Dinara is from a city in Western Kazakhstan located at the crossroads between Europe and Asia. A social science enthusiast, she obtained her bachelor’s degree in Political Science and International Relations from American University in Bulgaria.

After that she worked as a staff writer for Tengrinews – one of the biggest English-language news sources in Kazakhstan. She obtained her MA degree in Political Science from Central European University and undertook an internship at Georgian Foundation for Strategic and International Studies.

Among her broader interests are social science methodology, regime transformation, contentious politics, inequalities, including those predicated upon gender and socio-economic standing, and political sociology.