Canada’s Special Representative on Combatting Islamophobia, Amira Elghawaby

October 23 | 5:30 PM

SFU Downtown Campus, Harbour Centre Room 1800

Canada’s Special Representative on Combatting Islamophobia, Amira Elghawaby, joined us in conversation with SFU scholar-in-residence Dr. Amyn Sajoo.

Islamophobia challenges safety and well-being, undermines social cohesion, and threatens Canada’s core democratic values. What is the role of civil society in coming together to confront hate in all of its forms, including Islamophobia, to uphold Canadian values of diversity, understanding, and belonging?

About the Speakers:

Amira Elghawaby, previously a journalist and human rights advocate, was appointed as Canada’s first ever Special Representative on Combatting Islamophobia in January 2023.

Since her appointment, Ms. Elghawaby has been providing strategic advice to the Government of Canada on legislation, policies, and programs impacting Canadian Muslim communities. She also worked closely with federal departments to address issues related to online hate, anti-racism, discrimination and community safety.

Additionally, Ms. Elghawaby has worked to raise public awareness on the challenges Islamophobia poses to Canada’s shared values, championing human rights, freedom of religion and inclusion on national and global platforms, including at the United Nations.

In spring 2025, her Office published The Canadian Guide to Understanding and Combatting Islamophobia, the first of its kind to be launched by a national government.

Prior to Ms. Elghawaby’s appointment, she was a contributing columnist at the Toronto Star and held roles in strategic communications and human rights at various national organizations, including at the Canadian Race Relations Foundation, at the National Council of Canadian Muslims, and in Canada’s labour movement.

Ms. Elghawaby is a founding board member of the Canadian Anti-Hate Network and has served two terms as a Commissioner on the Public Policy Forum’s Canadian Commission on Democratic Expression. She currently sits on the National Security Transparency Advisory Group.

In 2025, Ms. Elghawaby was awarded the King Charles Coronation Medal for her leadership.

Amyn Sajoo is scholar-in-residence and lecturer at Simon Fraser University’s Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences. His research and teaching is at the interface of citizenship, human rights and identity.

Dr. Sajoo was earlier affiliated with Cambridge and McGill universities, the Institute of Southeast Asian Studies in Singapore and the Institute of Ismaili Studies, London.

Since 2018, he has hosted a public conversations series, sponsored by SFU with civic partners. His guests have included former Supreme Court of Canada chief justice Beverley McLachlin, John Ralston Saul, Indigenous scholar Wenona Hall, and and the writers David Chariandy, Kamal al-Solaylee, Anosh Irani, Janika Oza and Saeed Teebi.

Dr. Sajoo has contributed extensively to the newsmedia, including the Guardian, BBC, Open Democracy and the Globe & Mail. His books include Pluralism in Old Societies and New States and Muslim Modernities: Expressions of the Civil Imagination (edited volume, 2008). He is currently working on a collection of essays on diaspora identities and citizenship.