As UC Berkeley Global Studies chair, Elora Shehabuddin promotes a strong and supportive academic community for her faculty colleagues and students. From learning about foreign policy decisions to climate change and resource conflicts, Global Studies students gain in-depth knowledge about the world around them.
Born in Pakistan, and raised in Europe and the Middle East, Shehabuddin brings a range of perspectives to the Global Studies program. She also serves as a Cal professor and equity advisor in Gender & Women Studies and director of the Subir and Malini Chowdhury Center for Bangladesh Studies.
Shehabuddin earned her A.B. in Social Studies from Harvard University and a Ph.D. in Politics from Princeton University. She worked at UC Irvine and Rice University before joining UC Berkeley in 2022, where she continues her research on Muslim Bengali women’s activism in different arenas.
Professor Shehabuddin recently spoke to Berkeley Social Sciences about her academic career. The interview has been edited for clarity.
Can you share more about your background and what led you to Cal?
Elora Shehabuddin: Let me go all the way back. I was born in Pakistan, but both my parents are from Chittagong in southeastern Bangladesh. I grew up mostly in Europe and the Middle East and came to the U.S. for the first time in order to attend college. My first academic job was at UC Irvine, but I moved to Rice University after two years, and spent over two decades there. I started at UC Berkeley in July 2022.
I was drawn to Cal because of its reputation, sheer scale, faculty, staff and students. In addition, it includes the only university center dedicated to Bangladesh studies in North America. Given my research and teaching interests, it seemed like the right move at the right time.
What does your research focus on?
Elora Shehabuddin: My research has focused on Muslim Bengali women’s activism, in relation to formal politics, legal reform, development and feminism. In my recent and current projects, I’ve tried to broaden the scope of these long standing interests across time and space by looking at both the deeper history of South Asian women’s activism and the complex network of international (or transnational) connections forged by these activists.
What inspired you to lead the Global Studies program?
Elora Shehabuddin: My appointment at Cal is split between Gender and Women’s Studies and Global Studies – so, at one level, it’s understood that we will all take turns stepping into such roles. At the same time, I see administrative work of this kind — I became director of the Chowdhury Center at the start of my second year on campus and was asked to lead Global Studies starting in my third year — as a really good way to learn about the institution and to meet colleagues from other units. I still feel like the new person at most meetings but I’m learning a lot every day.
Global Studies, specifically, appealed to me as an institutional home because it is both interdisciplinary and, yes, “global!” I appreciated my own undergraduate training in an interdisciplinary program (called Social Studies) and the freedom it afforded me to choose my classes and focus. Also, although I’ve now been in the U.S. for many years at this point, I did live and attend schools in several countries. So I also appreciate the importance of looking at something seemingly familiar from different perspectives.
What does an average day look like for you as Global Studies Chair?
Elora Shehabuddin: Mostly a lot of emails and meetings! But it’s been really lovely to have this opportunity to get to know my GS colleagues better, and to work with them on ways to make the undergrad and grad programs stronger and more meaningful for both students and faculty. It isn’t a traditional discipline, so the students who become GS majors, minors or master's students are here because they want to be here. They are a pretty dedicated and special group! We want to be able to regularly offer the classes they need and want to offer financial support for those who want to do independent research.
What kind of skills do you think Global Studies students gain?
Elora Shehabuddin: Global Studies offers undergraduate students the chance to gain in-depth knowledge about a particular part of the world, including learning a relevant language, while also specializing in a certain track, like Societies and Cultures, Development, or Peace and Conflict Studies. But they also have to take classes that push them to think of themselves as citizens of the world and that complicate connections between their own lives and those of people around the world — whether through the climate crisis, our government’s foreign policy decisions, or the clothes and food they consume.
Could you describe an experience, book or individual that has impacted your perspective on global issues?
Elora Shehabuddin: It’s hard for me to name just one. I’d say my personal background, my life experiences, my own research in transnational feminist activism, as well as the courses I teach, have all helped to shape how I view the world and my place in it.