Berkley Center

Zainab Alwani is the founding director of the Islamic Studies program at Howard University School of Divinity, where she is associate professor of Islamic studies and chair of the Religious Studies Master of Arts program. Her research focuses on Qur'anic studies, Islamic jurisprudence, the relationship between civil and religious law in the area of family, women and gender, and interreligious relations. A prolific author in both Arabic and English, her publications include Implementation of Maqasid al Shariah: Marriage and Divorce in American Muslim Family (2013, in Arabic) and “Religion, Gender, And Family Law: Critical Perspectives On Integration For Western-Muslims” in Applying Sharia in the West (2013). She is the first female jurist to serve on the board of the Fiqh Council of North America and currently serves as the council’s vice-chair. She received her Ph.D. in Islamic sciences from the International Islamic University in Malaysia.