WASHINGTON, February 20, 2018 – The Arab Gulf States Institute in Washington is pleased to announce that Alanoud Al-Sharekh has joined the institute as a non-resident fellow.
Al-Sharekh has enjoyed an extensive career in consulting and scholarly research. She is currently a consulting partner at Ibtkar Strategic Consultancy and a research associate at the London Middle East Institute at the School of Oriental and African Studies at the University of London. She serves as chairperson of the “Friends Who Care” project in Kuwait, as well as the Abolish 153 campaign, the winner of the 2016 European Union Chaillot Prize for Human Rights. In addition, she held research and consultancy positions at the LMEI, the Supreme Council for Development and Planning in Kuwait, UNIFEM, Freedom House, and the United Nations Development Programme, and was a strategy advisor at the International Institute for Strategic Studies. In 2014, her research won the Arab Prize for best publication in a foreign journal and includes books such as The Gulf Family: Kinship Policies and Modernity and Popular and Political Cultures of the GCC. Her dedication to improving women’s rights in the region earned her knighthood of the National Order of Merit by the French government in 2016. A Fulbright scholar on Women and Islam at Whittier College, she earned her PhD and master’s from SOAS and a BA from King’s College, London. Her teaching posts include Kuwait University, Gulf University of Science and Technology, and the Arab Open University, and she is a visiting lecturer at Uppsala University, Sweden.
“I am very pleased to be joining AGSIW as a non-resident fellow,” said Al-Sharekh. “I appreciate the institute’s emphasis on researchers who are either from the Arabian Gulf or those who have been immersed in Arabian Gulf studies and have spent a considerable amount of time in the region. It is great to have a platform for voices from the GCC in Washington, DC.”
Ambassador Marcelle M. Wahba welcomed Alanoud Al-Sharekh to AGSIW: “Alanoud is a great addition to our team of scholars with her outstanding academic standing in the Gulf, Europe, and the United States, plus she is recognized as a leading champion for women’s rights in the Middle East.”
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The Arab Gulf States Institute in Washington (AGSIW), launched in 2015, is an independent, nonprofit institution dedicated to increasing the understanding and appreciation of the social, economic, and political diversity of the Gulf Arab states. Through expert research, analysis, exchanges, and public discussion, the institute seeks to encourage thoughtful debate and inform decision makers shaping U.S. policy regarding this critical geostrategic region.
