Research
I have an interdisciplinary social science background and have been working on different projects throughout the years in the fields of gender studies, sociology, anthropology, media and communication, and political science. The topics I have been working on include trauma, vulnerability, and crisis in the context of disasters and conflicts; atrocity photography, humanitarian photography, and historical photography; feminism in humanitarian assistance, development cooperation, and foreign policy. In general, I am interested in (i) how people make sense of the world around them and how this sense- and meaning-making can lead to conflict or cooperation, and (ii) how global injustices can be reproduced or challenged.
I got my PhD in Political Science from Aarhus University in Denmark where I studied how different states address long-term consequences of nuclear disasters. I worked at the intersection of cultural sociology and international studies. I spent my PhD stay abroad at the Department of Sociology at Yale University in the USA.
My first postdoc was at the Department of Gender Studies at Lund University in Sweden, where I worked on the role of gender in humanitarian projects to disaster survivors. Here I engaged with humanitarian studies, social anthropology, and gender studies. My second postdoc was at the Department of Communication at the University of Copenhagen in Denmark, where I looked at the influence of social media on humanitarian photography. I combined theories in visual communication and cultural sociology.
I then worked as Researcher and Senior Lecturer at the Department of Political Science at Lund University, where I have been studying external perceptions of feminist foreign policy (FFP). This project is financed by Riskbankens Jubileumsfonden since 2020 and we continue working on it till 2024 in collaboration with Malena Rosén Sundström.
Starting from 2023, I am collaborating with Maria-Louise Clausen (Danish Institute for International Studies) and Vasna Ramasar (Lund University) on Formas-funded project on renewable energy, violent conflict, and gender equality in Yemen.
I joined the Intercultural Studies unit at Karlstad University as a permanent member of staff on 1 November 2022. I am a member of KUFO and CGF.
Teaching
I teach different courses at Intercultural Studies unit at KAU.
At Lund University, I taught at the bachelor programme in International Development Studies (BIDS), at the master's programme in International Development and Management (LUMID), and at several interdisciplinary programmes at the Graduate School of Social Sciences (e.g. Global Studies, Development Studies, The Social Studies of Gender, Middle Eastern Studies).
Collaboration
Since 2018, I have been a founding member of the Anthropology of Humanitarianism Network (AHN - The European Association of Social Anthropologists - EASA). During 2021-2022, I served as the AHN's Co-Convener together with Andrea Steinke from The Center for Humanitarian Action (CHA) in Berlin.
In 2021, with Antonio De Lauri (Chr. Michelsen Institute, Norway), I launched a new podcast on "Talking Humanitarianism" with the Norwegian Centre for Humanitarian Studies (NCHS). The podcast brings conversations with humanitarian researchers and practitioners. The first mini-series on the intersecting vulnerabilities of humanitarian disasters came out in 2021 and the second mini-series on humanitarianism and transitions to a low-carbon future came out in 2022.
Since 2021, I am also Associate Editor of the international peer-reviewed journal Public Anthropologist.
Selected publications
Articles:
2023. “A struggle for hegemonic feminisation in six feminist foreign policies or, how social hierarchies work in world politics”. Millennium. Online before print.
2023. “Postcolonial logic and silences in strategic narratives: Sweden’s feminist foreign policy in conflict-affected states”, Global Society, vol. 37, no. 1, pp. 1-22.
2022. (with Malena Rosen Sundström & Ole Elgström). “Feminist Foreign Policies (FFPs) as strategic narratives: Norm translation in Sweden, Canada, France, and Mexico”, Review of International Studies, vol. 48, no. 1, pp. 195-216.
2022. “Chronic crisis and nuclear disaster humanitarianism: Recuperation of Chernobyl and Fukushima children in Italy”. Global Discourse, vol. 12, no. 3-4, pp. 616-637.
2022. “Kinning as intimate disaster response: From recuperation in host families to educational migration of the Chernobyl children from Belarus to Italy”, Identities, vol. 29, no. 2, pp. 205-222.
2022. “How cultural traumas occur on social media: The case of the Ukrainian famine 1932-1933”, International Journal of Politics, Culture, and Society, vol. 35, no. 1, pp. 1-15.
