• Oxford Barakat Trust Award, 2013. Documenting khanaqahs (Sufi monasteries), Afghanistan. ₤2,000.
• Oxford Barakat Trust Award, 2012. Documenting khanaqahs in Pakistan and digitizing manuscripts. ₤2,000.
• MacMillan Center South Asian Summer Research and Language Study Award, 2012. For numismatic research in the Pakistan-Afghanistan frontier. $3,000.
• Sutherland and George H. Douglas Fellowship, 2010-11.
• MacMillan Center South Asian Summer Research and Language Study Award, 2011. For research on Naqshbandi Sufism in Pakistan and Indo-Persian studies. $4,000.
• Richter Fellowship, Yale, 2002. Arabic Language Study at American University of Cairo. $2,000.
• Linck Summer Fellowship, Yale, 2001. For research on politics of the Middle East. $2,000.

PROFESSIONAL SERVICE

The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill

• NC Consortium for the Middle East board member (2023)
• Media and Communication committee (2023)
• Undergraduate Studies committee (2019-2023)
• Organizing member for Persian Studies at UNC-Chapel Hill (2021)
• Religious Studies library liaison (2020-2021)
• Organizing member of the UNC-Chapel Hill Central Asia Working Group (2020-2021)
• Islamic Studies hiring committee (2019-2020)
• Donor relations

Service for the Academic Field

• Organizing committee member for Poullada Symposium Between Wilayah & Waqf: Sacrality, Sovereignty, and Society in Early Modern Central Asia, Princeton University (2023)
• Editorial Board Member, book series, Sources on Persianate History (Brill), with Abbas Amanat (2020-2023)
• Librarians, Sufis, and historians community building on the Pakistan-Afghanistan frontier (2021-2023)
  • The endangered archive grant for which I have applied with UNC Library required building a community of librarians, bibliophiles, local scholars, Sufis, and historians in the border regions between Afghanistan and Pakistan, long isolated and deprived of resources for archiving, preservation, cataloguing, and digitization.
• Treasurer, Association for the Study of Persianate Societies (2018-2021)
• Article and book peer reviews (2021)
  • Peer review of two journal articles for Journal of the Economic and Social History of the Orient.
  • Peer review of journal article for Afghanistan.
  • Peer review of book for Cambridge University Press.
• Launched interdisciplinary Comparative Liberal Studies program, the centerpiece major of Habib University in Karachi. (2019)
• Created Sacred Geographies multi-disciplinary field-based course, partnering with Las Bela Agricultural University in Balochistan, a pioneering project in the region. (2017-2019)
• Designed and implemented first critically oriented Islamic Studies curriculum in higher education, Pakistan, Habib University & Las Bela Agricultural University, Balochistan. (2017-2019)

Language Study

• English (native speaker)
• Urdu (native speaker)
• Persian, Dari, and 18th-19th century Indo-Persian (advanced study)
• Arabic (advanced study)
• French (advanced study)
• Romanian (intermediate)
• Uzbek & Chaghatai (intermediate)
• Sindhi (intermediate)
• Middle Brahmi, Bactrian, Sarada, Archaic Kufic (Numismatic epigraphy)