Zareena Grewal

Zareena A. Grewal is a historical anthropologist and documentary filmmaker. She is an associate professor at Yale College and the author of a 2013 ethnography on Islam in the United States.

Grewal is an associate professor of American studies, ethnicity, race, and migration, and religious studies at Yale College. In 2004, she directed and produced her debut film, By the Dawn’s Early Light: Chris Jackson’s Journey to Islam. In 2013, Grewal authored her first book, Islam is a Foreign Country: American Muslims and the Global Crisis of Authority. The ethnography won a Victor Turner Prize [ar]. In October 2023, she gained national attention due to tweets expressing support for violent action taken by the militant Palestinian group Hamas. In response, a student led petition to terminate Grewal garnered more than 40,000 signatures.