Shaista Aziz Patel

Shaista Aziz Patel is a scholar of Critical Muslim Studies in the Department of Ethnic Studies at the University of California, San Diego (UCSD), where she has been since 2018. She holds a PhD in Social Justice Education from the University of Toronto and a graduate Certificate in Women and Gender Studies. Her research focuses on intersections of colonialism, race, caste, gender, religion, capitalism, and labor relations, with an emphasis on decolonial theory and solidarity movements in Palestine, North America, and Kashmir. She critiques non-Black, non-Indigenous POC complicity in settler colonialism and white/Brahminical supremacies.

Patel has published in journals such as Theory & Event, Cultural Studies, and Critical Ethnic Studies Journal, and co-edited the upcoming book Contestations and Compromise: Reading against Multiple Colonialities, Race, and Caste in the University (University of Alberta Press, 2025). She teaches undergraduate and graduate courses on critical Muslim studies, caste studies, and cultural/social movements.