
Aziza Ahmed
Professor of Law
R. Gordon Butler Scholar in International Law
Co-Director, BU Law Program in Reproductive Justice
BA, Emory University
JD, University of California, Berkeley School of Law
MS, Harvard School of Public Health
Biography
Aziza Ahmed’s scholarship examines the intersection of law, politics, and science in the fields of constitutional law, criminal law, health law, and family law. She will be teaching the International Human Rights Seminar and a Reproductive Rights course this fall.
Before joining Boston University School of Law, Ahmed was professor of law at University of California, Irvine School of Law. She also taught at Northeastern University School of Law. She has served as visiting professor at the University of Chicago Law School, Bennett Boskey Visiting Professor at Harvard Law School, visiting scholar at the Harvard Law School Petrie-Flom Center for Health Law Policy, Biotechnology, and Bioethics, and Law and public affairs fellow at Princeton University.
Professor Ahmed’s scholarship has appeared in journals including University of Miami Law Review, American Journal of Law and Medicine, Harvard Journal of Law and Gender, Boston University Law Review, and American Journal of International Law.
Prior to teaching, Professor Ahmed was a research associate at the Harvard School of Public Health Program on International Health and Human Rights. She came to that position after a women’s law and public policy fellowship with the International Community of Women Living with HIV/AIDS. Professor Ahmed was a member of the Technical Advisory Group on HIV and the Law convened by the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) and has been an expert for many institutions, including the American Bar Association and UNDP.
Ahmed is the author of the forthcoming book Feminism’s Medicine: Law, Science, and Social Movements in the AIDS Response, published by Cambridge University Press, and coeditor of the forthcoming handbook, Race, Racism, and the Law, published by Edward Elgar Publishing.
Professor Ahmed earned a BA from Emory University, a JD from the University of California, Berkeley School of Law, and an MS in Population and International Health from the Harvard School of Public Health.
- Profile Types
- Faculty, Full-Time Faculty, and Professors & Clinical Instructors
- Areas of Interest
- Health Law, Humanitarian Law, Property Law, and Reproductive Rights and Justice
- Profiles
- Aziza Ahmed
Publications
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Aziza Ahmed, Commentary on Reynolds v. McNichols, in Feminist Judgments: Health Law Rewritten (Seema Mohaptra and Lindsay Wiley,2022)
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Aziza Ahmed & Jason Jackson, The Public/Private Distinction in Public Health: The Case of COVID-19 90 Fordham Law Review (2022)
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Aziza Ahmed, Recovering Feminist Lessons From the Past For a Less Carceral Future JOTWELL (2022) (book review)
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Cecília Tomori, Dabney P. Evans, Aziza Ahmed, Aparna Nair & Benjamin Mason Meier, Where is the “Public” in American Public Health? Moving from individual responsibility to collective action 45 eClinicalMedecine (2022)
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Aziza Ahmed, Donna Coker, Leigh Goodmark & Deborah Weissman, Gender Violence (2022)
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Aziza Ahmed & Guy-Uriel Charles, Race, Racism, and the Law (2022)
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Aziza Ahmed, Abortion Experts 2022 University of Chicago Legal Forum (2022)
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Aziza Ahmed, A Critique of Expertise for Health Law 50 Journal of Law, Medicine & Ethics (2022)
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Aziza Ahmed, Policing the Womb: Invisible Women and the Criminalization of Motherhood. By Michele Goodwin. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2020. 47 Signs: Journal of Women in Culture and Society (2022) (book review)
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Aziza Ahmed, Feminism’s Medicine: Law, Science, and Social Movements in the AIDS Response (2022)
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Cecília Tomori, Aziza Ahmed, Dabney P. Evans, Benjamin Mason Meier & Aparna Nair, Your Health Is in Your Hands? US CDC COVID-19 Mask Guidance Reveals the Moral Foundations of Public Health 38 eClinicalMedecine (2021)
