Teaching is a natural outgrowth of my scholarship. As a teacher, in and out of the classroom, I work to communicate complex information clearly to a varied audience. My work in the formative and classical periods of Islamic history, together with my interdisciplinary work in the contemporary period, make it possible for me to help my audience bridge the divide between the past and the present to facilitate the development of a deeper and more nuanced understanding that will allow them to situate current events along the broad spectrum of Islamic social, intellectual, and religious history.