Dr Aliakbar Jafari

Personal statement

I am Director of Knowledge Exchange in the Department of Marketing. I joined the University of Strathclyde in September 2008 after completing my PhD under the supervision of Professor Christina Goulding and Professor Pauline Maclaran who have generously and significantly contributed to my professional development since then. During my academic journey, I have been very privileged to have benefited from the invaluable insights and experiences of professors A. Fuat Fırat, Pervaiz K. Ahmed, Alladi Venkatesh, Craig Thompson, Heiner Evanschitzky, Fred Lemke, and Lisa Peñaloza.    

Before joining academia, I held international marketing positions in the Iranian automotive industry. At the momemnt, I am a Research Fellow at Vlerick Business School in Belgium and Visiting Professor at UCLAN School of Business and Management in Cyprus. I am also Chief Visiting Examiner at SOAS University of London for postgraduate degrees awarded by the departments of Finance and Management, Economics, Development Studies, Law, Politics and International Studies, and Academic Summer School. I am also External Examiner for MSc Management Programmes at Queen's University Belfast in Northern Ireland. 

Thanks to the generous invitation of journal editors, I have the pleasure of contributing to the peer-review services of a number of academic outlets as I sit on the Editorial Review Board of Consumption, Markets & Culture, Senior Editorial Advisory Board of Journal of Islamic Marketing, Editorial Advisory Board of Journal of Halal Service Research, and the Editorial Board of Marketing Theory, Iranian Journal of Management Studies, Tourism Planning and Development, International Journal of Islamic Marketing and Branding.

I have been fortunate enough to serve Marketing Theory as guest co-editor of two special issues: "Non-western contexts: The invisible half " (2012) and "Islamic Encounters in Consumption and Marketing" (2013) and also as guest co-editor of a special commentary section on "Ethnicity and Wellbeing in Marketing and Consumer Research" (2015). As invited (keynote) speaker I have delivered talks in different academic and industry events in the UAE, UK, Malaysia, Romania, Cyprus, Turkey, and Iran. I have co-edited 'Islam, Marketing and Consumption: Critical Perspectives on the Intersections' (Routledge, 2016) and the four-volume set of 'New Directions in Consumer Research' (Sage, 2015).

Thanks to the attention of scholarly committees, I have received Consumer Culture Theory Conference's 2016 Best Special Session Award, Emerald's 2015 Citations of Excellence Award for "Islamic Marketing: insights from a critical perspective" and Consumption, Markets & Culture's 2014 Honourable Mention Award for "Globalization, Reflexivity and the Project of the Self: A Virtual Intercultural Learning Process". I have also received two research fellowships from The British Academy (2018) and The Scientific & Technological Research Council of Turkey (2016).