• Keynotes, Leadership Sessions, and Story-Based Training to ground diversity/equity/inclusion initiatives in your organization or community

  • Interviews about A Good Country 

  • Story-style talks based on A Good Country

Sofia Ali-Khan is a powerful anti-racist storyteller and a public interest lawyer. Her book, A Good Country: My Life in Twelve Towns and the Devastating Battle for a White America was published by Random House in 2022 and won the 2023 Nautilus Gold Book Award for Social Justice.

Writing at the intersection of politics, race, history, and Muslim America,  her essays have appeared in the Los Angeles Times, TIME Magazine, the Chicago Tribune, and other publications, earning her a Pushcart Prize nomination in 2022.


As an attorney, Sofia became a national leader on national origin discrimination/language access and practiced in the areas of civil rights, welfare law, Medicaid access, immigration, housing, and community economic development. She was a founding board member, activist and educator with the Philadelphia chapter of the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) in the aftermath of 9/11. Her work evidences her broad commitment to human rights for all people; she’s been an advocate on behalf of victims of domestic violence, gender-based hate crimes, torture, and voter suppression. 

Sofia has led a wide range of technical trainings on public benefits law, language access, and effective policy advocacy, but she is also a respected interfaith leader and teacher, presenting information about Islam, emphasizing the diversity of thought, culture and practice among Muslims. She is a constructive and dynamic storyteller who has captivated audiences from The Moth’s Mainstage and at the Manhattan Public Theater.

Sofia illuminates our shared humanity through storytelling, creating opportunities for personal and institutional  growth in this divisive political moment. A second-generation Pakistani American born in the United States and a practicing Muslim, Ali-Khan now lives in Ontario, Canada, with her family.

Sofia Ali-Khan

Frequently invited to address corporate, interfaith, community, and literary audiences, Sofia Ali-Khan brings a grounded, compassionate wisdom that has been shaped by decades of grass-roots activism, policy advocacy and institutional transformation.  

  • Judge, 2023 New American Voices Book Award

  • Board Member, Assoc. for Public Religion & Intellectual Life

  • District School Board Human Rights Equity & Advisory Committee (HREAC)

Current Leadership

Advocacy and Training Experience

Language Access, Cultural Competency, Medicaid for Immigrants

  • Community Legal Services of Philadelphia

  • Prairie State Legal Services

  • American Bar Association

  • Pennsylvania Immigrant and Citizenship Coalition

  • Lutheran Children and Family Services-Philadelphia

  • Nationalities Service Center

  • City of Philadelphia

  • Hebrew Immigrant Aid Society (HIAS)

  • Pennsylvania Women Against Abuse

  • Pennsylvania Bar Institute

  • Drexel University College of Medicine

  • Pennsylvania Council for Children, Youth and Family Services


Islam/Muslims/Civil Rights

  • Pottstown Presbyterian Church

  • Neumann College

  • Elderhostel Days of Discovery Biweekly Series

  • Grace Presbyterian Church of Jenkintown

  • Widener University School of Law

  • Chestnut Hill College

  • Kesher Israel Synagogue of West Chester

  • Lutheran Theological Seminary

  • New Life Presbyterian Church of Glenside

  • Rotary Club of Souderton-Telford

  • Chester County Adult Education Program Eight Week Series


Partial List of Trainings and Talks

  • Title VI Language Access

  • Implementing Language Access in Your Organization

  • Working with Interpreters

  • Cultural Competency

  • Noncitizen Access to Emergency Medicaid

  • Immigrant Access to Public Benefits Access

  • Public Benefits

  • Slippery Liberty

  • Not in My Country, Not in My Town, Not in My Neighborhood

  • Gender and Islam

  • Jesus and Mary in the Qur'an

  • Faith and Identity

  • Faith and Good Works

  • Islam and Interfaith Initiatives

  • People of the Book Series: the Nature of God in the Qur'an

  • Islam and Muslims: An Introduction to Text, Practice, and History

  • Local Muslims and Current Events

  • Pedagogy or Persecution