Maya Alkateb-Chami is a Doctoral Candidate at the Harvard Graduate School of Education, with a secondary field in Philosophy, and an Instructor in Education at Harvard University and Boston College. Her research examines how literacy can be more meaningfully and equitably realized, guided by a concern for cultural and political participation, particularly in multilingual and culturally diverse societies. She pursues this work through three inter-connected dimensions: a) normative, concerned with improving our conceptions of literacy and basic literacy; b) structural, centered on language-of-instruction policies and practices, which she mostly studies comparatively between countries; and c) instructional, investigating curricular and pedagogic implications of research in the prior two areas. Before beginning doctoral studies, Alkateb-Chami spent over a decade leading organizations in refugee education, human rights, and community arts, experiences that continue to inform her research and teaching. A former Fulbright Scholar, her recent work has appeared in journals including the Harvard Educational Review and the International Journal of Educational Development.