Afary is a professor of religious studies at the University of California Santa Barbara. She previously taught at in the History Department and Women's Studies at Purdue University. In the 1980s, she served as the coordinator for the Iranian Jewish Association of California. She has served as president of the International Society for Iranian Studies (ISIS-MESA), the Association for Middle East Women's Studies (AMEWS-MESA), and the Coordinating Council for Women in History of the American Historical Association (CCWH-AHA).
