Samar Al-Bulushi is a non-resident fellow at the Quincy Institute and Associate Professor of Anthropology at University of California, Irvine. Her research lies at the intersection of feminist geopolitics, race, militarism, imperialism, and transnational solidarities, with a primary regional focus on East Africa and the Red Sea arena. Her book, War-Making as World-Making: Kenya, the United States, and the War on Terror (Stanford University Press, 2024), documents the human impact of counter-terror policies in Kenya, where US-trained Kenyan police have been complicit in disappearances and extrajudicial killings.

Al-Bulushi is a member of the editorial committee for MERIP (Middle East Research and Information Project) and has published in a variety of public outlets on topics ranging from the International Criminal Court to the militarization of U.S. policy in Africa. Her writing and interviews have appeared in The Intercept, Teen Vogue, Democracy Now!, Africa is a Country, The Guardian, Al-Jazeera, Pambazuka, Review of African Political Economy, and Warscapes.

Al-Bulushi received her BA at Columbia University, her MA from Columbia’s School of International and Public Affairs, and her PhD in anthropology from Yale University.