• Islamic Law
• Human Rights
• Cross-cultural Perspectives

ABDULLAHI AN-NA'IM
EMORY LAW SCHOOL
404-727-1198
aannaim@law.emory.edu

Abdullahi An-Na'im, (pronounced Ab-doo-LA-hee An-Nigh-EEM), is the Charles Howard Candler Professor of Law and a fellow of Emory's Law and Religion Program. He also serves as director of the Religion and Human Rights Program at the Emory Law School. He is an internationally recognized scholar of Islam and human rights, and human rights in cross-cultural perspectives.

A scholar, activist and reformer, An-Na'im has been called the "Martin Luther of modern Islam." A practicing Muslim, An-Na'im was jailed in the 1980s for his views while working as an attorney and university professor in his native Sudan.

In exile from Sudan since that time, An-Na'im is a prolific scholar and advocate in this country, but the impact of his work is international. At Emory since 1995, he has directed a series of multi-year, international research projects funded by the Ford Foundation on women and land rights in Africa, a 40-nation study of Islamic family law involving hundreds of scholars, and a new human rights and Islam fellowship program.

The fellowship program will support nine scholars doing research on the relationship between Islam and human rights. The first Ford Fellows were in residence this past year. The goal is to bring Muslim scholars and activists from around the world together to develop human rights scholarship and advocacy strategies.

In his role as a senior fellow for Emory's new Center for the Interdisciplinary Study of Religion, An-Na'im is taking on major explorations of Islamic family law. He will publish two books under the project's research theme of "Marriage, Sex and Family Among the Religions of the Book." The first will be "The Future of Family Law in Islamic Societies," followed by "Islamic Family Law in a Changing World: A Global Resource Book."

Prior to joining the faculty of the Emory Law School, An-Na'im was the executive director of Human Rights/Africa from 1993 to 1995. He taught at the University of Khartoum, Sudan, until 1985. He also served in visiting scholar positions at the UCLA School of Law, the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars, the University of Saskatchewan in Canada, Uppsala University in Sweden, and the Ford Foundation Office for the Middle East and North Africa.

An-Na'im earned his M.A. from the University of Cambridge in England, and his Ph.D. in law from the University of Edinburgh in Scotland.