2022. “Image substitutes and visual fake history: Historical images of atrocity of the Ukrainian famine 1932-1933 on social media”, Visual Communication, vol. 21, no. 1, pp. 3-27.
2021. (with Malena Rosen Sundström & Ole Elgström). “Spreading its norms? Sweden’s Feminist Foreign Policy in international media”, Contemporary Politics, vol. 27, no. 4, pp. 439-460.
2020. "Private humanitarian responses to disaster vulnerabilities: The Chernobyl children from Belarus in Italy", Childhood, vol. 20, no. 2, pp. 238-253.
2020. “Nuclear disaster as chronic crisis: Accounts of radiation embodiment by survivors of the Chernobyl nuclear disaster from Belarus born before, in and after 1986,” Health, vol. 24, no. 5, pp. 589–605.
2018. “Chernobyl, responsibility, and national identity: Positioning Europe and Russia in the media of Belarus and Ukraine (1992–2014),” Europe-Asia Studies, vol. 70, no. 7, pp. 1055-1082.
2017. “Foreign aid and identity after the Chernobyl nuclear disaster: How Belarus shapes cooperation with Germany, Europe, Russia, and Japan,” Cooperation & Conflict, vol. 52, no. 4, pp. 485-501.
2016. “From ontological security to cultural trauma: The case of Chernobyl in Belarus and Ukraine,” Acta Sociologica, vol. 59, no. 4, pp. 332-346.
2016. “Trauma management: Chernobyl in Belarus and Ukraine,” British Journal of Sociology, vol. 67, no. 2, pp. 195-215.
Book chapters:
2020. “Foreign aid”. In Humanitarianism: Keywords. Edited by Antonio de Lauri. Brill.
2020. “Trauma”. Humanitarianism: Keywords. Edited by Antonio de Lauri. Brill.
2020. “Vulnerability”. Humanitarianism: Keywords. Edited by Antonio de Lauri. Brill.
Book reviews:
2019. Humanitarianism and mass migration: Confronting the world crisis, edited by Marcelo M. Suárez-Orozco, Oakland, CA, University of California Press, Ross Institute, 2019. Ethnic and Racial Studies, vol. 43, no. 3, pp. 610-612.
Monographs:
2015. Whose Responsibility? Chernobyl as Trauma Management in Belarus and Ukraine, Politica. Institut for Statskundskab. Aarhus Universitet. ISBN: 978-87-7335-200-7 (PhD thesis).
Policy briefs:
2022. (with Maria-Louise Clausen & Vasna Ramasar) “Renewable energy transitions impact power structures in local communities”, DIIS Policy Brief. Danish Institute for International Studies, Denmark, 28 March 2022.
2021. (with Maria-Louise Clausen) “Making women count, not just counting women”, DIIS Policy Brief. Danish Institute for International Studies, Denmark, 31 May 2021.
Popular science/research communication articles:
2023. (with Julia Morris). “The NCHS Conversation: Julia Morris. From extracting resources to extracting people”, Norwegian Centre for Humanitarian Studies (NCHS) Blog, 14 February 2023.
2021. (with Malena Rosen Sundström & Ole Elgström). “Telling stories strategically: How Sweden, Canada, France, and Mexico interpret gender norms in their Feminist Foreign Policies (FFPs)”, British International Studies Association (BISA) Blog, 10 August 2021.
2021. (with Tess Altman) “Introduction to blog series: Conversations about scale and space in the Anthropology of Humanitarianism”, AHN EASA Blog, 1 April 2021.
2020. “L’antropologia umanitaria: ripensare il ruolo dell’apolitico e del privato nello spazio umanitario”, Public Anthropologist Journal Blog, 8 December 2020.
2020. “Kinning as intimate disaster response: The Chernobyl children from Belarus in Italy”, Identities Journal Blog, 18 March 2020.
2018. “The anthropology of humanitarianism: Rethinking the role of the apolitical and private in humanitarian space”, Public Anthropologist Journal Blog, 2 October 2018.
2018. “Chernobyl brought Italy and Belarus closer together – their approach could do the same for other nations”, The Conversation, 8 May 2018.
2016. “Trauma management as a way to sustainable development,” The Baltic University Programme Newsletter, issue no. 49, December 2016, p. 5.
Other
My publications can be found here