She was a student of the
École Normale Supérieure (rue d'Ulm, Paris) where she was admitted in 1987. She received her
doctorate from the
Institut d'Etudes Politiques de Paris in 1994. She began her postdoctoral research in 1995 at the
Hagop Kevorkian Center for Near Eastern Studies at New York University before returning to France to join for ten years, the
Centre national de la recherche scientifique from 1995 to 2005. She is a Member of the Scientific Council of the
Tunisian Academy of Sciences, Letters, and Arts. Her work, ''Gardiens de l'Islam: Les oulémas d'Al Azhar dans l'Egypte contemporaine'', written in French is an analysis of the influence of the
ulama of
Al-Azhar University.
A. Marsot argues her thesis is that "the ulama of the Azhar believe that it is their duty, daʿwa, as the guardians of religion to see that the laws of a country conform to the shariʿa; thus, their struggle with the authorities is defined by an attempt to set aside the laws of the state in favor of the shariʿa." The book explores how state interactions with the Azhari ulama helped to lead to the rise other Islamic movements, namely the
Muslim Brotherhood, outside of traditional institutions. Her most recent book,
The Making of the Modern Muslim State:
Islam and Governance in the Middle East and North Africa was published by
Princeton University Press in 2024. ==Courses taught==