Shilan Fuad

Shilan Fuad Hussain is an interdisciplinary Kurdish academic, researcher, and analyst specializing in socio-cultural studies and gender studies. Her work focuses on the intersection of sociology and cultural analysis, with a specific emphasis on women's rights, the Kurdish diaspora, and Middle Eastern society.

Early life and education Hussain grew up in Baghdad, Iraq. As a child, her parents forbid her from telling people she was Kurdish or speaking Kurdish in public; she began learning Arabic at age six, when she began school. She lived through multiple periods of conflict, including the Iran–Iraq War and the Gulf War, leaving Baghdad for northern Iraq in the hours after the Gulf War began. She later moved to Europe as part of the Kurdish diaspora, an experience that shaped her academic focus on cultural and political debates.

Hussain holds a master's degree in Middle Eastern Studies from the University of Bologna and a PhD in Cultural Analysis from the University of Urbino in Italy.