Deniz Kandiyoti is Emeritus Professor of Development Studies at SOAS, University of London. She pioneered new research into comparative perspectives on patriarchy and on the implications of global governance, Islam and state policies for the politics of gender in Turkey, post-Soviet Central Asia and Afghanistan. 2011-2015 she monitored the effects of the Arab uprisings (as guest editor for 50.50 Open Democracy) analysing new forms of gender-based violence and grass-roots mobilization.

Nadje Al-Ali is Robert Family Professor of International Studies and Professor of Anthropology and Middle East Studies at Brown University. Her main research interests and publications revolve around feminist activism in the Middle East; transnational migration and diaspora mobilization; war, conflict and reconstruction; art & cultural studies and food. Her publications include Iraqi Women: Untold Stories from 1948 to the Present (2007, Zed Books); What kind of liberation? Women and the Occupation of Iraq (2009, with Nicola Pratt, University of California Press) and Secularism, Gender and the State in the Middle East: The Egyptian women's movement (2000, CUP). Her co-edited book with Deborah al-Najjar entitled We are Iraqis: Aesthetics & Politics in a Time of War (Syracuse University Press) won the 2014 Arab-American book prize for non-fiction. Her more recent research and publications focus on the Turkish-Kurdish conflict and the Kurdish women's movement. She has been a member of the Feminist Review Collective, and is on the editorial board of Kohl: a journal of body and gender research. Prof Al-Ali has been involved in several feminist organizations and campaigns, including being a founding member of Act Together: Women's Action for Iraq, in addition to her involvement in trade union activism.

Kathryn Spellman Poots is Associate Professor at Aga Khan University's Institute for the Study of Muslim Civilizations in London and Visiting Associate Professor at Columbia University and Academic Program Director for the MA in Islamic Studies. Her research interests include Muslims in Europe and North America, the Iranian diaspora, transnational migration and gender studies.