Dina Benbrahim

Associate Professor of Graphic Design

Art & Art History

Dina Benbrahim is a designer, educator, and scholar whose work sits at the intersection of intersectional feminism, design histories, and social justice. She collaborates with minoritized communities to collectively reimagine equitable futures — with a particular focus on pan-African and feminist design histories in North Africa, including significant contributions to the study of Amazigh visual and material culture.

Her scholarship spans essays, book chapters, and other publications, including contributions to Centered (ed. Kaleena Sales), where she authored “Woven in Oral History: An Incomplete Taxonomy of Amazigh Symbols,” and Politics of Craft (ed. D. Wood), where her essay “The Political Fabric of Amazigh Rugs” examines textile as political language. Her research has earned speaking invitations from Yale, the Royal Danish Academy, Rutgers University, and other distinguished institutions. Most recently, she held the 2025 Mary Ausplund Tooze Endowed Scholar of Islamic and Ancient Art fellowship at Portland State University.
Benbrahim is an Associate Professor of Graphic Design at the University of Connecticut, where she also directs the Department of Art and Art History’s Design Center and holds affiliate faculty appointments in Middle East Studies; Women’s, Gender, and Sexuality Studies; and Intersectional Indigeneity, Race, Ethnicity, and Politics. Her work and research have been showcased in national and international exhibitions, conferences, and publications, and recognized with multiple awards, including the AIGA365 Social Design Award.

Beyond the academy, she is the founder and director of Hello Departures, a Docent for the Letterform Archive, a member of the Advising Council of the School of Architecture and Design at the Lebanese American University, Director of DEIA for the AIGA Connecticut chapter, and a member of the Board of Directors of ATypI.

She brings over eight years of teaching experience in higher education alongside eight years of industry practice in design, art direction, copywriting, and freelancing across New York City and Casablanca. Benbrahim holds a Bachelor’s in Business Administration and a Master’s in Marketing and Communications from the University of Florida, where she also taught graphic design as an Instructor of Record and received the 2020 Calvin A. VanderWerf Award for Excellence in Teaching.