Khalid Anis Ansari, Visiting Scholar

Khalid Anis Ansari (he/him) is a researcher, edu­ca­tor, and pas­sion­ate advo­cate of the anti-caste Pas­man­da Move­ment with­in Indi­an Mus­lims. Khalid’s pri­ma­ry research per­tains to social and cul­tur­al the­o­ry, focus­ing on democ­ra­cy and coun­ter­publics, soci­ol­o­gy of caste and reli­gion, minor­i­ty stud­ies, and pub­lic pol­i­cy. He served as Asso­ciate Pro­fes­sor and Direc­tor, Ambed­kar Cen­tre for Exclu­sion Stud­ies & Trans­for­ma­tive Action (ACESTA) at Glo­cal Uni­ver­si­ty (India), where he taught social anthro­pol­o­gy for over eight years. Before join­ing aca­d­e­mics, he worked in lead­er­ship posi­tions in the social sec­tor for 10+ years. He coor­di­nat­ed research and com­mu­ni­ty devel­op­ment projects sup­port­ed by inter­na­tion­al agen­cies such as the HIVOS (the Nether­lands), Mensen Met Een Missie (the Nether­lands), Action Aid (UK), and the Gand­hi Foun­da­tion (Unit­ed King­dom). 

Khalid has pub­lished wide­ly in reput­ed aca­d­e­m­ic jour­nals and pop­u­lar spaces like the Eco­nom­ic & Polit­i­cal Week­ly, Crit­i­cal Phi­los­o­phy of Race, The Women Philoso­phers’ Jour­nal (UNESCO), The Indi­an Express, The Hin­du, The Print, Out­look, The Wire, and so on. Besides, he has deliv­ered invit­ed talks at promi­nent uni­ver­si­ties like Michi­gan Uni­ver­si­ty (US), Har­vard Uni­ver­si­ty (US), the Uni­ver­si­ty of Free State (South Africa), the Uni­ver­si­ty of Human­is­tic Stud­ies (the Nether­lands), and so on. Since 2021, he has also been a research part­ner with Simag­ine (Social Imag­i­nar­ies between Sec­u­lar­i­ty and Reli­gion in a Glob­al­iz­ing World). This research con­sor­tium includes eleven part­ner insti­tu­tions from Europe, the USA, and South Africa.

Khalid holds two Master’s degrees, MBA (Human Resource Man­age­ment) and MA (Soci­ol­o­gy), and a Ph.D. in inte­grat­ed social sci­ences from the Uni­ver­si­ty of Human­is­tic Stud­ies (UvH), the Nether­lands. He can be reached at khalidanisansari@gmail.com.