Soraya M. Deen is a lawyer, author, and founder of the Muslim Women Speakers. She is an award-winning international interfaith activist, community organizer, and motivational speaker. A fierce advocate of human rights, gender equity (redressing religious-based oppression, dominance, and violence)minority rights, and #FoRB, Soraya is a member of the International Religious Freedom Roundtable (IRF Roundtable) and Co-Founder of the Women’s Working Group. Soraya teaches communities how to organize for action in order to solve urgent, relevant, and winnable issues. She is an advisory board member of Faith In Action – the USA’s largest clergy-organizing network that gives people of faith the tools that they need to fight for justice and work towards a more equitable society.

Soraya is the 2019 recipient of the Los Angeles Impact Maker Award. Her work prioritizes organizing women to dismantle the supremacy of patriarchy and religion-based oppression, dominance, and violence. Soraya is the recipient of the prestigious Paul Carus Award for grassroots activism by the world’s premier interfaith convening organization – The Parliament of the World’s Religions. In the words of Ella Baker, Soraya believes that “Oppressed people do not need a messiah to deliver them from oppression; all they need is themselves, one another, and the will to persevere.”