Eliz Sanasarian is an Associate Professor of Political Science at USC and considered one of the foremost authorities on Iranian politics. She has been awarded USC’s President’s Circle Faculty award for outstanding merit in the areas of teaching, research and service. In addition to serving in different capacities at various scholarly organizations, she was elected by the membership to the Council of the Society for Iranian Studies, the principal academic organization of scholars and researchers involved in the study of Iran in North America. She is consulted widely by public and private institutions in and outside the U.S. on various issues concerning Iran and has served as member of the Board of Directors of several major academic and non-academic organizations.
She is the author of numerous publications on a wide range of topics including genocide, Ayatollah Khomeini, the Islamic Republican Government, women, and religious and ethnic minorities in Iran and Islam. Her publications have appeared in the Holocaust and Genocide Studies Journal, Diaspora, Oxford Encyclopedia of the Modern Islamic World, Natural Resources Journal, and Journal of Developing Societies. Her first book, The Women’s Rights Movement in Iran is considered a pioneering study in the field. Her second book, Religious Minorities in Iran was published in 2000 by Cambridge university Press. The New York Times called the book “important” and “indispensable” and the Times Literary Supplement (London) referred to the book as “absorbing … rare and valuable.”
