He was raised as an Episcopalian and converted to Islam in 1997.[3] Brown is Sunni and follows the Hanbali school of Islamic jurisprudence.[4] Brown graduated magna cum laude with a Bachelor of Arts in History in 2000 from Georgetown University in Washington, D.C., studied Arabic for a year at the Center for Arabic Study Abroad at the American University of Cairo, and completed his doctorate in Islamic thought at the University of Chicago in 2006. Professor Brown is married to Laila Al-Arian, Executive Producer at Al Jazeera.[5]