I am a historian of environment, capitalism, and empire across the Caribbean, Atlantic, and Indian Ocean worlds. My dissertation examines how “reefs” in the 20th century were understood and commodified through the logics of science, law, and political economy. Even today, the Great Barrier Reef functions culturally as a metonym for all coral reefs. But in truth, most of the world’s reefs remained unmapped or unknown until advancements in satellite and multispectral imaging occurred in the late 20th and early 21st centuries. How, then, did historical actors see and use these coastal and marine formations in the political and economic projects that shaped their worlds? My work focuses on Belize, Sri Lanka, the Gulf of Mexico, and the Philippines in the context of the global projection of North American power before and after the end of formal empire. My work has been supported by grants and fellowships from the Macmillan Center, South Asia Studies Council, the Franke Program in Science and the Humanities, the Overbrook Foundation, and the Marine Biological Laboratory, as well as initiatives and colloquia at various universities. See more about my research here.

Originally from Lahore, Pakistan, I conducted my undergraduate work at the Lahore University of Management Sciences (LUMS). I’m a journalist, essayist, and critic and the founder, former chief editor, and advisory editor of the literary journal South Asian Avant-Garde.

My public work has appeared in The Nation, L.A. Review of Books, NPR, Aeon, The Baffler, Dissent, and The American Prospect, among others.