Farzaneh Milani completed her graduate studies in Comparative Literature at the University of California in Los Angeles in 1979. Her dissertation, “Forugh Farrokhzad: A Feminist Perspective” is a critical study of the poetry of a pioneering Iranian poet. A past president of the Association of Middle Eastern Women Studies in America, Milani was the recipient of the All University Teaching Award in 1998 and nominated for Virginia Faculty of the Year in 1999.

Milani has published over 100 articles, epilogues, forewords, and afterwords in Persian and in English. She has served as the guest editor for two special issues of Nimeye-Digar, Persian Language Feminist Journal (on Simin Daneshvar and Simin Behbahani), IranNameh (on Simin Behbahani), and Iranian Studies: Journal of the International Society for Iranian Studies (on Simin Behbahani). She has written for the New York Times, the Washington Post, Christian Science Monitor, Ms. Magazine, Readers Digest, USA Today, and N.P.R.’s All Things Considered. She has presented more than 250 lectures nationally and internationally. A former Chair of the Department of Middle Eastern and South Asian Languages and Cultures and former director of Women, Gender, and Sexuality Department, Milani was also a Carnegie Fellow (2006-2007).