Claudia Derichs

Claudia Derichs is a Professor at the Department of Asian and African Studies, Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin, specializing in transregional Islamic studies, social movements, and gender politics. Her research spans Southeast Asia, the MENA region, and Japan, focusing on political activism, knowledge production, and comparative analysis of authoritarian regimes.

• Key Fields: Transregional Islamic movements, women under Muslim law(s), social movement theory, gender and development.
• Education: PhD on Japan’s New Left (1994), informed by fieldwork in the 1980s/90s.

Recent Publications highlight global 1960s activism, kinship in political analysis, and decolonizing knowledge. Her 2017 monograph critiques Western Area Studies and advocates transregional connectivities. Articles include analyses of digital media’s role in Malaysia’s political reform (2000s) and contributions to the Routledge Handbook of the Global Sixties (2018).

Scientific Awards include a senior fellowship at the Centre for Global Cooperation Studies (Duisburg-Essen, 2017). She actively supervises PhD students and participates in international conferences, such as on epistemic decolonization (2019) and transnational women’s movements.