Dr. Iqbal Akhtar

Dr. Iqbal Akhtar is an esteemed scholar with a dual appointment in the Department of Politics & International Relations and Religious Studies at Florida International University (FIU). He earned his PhD from the University of Edinburgh’s New College School of Divinity, focusing on the history of the Khōjā of Tanzania, an Indic Muslim merchant caste in East Africa. His research interests lie in reconstructing the 18th-century religious cosmology of the Sindhi Khōjā, which forms a key part of his current interdisciplinary work at FIU towards developing a comprehensive Muslim Studies program. This ongoing initiative positions Khōjā Studies as a vital area of international scholarly cooperation.

Dr. Akhtar’s teaching repertoire at FIU includes courses such as The International Relations of South Asia, Development of International Relations Thought, Gender and Jihad in the Quran, Islam and International Relations, Islamic Faith and Society, Islamic Political Thought, and Sufism: Islamic Mysticism.

His areas of expertise span Khōjā Studies, Western Indian Ocean Studies, transnational histories, Sindhi and Gujarati Islamic literature, postcolonial thought, and broader Islamic studies. Dr. Akhtar holds a BA in Political Science from Washington University (2002), an MA in Political Science from Tulane University (2004), an MA in Religious Studies from the University of Denver (2008), and a PhD from the University of Edinburgh (2012). Some of his published works can be accessed on Academia.