Mafaz Al-Suwaidan

Mafaz Al-Suwaidan (Arabic: مفاز السويدان) is a Kuwaiti American academic and current doctoral candidate at Harvard University. She is also a producer and writer for American Muslims (2024),^[1][2] a PBS film series of short documentary films.^[3]

Al-Suwaidan was born in Oklahoma and spent some of her youth in Kuwait and Canada.^[4][5] Her father is Islamic author, Tareq Al-Suwaidan, who is also a leader of Kuwait's Muslim Brotherhood.^[6]

In 2010, she married Kuwaiti singer-songwriter Humood Alkhudher,^[7] but they later separated.^[8]

Al-Suwaidan received her undergraduate degree in journalism from Toronto Metropolitan University (formerly Ryerson University) in 2011.^[9] She then worked briefly as a journalist in Kuwait.^[10][11] In 2016, she received her Master of Fine Arts (MFA) degree from Emerson College, in Boston, Massachusetts.^[12][5]

She earned a Master of Theological Study (MTS) degree from Harvard Divinity School in 2018.^[13] She is currently a PhD candidate at Harvard University in Philosophy of Religion, focused on Islam and Modern Thought, with a secondary degree in African and African American Studies. She is also a member of the university's Committee on the Study of Religion.^[14]

She has been named as Dorothy Porter & Charles Harris Wesley Fellow for 2024–2025 by the Hutchins Center for African and African American Research.^[15] In Fall 2025, she joins as a Fellow at the Abdallah S. Kamel Center for the Study of Islamic Law and Civilization at Yale Law School.^[16]

Al-Suwaidan is and has long been a supporter of social justice, human rights, and specifically, Palestinian liberation, in relation to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.^[17]

She has participated in conversations and writings about racism in the Arab world in context of the Black Lives Matter movement.^[18][19] She started the #ArabsForBlackLives campaign with Egyptian-American community organizer, Rana Abdel Hamid, about how Arabs can work to fight against anti-Black racism.^[20][21]

In 2021, when philosopher Cornel West had threatened to (and eventually did) leave Harvard after his request for tenure was denied; Al-Suwaidan, who had trained with West as a master's student, organized a letter of support for him, which was signed by more than 60 other doctoral candidates.^[22]

She was one of the representatives of HGSU-UAW who wrote a letter in February 2024 to Shawn Fain, president of the United Auto Workers (UAW), on behalf of the UAW Arab Caucus, demanding the union divest from Israel.^[23]

In March 2024, a Lowell House panel discussion on Islamophobia and antisemitism featuring Al-Suwaidan, Rabbi Professor Shaul Magid, and Madeline J. Levy (a PhD student) was planned to take place. However, the event was cancelled after Al-Suwaidan, Lowell House Faculty Deans, and the Edmond and Lily Safra Center for Ethics withdrew. ^[24][25]

In July 2025, Al-Suwaidan spoke at a sold-out event with Aymann Ismail discussing his memoir, "Becoming Baba," which is about Muslim parenthood in the United States.^[16]