CHR is thrilled to have the support of George Mason's Graduate Division to offer competitive summer fellowships to doctoral fellows conducting research in the humanities.
Read on to learn about our summer 2024 fellows. All will give research talks at the CHR this academic year- please see our events page for talk announcements.
Kylie Erfani (Cultural Studies), "Culture of Complaint: Dialectics of a Neoliberalism Cultural Form"
My dissertation aims to understand the contemporary landscape of grievances in US American politics and society. Rather than reignite ancient debates about the ethics of complaining, this work seeks to understand how the profound social, economic, and technological transformations enacted at the turn of the 21st century give rise to changes in the material form and consequences of complaint. By collecting and analyzing grievances from public institutions, consumer reports, and social media platforms, I explain how the shifting terrain of complaint reflects the onset and eventual crisis of neoliberal subjectivity in the digital age. This work synthesizes crucial insights from literary theory, affect studies, critical political economy and political philosophy in order to develop a framework for understanding complaint in the age of Karens, Yelp, and the so-called snowflake generation.
Erfani is a PhD candidate in Cultural Studies at George Mason University. She holds a BA in Philosophy and Women's, Gender, and Sexuality Studies from American University and an MA in Philosophy from the University of New Mexico.
Ellie Gibson (Cultural Studies), "Naked Capitalism: Trans Women Porn Content Producers Contesting Neoliberal Disposability"
My dissertation explores transgender women’s resistance to systematic dehumanization and employment precarity in late capitalism, as porn content producers/actors in the emergent “gig” economy. This project situates trans pornography within the broader field of feminist porn studies and represents a contribution to the growing field of transgender studies. I intend this to be a largely ethnographic study of trans porn actors/content producers in the porn gig economy.
Gibson is a PhD Candidate in Cultural Studies at George Mason University. She also has her master’s degree in Women and Gender Studies from George Mason. Her research interests center on Sex work and porn studies; feminist, queer and transgender studies; human rights
Umida Hashimova (Sociology and Anthropology), "Xenophobia and Racism in Russia: State Policies, Practices, and Perceptions of Migrants and Russians"
Russia’s state-building process is dominated by imperialistic views where ethno-nationalism plays a binding role. As a result, Russia’s attitude toward migrants has become more xenophobic and anti-migrant. This shift is reflected in recent studies of migrant perception of discrimination and racism, opinion poll results from migrants and Russians on their perception of each other, and on the state level, increasingly stringent legalization regulations and the worsening treatment of migrants by the police. Current legalization rules and consequent punishments for non-compliance are the strictest in Russia’s history. Additionally, the number of deportation cases has been rising, and the legalization process has become highly bureaucratic, making compliance difficult for migrants.
Hashimova is a doctoral student in Sociology and a graduate research assistant at the Institute for Immigration Research. She returned to academia after 14 years of experience as a researcher and analyst with federal research, consultancy, and international organizations. Umida holds a Master's in Public Policy with a specialization in International Economics from the School of Advanced International Studies, Johns Hopkins University, and a Master of Arts in Human Rights Law from the University of Essex.
Junghyun Nam (Sociology and Anthropology), "Space Reloaded: the Role of Space and Place-Based Interactions and Practices in the South Korean Candlelight Protests, 2016-2017"
My dissertation examines the socio-spatial mechanisms through which heterogeneous actors initiate, sustain, and experience mass protests, focusing on the Candlelight Protests in South Korea from October 2016 to March 2017. I analyze how protesters facilitate and sustain mass voluntary mobilization, forge a collective identity, perceive police, and regulate other participants’ conduct. Drawing on semi-structured interviews, I explore how public spaces serve as repositories of movement history and ethical spectacles that facilitate mobilization. I also investigate how place-based interactions help protesters forge a collective identity and how protesters evaluate and regulate other participants based on the new social order they enacted through prefigurative action and unprecedented cooperation with police.
