Experts Database

I am a PhD candidate at Sociology of Education and Culture (SEC) at Uppsala University, Sweden. My doctoral dissertation analyzes the educational dispositions of refugee families in Sweden by questioning the conversion of assets in transnational contexts and how it functions in the case of statelessness. My interests include ethnic studies, migration studies, and displacement as I attempt to bridge migration studies with the sociology of education using the case of Kurds who fled the Syrian war and reside in Sweden. Previously, I was awarded a masters’ degree analyzing the educational strategies of the same group in the Turkish context. I am a member of the working research group Education and Migration at Uppsala University, and a PhD representative of the standing committee “Education and Social Inequality” as a member of International Migration, Integration and Social Cohesion in Europe (IMISCOE), where I am organizing a panel on refugee education during the 18th annual conference.

Laura Cleton is a postdoctoral researcher in return migration governance in Europe. At UNU-MERIT, she investigates the involvement of diaspora in capacity building and development through temporary return programs, facilitated by the International Organization for Migration. She investigates whether and how such programs enable the transfer of skills and knowledge to diaspora members’ countries of nationality. It not only questions what this process looks like and what (enduring) effects it has, but also challenges the underlying assumptions and discourses embedded in diaspora engagement for development.

Her dissertation entitled Deporting Children. Policy Framing, Legitimation and Intersectional Boundary Work (2022, Department of Political Science at University of Antwerp) relied on critical migration and border studies, intersectionality and interpretative policy analysis to question how the Dutch and Belgian authorities legitimize the deportation of undocumented migrant children. It argued that they do so through a conscious attempt to (re)frame the policy problem at hand, by deliberately drawing attention away from the underlying moral-political conflict and the hardships deportation poses for children. Instead, they on the one hand emphasized the diligence of their procedures and their compassionate way of working, while on the other also directing attention to the potential danger that children and their family pose to the citizenry. The dissertation complicates scholarly understanding of the workings of securitization and humanitarianism as means to legitimate migration control, and points to the crucial importance of intersectionality and interpretative policy analysis to deportation studies.

Prior to starting her postdoc and PhD, she worked as a junior lecturer in Interdisciplinary Social Sciences (University of Amsterdam) and a junior researcher in Social Geography (Utrecht University). She is an Associate Editor for the Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies, steering board member for IMISCOE's Gender & Sexuality in Migration Research Standing Group, and acts as the secretary of the Dutch Association for Migration Research (DAMR). Her research interests include migration governance, migration policies & politics, voluntary and forced return migration, gendered & feminist approaches to migration studies, and family migration.

Dr Clelia Clini is a research associate on the project “Migrant Memory and the Postcolonial Imagination (MMPI): British Asian Memory, Identity and Community after Partition”. She has extensive teaching and research experience in the field of Migration, Media, Cultural and Postcolonial Studies. Her research interests include: Migration and Diaspora Studies; forced displacement, arts and mental health; migration, transnational networks and experiences of belonging; narratives of identity and belonging in South Asian diasporic literature and films; immigrants’ experiences in Italy in relation to cinema, media and music.

My research focuses on Chinese migration to Japan and Sino-Japanese mobilities more broadly including media, tourism and international relations. I have a PhD in anthropology from the Australian National University, and was formerly co-convenor for the European Association for Social Anthropology, Anthropology and Mobility Network (ANTHROMOB)

I am Associate Professor of Political Science at the University of Wisconsin-Green Bay, where I am also serving as the Chair of the Public & Environmental Affairs Unit. My research focuses on refugees, migration, human rights, global governance, and U.S. foreign policy. I am currently completing a book about U.S. refugee policy which shows how domestic identity narratives, political polarization, and local meaning-making intervene in global migration governance and refugee responsibility-sharing.

Dr. Cohen's research focuses on three areas: migration, development and nutrition. Since the early 1990s he as studied the impact, structure and outcome of migration from indigenous communities in Oaxaca, Mexico to the US with support from the National Science Foundation. He has also conducted comparative research on Mexican, Dominican and Turkish migration. His work on traditional foods, nutrition and migration was supported by the National Geographic Society. In addition to ongoing work in Oaxaca, he is currently studying the migration of Mexicans to Columbus.