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Aziza Ahmed, Transnational Legal Orders and Global Health, in The Oxford Handbook of Transnational Law (Peer Zumbansen,2021)
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Deborah Anker & Aziza Ahmed, Ask a Feminist: Deborah Anker Discusses Gender and Asylum Law 46 Signs: Journal of Women in Culture and Society (2021)
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Aziza Ahmed & Jason Jackson, The Future of Facts: The Politics of Public Health and Medicine in Abortion Law 92 University of Colorado Law Review (2021)
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Aziza Ahmed & Jason Jackson, Race, Risk, and Personal Responsibility in the Response to COVID-19 121 Columbia Law Review Forum (2021)
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Aziza Ahmed, Floating Lungs: Forensic Science in Self-Induced Abortion Prosecutions 100 Boston University Law Review (2020)
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Aziza Ahmed, How the COVID-19 Response is Altering the Legal and Regulatory Landscape on Abortion 7 Journal of Law and the Biosciences (2020)
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Aziza Ahmed, State v. Oakley, 629 N.W.2d 200 (Wis. 2001), in Feminist Judgments: Reproductive Justice Rewritten (Kimberly M. Mutcherson,2020)
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Aziza Ahmed & Terry McGovern, Equity in Health: Sexual and Reproductive Health and Rights, in Foundations of Global Health & Human Rights (Lawrence O. Gostin and Benjamin Mason Meier,2020)
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Aziza Ahmed, Feminist Activism in the Context of Clinical Trials and Drug Roll-Out, in A Jurisprudence of the Body (Chris Dietz, Mitchell Travis, and Michael Thomson,2020)
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Susana T. Fried, Aziza Ahmed & Luisa Cabal, Tensions and exclusions: the knotty policy encounter between sexual and reproductive health and rights and HIV 27 Sexual and Reproductive Health Matters (2019)
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Aziza Ahmed, Women's Rights, Human Rights and the Criminal Law or, Feminist Debates and Responses to [De]Criminalization and Sexual and Reproductive Health 112 Proceedings of the Annual Meeting (Proceedings) (2019)
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Aziza Ahmed, Feminism, Law, and Epidemiology in the AIDS Response, in Governance Feminism: Notes from the Field (Janet Halley, Prabha Kotiswaran, Rachel Rebouché, and Hila Shamir,2019)
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Aziza Ahmed, Janet Halley in Conversation with Aziza Ahmed: Interview, in Beyond Virtue and Vice: Rethinking Human Rights and Criminal Law (Alice M. Miller and Mindy Jane Roseman,2019)
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Aziza Ahmed, Theories of State and Family, in Routledge Handbook of International Family Law (Barbara Stark and Jacqueline Heaton,2019)
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Aziza Ahmed, Race and Assisted Reproduction: Implications for Population Health 86 Fordham Law Review (2018)
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Aziza Ahmed, Women’s Human Rights and Migration: Sex Selective Abortion Laws in the United States and India 36 Nordic Journal of Human Rights (2018) (book review)
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Aziza Ahmed, Addressing HIV/AIDS at the Intersection of Anti-Trafficking and Health Law and Policy, in Revisiting the Law and Governance of Trafficking, Forced Labor and Modern Slavery (Prabha Kotiswaran,2017)
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Aziza Ahmed, Bandung's Legacy: Solidarity and Contestation in Global Women’s Rights, in Bandung, Global History, and International Law: Critical Pasts and Pending Futures (Luis Eslava, Michael Fakhri, and Vasuki Nesiah,2017)
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Aziza Ahmed, Abortion in a Post-Truth Moment: A Response to Erwin Chemerinsky and Michele Goodwin 95 Texas Law Review Online (2017)
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Aziza Ahmed, Dealing in Desire: Asian Ascendancy, Western Decline, and the Hidden Currencies of Sex Work. By Kimberly Kay Hoang. Oakland: University of California Press, 2015. Cosmopolitan Sex Workers: Women and Migration in a Global City. By Christine B. N. Chin. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2013. Street Corner Secrets: Sex, Work, and Migration in the City of Mumbai. By Svati P. Shah. Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 2014. 42 Journal of Women in Culture and Society (2016) (book review)
