Maryam Palizban is a scholar, actress, director, and poet whose interdisciplinary work spans performance studies, Islamic theology, and cultural theory. She received her PhD from Freie Universität Berlin and the Center for Literary and Cultural Research (ZfL), where her dissertation—Performativität des Mordes—examined martyrdom and Shiite theatrical ritual, later published by Kadmos Verlag in 2017.

 

Her research explores the intersections of religion, performativity, and embodiment, with a focus on Shi’a Islam, theatricality, and modern cultural expression. She has published and lectured widely on subjects such as martyrdom, corporeality, and faith in performance, and has led major colloquia including Body and Corporeality and Woman, Body, and Revolution at the Center for Islamic Theology at Münster University.

 

Palizban is also a celebrated film actress in Iran, known for her roles in Deep Breath (Cannes, 2003), Fat Shaker (Tiger Award, Rotterdam, 2013), and LANTOURI (Berlinale, 2016), earning critical acclaim and the Iranian Film Academy’s Best Actress award. She has held fellowships at the Käte Hamburger Kolleg, Schloss Wiepersdorf, and Münster University. Her latest book, Understanding and Forgetting the Body (Karl Alber Verlag), continues her exploration of human corporeality through an interdisciplinary lens. In response to the Jina Revolution, Palizban publicly expressed solidarity with Iran’s women’s movement by sharing a photo without a headscarf. She remains actively engaged in transnational feminist and intellectual networks.