Sarah has a range of research interests, all influenced by personal, professional and academic experience. Broadly speaking, her interests span the subject of International Relations (IR), and include everything from global governance to international organizations and cooperation among states and non-state actors. More specifically, she is most interested in forced migration, including refugees, internally displaced people and other groups of forced migrants. This relates to humanitarian/development studies, human rights, international legal norms, and the role of international organizations in responding to instances of forced migration.
Regionally speaking, she has spent most of my time in East Africa: she worked in Tanzania, and carried out field research in Tanzania, Kenya and Uganda. She also carried out shorter research stints in Thailand, Nepal, Jordan, Lebanon and Syria. She also has a forthcoming book on Syrian displacement (to be published through Routledge) toward the end of 2016. During her undergraduate days, her Spanish major and various travel opportunities took her to Latin America, including Mexico, the Dominican Republic, Nicaragua and Costa Rica, and more recently the US Embassy in Ottawa hosted her for a speaking tour on refugee resettlement in the US and Canada (see "media" section). Thus, she has a diverse range of regional interests.
Sarah's doctoral research focused on the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees and protracted refugee situations. This remains an area of study that is still of great interest to her, and there remains much more to be done. As indicated above, she also has a book coming out soon on Syrian displacement, and she is very interested in pursuing additional research on the UN Summit taking place in September 2016, which relates to large-scale and protracted displacement. Indeed, Sarah would like to further examine the historical dimensions of the three traditional "durable solutions" and how new thinking is evolving on solutions to displacement.
Theoretically, Sarah does not pledge allegiance to one specific "ism" in IR, but has drawn on a range of tools from the various theories in her work. Because she often looks at international norms that pertain to refugees and IDPs, she has often drawn on constructivist tools and scholarship. However, she feels strongly that a topic like forced migration benefits from a range of perspectives--both within IR and beyond. Indeed, her graduate work at the University of Chicago and Oxford University was interdisciplinary, and she appreciates relevant scholarship from subjects like sociology, anthropology, law and history in my research. She has found that literature within these subjects greatly enriches her IR-focused perspectives.
Above all, she is passionate about her work because it includes a hybrid of theory, policy and practice. Indeed, studying something like forced migration--a subject that involves looking closely at human suffering and some of the world's most dire situations--should not be done out of mere academic curiosity, but with also with the motivation that research will provide information that might contribute to better solutions to displacement. As David Turton writes, “I cannot see any justification for conducting research into situations of extreme human suffering if one does not have the alleviation of suffering as an explicit objective of one’s research. For the academic this means attempting to influence the behavior and thinking of policy-makers and practitioners so that their interventions are more likely to improve than worsen the situation of those whom they wish to help.”* Thus, the politics of forced migration is fascinating and important to her on multiple levels: out of academic inquiry as a scholar of IR; out of professional interest, given her experiences with refugees and other displaced persons in her own work; and on a personal level out of concern for those in need.
Sarah looks up to a number of scholars, including her former supervisor at Oxford, Alexander Betts; Kate McNamara at Georgetown, who is very supportive of women in IR; and Elizabeth Ferris, now at Georgetown, who has modeled a career that Sarah hopes to emulate--one that advocates for better solutions, while also producing exceptional scholarship on forced migration. Other faculty she has enjoyed learning from include Dan Nexon (also at Georgetown) and Patrick Thaddeus Jackson (at American University), whose syllabus she taught for AU master's students core IR course. She greatly enjoys Michael Barnett's work, as well.
*David Turton, “Migrants and Refugees: A Mursi Case Study,” in In Search of Cool Ground: War, Flight and Homecoming in Northeast Africa, edited by T. Allen (James Currey/Africa World Press: London/Trenton, 1996) p. 96.
Regionally speaking, she has spent most of my time in East Africa: she worked in Tanzania, and carried out field research in Tanzania, Kenya and Uganda. She also carried out shorter research stints in Thailand, Nepal, Jordan, Lebanon and Syria. She also has a forthcoming book on Syrian displacement (to be published through Routledge) toward the end of 2016. During her undergraduate days, her Spanish major and various travel opportunities took her to Latin America, including Mexico, the Dominican Republic, Nicaragua and Costa Rica, and more recently the US Embassy in Ottawa hosted her for a speaking tour on refugee resettlement in the US and Canada (see "media" section). Thus, she has a diverse range of regional interests.
Sarah's doctoral research focused on the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees and protracted refugee situations. This remains an area of study that is still of great interest to her, and there remains much more to be done. As indicated above, she also has a book coming out soon on Syrian displacement, and she is very interested in pursuing additional research on the UN Summit taking place in September 2016, which relates to large-scale and protracted displacement. Indeed, Sarah would like to further examine the historical dimensions of the three traditional "durable solutions" and how new thinking is evolving on solutions to displacement.
Theoretically, Sarah does not pledge allegiance to one specific "ism" in IR, but has drawn on a range of tools from the various theories in her work. Because she often looks at international norms that pertain to refugees and IDPs, she has often drawn on constructivist tools and scholarship. However, she feels strongly that a topic like forced migration benefits from a range of perspectives--both within IR and beyond. Indeed, her graduate work at the University of Chicago and Oxford University was interdisciplinary, and she appreciates relevant scholarship from subjects like sociology, anthropology, law and history in my research. She has found that literature within these subjects greatly enriches her IR-focused perspectives.
Above all, she is passionate about her work because it includes a hybrid of theory, policy and practice. Indeed, studying something like forced migration--a subject that involves looking closely at human suffering and some of the world's most dire situations--should not be done out of mere academic curiosity, but with also with the motivation that research will provide information that might contribute to better solutions to displacement. As David Turton writes, “I cannot see any justification for conducting research into situations of extreme human suffering if one does not have the alleviation of suffering as an explicit objective of one’s research. For the academic this means attempting to influence the behavior and thinking of policy-makers and practitioners so that their interventions are more likely to improve than worsen the situation of those whom they wish to help.”* Thus, the politics of forced migration is fascinating and important to her on multiple levels: out of academic inquiry as a scholar of IR; out of professional interest, given her experiences with refugees and other displaced persons in her own work; and on a personal level out of concern for those in need.
Sarah looks up to a number of scholars, including her former supervisor at Oxford, Alexander Betts; Kate McNamara at Georgetown, who is very supportive of women in IR; and Elizabeth Ferris, now at Georgetown, who has modeled a career that Sarah hopes to emulate--one that advocates for better solutions, while also producing exceptional scholarship on forced migration. Other faculty she has enjoyed learning from include Dan Nexon (also at Georgetown) and Patrick Thaddeus Jackson (at American University), whose syllabus she taught for AU master's students core IR course. She greatly enjoys Michael Barnett's work, as well.
*David Turton, “Migrants and Refugees: A Mursi Case Study,” in In Search of Cool Ground: War, Flight and Homecoming in Northeast Africa, edited by T. Allen (James Currey/Africa World Press: London/Trenton, 1996) p. 96.