Dr. Saleena Saleem is a political sociologist with a regional focus on Asia. Her research and teaching interests are on topics at the intersection of race, religion, gender, politics, and society in Asia. Her research focuses on understanding the causes, processes, and consequences of low social trust, political polarization, and social divisions in multiracial and multireligious urbanizing societies, with aims to reduce societal mistrust and promote cross cultural understandings through inclusive human-centered policy solutions. She is currently working on a monograph tentatively titled Unity in Diversity: Navigating Faith and Secularism in Southeast Asia, which looks at how secular and religious civil society women’s groups in multiracial societies can build trust and cooperate on social problems in contexts of political polarization and religious nationalism. She is also co-editing a book volume on political sectarianism, with comparative case studies from Southeast Asia, South Asia, and the Middle East.
Dr. Saleena’s recent work has been published in various academic journals including Religion, State and Society, Sociology of Islam, Asia Maior, and Global Policy. She has published policy relevant commentaries in the Foreign Policy Centre (UK) and the Asia and the Pacific Policy Society (Australian National University). She co-edited a Special Issue on “Sectarianisation in Southeast Asia and Beyond” that was published in Religion, State and Society in 2021. She provides expert commentary to multinational and Asian media outlets including Channel News Asia, South China Morning Post, The Straits Times, and Berita Harian.
Dr. Saleena was a Visiting Assistant Professor in the Department of Sociology at Boston University, and a Research Affiliate at the Frederick S. Pardee School of Global Studies, Institute on Culture, Religion and World Affairs at Boston University (2023-2024). She has held research positions at the Institute of Defence and Strategic Studies, S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies, Nanyang Technological University, and at the Centre for Asia and Globalisation, Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy, National University of Singapore.
She earned her Ph.D. in Sociology from the University of Liverpool’s Department of Sociology, Social Policy, and Criminology in 2023. She also holds a Master’s in Political Science from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and a Master’s in Business and Economics Journalism from Boston University.
To invite Dr. Saleena to contribute an opinion editorial or expert commentary for your media outlet, or to arrange a lecture or workshop at your institution or organization, please contact her at sbsaleem(at)bu.edu.