His grandfather, Grand Ayatollah Seyyed Muhammad Mowlana, was a leading Islamic jurisprudent (faqih) and a community leader.

He is a descendant of the Iranian mystic poet, Qasim-i Anvar (1356-1433), and his ancestry dates back to Imam Musa al-Kazim (745-799) in the early Islamic history.

He served on the faculty of the University of Tennessee in Knoxville from 1965 to 1968 before moving to American University in Washington, D.C.[4] In 1963 Mowlana discovered the well preserved and original copy of the first Iranian newspaper called Kaqaze Akhbar, published in Tehran in 1837, in the files of the British Museum Library in London and came a cross further evidence of the paper's existence in the files of the Royal Asiatic Society, also based in London, and thus changed the beginning of Iranian journalism history to fourteen years earlier - from 1851 to 1837.

[12] Mowlana was honored by the Iranian universities and academies for his life achievements and was designated nationally in Iran as an "Eternal One"—"Chehrehaye Mandegar" in 2003.

[13] On the Persian tradition honoring noted scholars he was named as an honorary advisor to the former Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.

Mowlana's scholarly works extend over a number of disciplines including political science, economics, sociology, communication and philosophy.