Meriem El Haitami

Visiting Scholar (Fall 2021)

Meriem El Haitami is an Assistant Professor specializing in Gender and Religion at l’Université Internationale de Rabat in Morocco, and the Morocco-based PI for a 3-year project entitled « Gender, Politics and Critique in the MENA: Towards a Critical History of Feminism, 1970s until Today » and conducted jointly by the University of Zurich, Birzeit University and the International University of Rabat. Her research explores trends of Islamic feminism in post-2003 Morocco, gender perspectives in preventing and countering violent extremism and the role of women in state religious policy and Islamic scholarship. She has been awarded numerous research fellowships including the American Academy of Religion Award and the Global Religion Research Initiative to pursue collaborative research on Morocco’s deradicalisation processes, as well as the reshaping of urban subjectivities through the reinvention of Sufism in Morocco. Her most recent research explores the surge of new spiritualities in Morocco and the role of women in shaping new expressions of female and gender subjectivity outside of institutional Islam.