I am an academic based in London, and I am currently researching and writing about securitisation, race and Muslim life. My work is grounded in critical geography and aims to challenge dominant narratives around security and citizenship through engaged, interdisciplinary scholarship. I am currently teaching at LSE, where I work on an interdisciplinary module which looks at the social and political nature of Artificial Intelligence.
Latest Publications
“Through a call for the recognition of radical geography which embraces a decolonial framework, this intervention highlights the need for the discipline to re-imagine how knowledge can be produced outside the narrow parameters of the institution, while centring and nurturing dynamics of friendship and care.”
Researching Extremism and Risky Material
In this podcast episode, inspired by Dr Shereen Fernandez’s Identities article, ‘When counter-extremism ‘sticks’: the circulation of the Prevent Duty in the school space’ (2024), as well as in response to recent developments in and debates around extremism and terrorism, Islamophobia and free speech in the UK and more broadly, Identities co-editor Dr Aaron Winter, Dr Fernandez and Dr Rizwaan Sabir will discuss their experiences and the challenges of researching racism, counterextremism and counterterrorism. The discussion will cover a range of issues, including researcher identity and academic freedom, with a focus on the specific challenges and implications of handling primary documents associated with extremism and terrorism which may be seen as ‘hostile’ to the security state. The latter being something that all three have written about and was the focus of Dr Sabir’s The Suspect: Counterterrorism, Islam, and the Security State where he reflects on his experiences with this.
upcoming Events
Upcoming talk on 16th May [online]
Secrecy and Redaction in the War on Terror
Secrecy played a defining role in shaping surveillance practices and policing during the War on Terror. The haunting photos from the 2004 Abu Ghraib prison scandal is one way in which we can understand how secrecy functioned in the War on Terror, as only through the publication of the photos was the extent of torture and abuse of Iraqi prisoners made public knowledge. Other ways in which secrecy was maintained during the War on Terror was through the operation of ‘black site’ prisons, where those suspected of terrorism were detained beyond public scrutiny and legal oversight as well as the detention of almost a thousand Muslim men at Guantánamo Bay (GTMO) prison, where key information about detainee treatment was deliberately withheld. Additionally, heavily redacted policies by the US administration conceals the extent of state actions under the guise of national security. In this talk, I explore the political function of redaction, arguing that it is used as a mechanism of secrecy and a tool of invisibility. Drawing on the autobiographical account of former GTMO detainee Mohamedou Ould Slahi, I examine how redaction was used to shield interrogators who engaged in torture, obscuring both individual accountability and the broader structures of state violence.
