Esra Tunc

Office: AL-672 | Email: [email protected]

Esra Tunc is Assistant Professor in the Department for the Study of Religion at San Diego State University. Prior to joining the faculty at SDSU, she held a postdoctoral appointment at the John C. Danforth Center on Religion and Politics at Washington University in St. Louis. She earned her Ph.D. from the University of California, Santa Barbara in 2022 and her M.A. from New York University in 2017, both in religious studies. As a scholar of religion and racial capitalism, her work interrogates contemporary Islamic and ethical financial technologies, while exploring socialities based on care and liberatory solidarity.  Her current book project examines the innovation of financial capitalism among Muslim communities in the United States. Bringing religion and capital into conversation with feminist critiques of capitalism, Black radical traditions, and indigenous ideas of relationality, her project aims to contribute to not only scholarly work at the intersection of religion, capital, justice, and technology but also the search to imagine and implement alternative socialities amidst widely criticized products and systems within and beyond Muslim communities. Her research has been supported by grants and awards from the Social Science Research Council, Indiana University (Lilly Family School of Philanthropy), and the University of California, among others.