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Aziza Ahmed, Adjudicating Risk: AIDS, Crime, and Culpability 2016 Wisconsin Law Review (2016)
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Aziza Ahmed, Sienna Baskin & Anna Forbes, Criminal Laws on Sex Work and HIV Transmission: Mapping the Laws, considering the Consequence 93 Denver Law Review (2016)
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Aziza Ahmed, Informed Decision Making on Abortion: Crisis Pregnancy Centers, Clinics, and the First Amendment 43 Journal of Law, Medicine & Ethics (2015)
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Aziza Ahmed, Medical Evidence and Expertise in Abortion Jurisprudence 41 American Journal of Law & Medicine (2015)
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Aziza Ahmed, Trafficked? AIDS, Criminal Law and the Politics of Measurement 70 University of Miami Law Review (2015)
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Aziza Ahmed, Think Again: Prostitution 204 Foreign Policy (2014)
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Aziza Ahmed, HIV, Violence Against Women, and Criminal Law Interventions 18 CUNY Law Reiew (2014)
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Aziza Ahmed, “Rugged Vaginas” and “Vulnerable Rectums”: The Sexual Identity, Epidemiology, and Law of the Global HIV Epidemic 26 Columbia Journal of Gender and Law (2013)
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Aziza Ahmed, Underneath Her Pantsuit: A Reflection on Hanna Rosin's The End of Men 93 Boston University Law Review Online (2013)
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Aziza Ahmed & Meena Seshu, “We Have the Right Not to Be Rescued...”: When Anti-Trafficking Programmes Undermine the Health and Well-Being of Sex Workers June 2012 Anti-Trafficking Review (2012)
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Aziza Ahmed & Beri Hull, Sex and HIV Disclosure 38 Human Rights Magazine (2011)
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Aziza Ahmed, Feminism, Power, and Sex Work in the Context of HIV/AIDS: Consequences for Women's Health 34 Harvard Journal of Law & Gender (2011)
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Aziza Ahmed, When Men Are Harmed: Feminism, Queer Theory, and Torture at Abu Ghraib 11 UCLA Journal of Islamic and Near Eastern Law (2011)
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Aziza Ahmed, Margo Kaplan, Alison Symington & Eszter Kismodi, Criminalising Consensual Sexual Behaviour in the Context of HIV: Consequences, Evidence, and Leadership 6 Global Public Health (2011)
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Aziza Ahmed, HIV and Women: Incongruent Policies, Criminal Consequences 6 Yale Journal of International Affairs (2011)
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Aziza Ahmed, Catherine Hanssens & Brook Kelly, Protecting HIV Positive Women’s Human’s Rights: Recommendations for the Obama Administration 17 Reproductive Health Matters (2009)
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Aziza Ahmed, Dual Subordination: Muslim Sexuality in Secular and Religious Legal Discourse in India 4 Muslim World Journal of Human Rights (2007)
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In the Media
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Popsugar January 20, 2023
Will Roe Ever Be Law Again? Here’s How History Could Inform the Future.
Aziza Ahmed is quoted.
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The Received Wisdom Podcast December 13, 2022
The Future of Academic Culture, Cryptocurrency, and Abortion ft. Aziza Ahmed
Aziza Ahmed is interviewed on a podcast.
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Harvard Radcliffe Institute November 30, 2022
Conference: The Age of Roe: The Past, Present, and Future of Abortion in America
Aziza Ahmed speaks on panel.
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Health September 19, 2022
How Could the End of Roe v. Wade Impact IVF, Fertility Treatments, and Genetic Screening?
Aziza Ahmed provides insight.
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CNN
Opinion: These Are the Gray Areas for Women’s Privacy Now in a Post-Roe World
Aziza Ahmed co-authors an opinion.
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Ms. Magazine July 7, 2022
Supreme Court Term in Review: Experts Warn of a Court Coming for Your Rights
Aziza Ahmed speaks on a panel.
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