Nam is a Ph.D. candidate in the Department of Sociology and Anthropology at George Mason University. Her research interests lie at the intersection of social movements, mass protests, public space, emotion, and repression. In her doctoral dissertation, she explores the complex interplay between public space and place-based interactions and practices, and how these socio-spatial dynamics shape mass protest dynamics in the context of South Korea since 2000. Through her work, Junghyun aims to deepen our understanding of how social, spatial, and emotional factors influence collective action and social change.
Sharon Qiu (Cultural Studies), "To the End of the Line: The Culture of Informality in Late-socialist Cuba"
The dissertation will be an ethnography about Cuban people’s waithood and informal practices in everyday life. Since the collapse of the Soviet Union and loss of subsidies in the 1990s, Cuban people faced economic dilemma and resource shortage on a daily basis, and long lines are common in official sectors (i.e., state-owned grocery stores) where people wait for hours to get goods and services. The use of black market is prevalent among local Cubans as an alternative way that exempts people from waiting to access goods. Through participant observation and interviews to local residents, taxi drivers, streetworkers, snack vendors, tour guides, and other participants in petit businesses, official sectors, and informal sectors, this dissertation focuses on how temporal control influences Cuban people’s mentality and the consequent culture of informality that rewrites a regime of normalcy in everyday life.
Qiu is interested in public life and informal system in socialist and Post-soviet time. From 2018 to 2022, she conducted intermittent fieldwork in Santiago de Cuba and Havana and talked with local Cuban residents and various streetworkers to learn about their living situations under the intersection of planned socialist economy and external capital surge. Through ethnographic researches, Qiu looks into Cuba's post-revolutionary livelihood by studying governance and informal practices among differently structured people.
Christian Rafael Suero (Sociology and Anthropology), "(In)equality of Internships: An Exploration on Student Access, Experience, and Outcomes"
The purpose of this dissertation research is to apply Bourdieu’s theories of capital to understand how access as well as experiences with internships may lead to unequal outcomes (with specific attention to first-generation college students). This study proposes using in-depth interviews of (20) first-generation and (20) continuing-generation students in a Research I public university who took part in paid and or unpaid internships. Additionally, this dissertation research seeks to expand the literature on first-generation college students and internship experiences. The reason this topic was chosen was two-fold. First, although internships have been researched by sector, degree type, and some social identities (race, gender, etc.), there is a lack of research exploring the first-generation experience with regard to these opportunities. Second, as sociology has historically sought to understand workplace structures, applying a sociological framework can reveal the social problems that are rooted within present day internships, as well as the possibilities for change.
Suero is a PhD Candidate in Sociology researching internship programs' access, experiences, and outcomes. Christian has specialty is within higher education and learning & development and has worked at organizations such as George Mason University, Food and Drug Administration (FDA), and Riot Games.
Saahi Uppalapati (Communication), "From Assessment to Action: Scale Validation and Text Messaging Interventions for Climate Change Psychological Distress"
Climate change poses an unprecedented challenge to human health and well-being. Despite growing scholarship on climate change and mental health, two notable gaps remain: the lack of tools to assess psychological distress due to climate change and evidence-based coping strategies to reduce it. My research aims to fill these gaps by creating a simple tool to measure climate change-related psychological distress and building and testing a new support program that uses text messaging to help those who are experiencing distress as a result of their concerns about climate change. This support program is easy to use and affordable, making it a valuable addition to our efforts to address the mental health challenges posed by climate change.
Uppalapati is a doctoral student in the Department of Communication at George Mason University and a research assistant at the Center for Climate Change Communication. Her research interests sit at the intersection of climate change and health, policy, and communication. She is particularly interested in applying insights from social science research to leverage support for pro-climate actions and equitable climate and health policies.
Maria Valdovinos (Sociology and Anthropology), "Theorizing Care in Reentry"
Criminal conviction produces a socially stigmatized group of individuals in need of care whose interactions with others are characterized by distrust, and whose humanity and worthiness is continually in question. For this group, the primary vehicle for accessing supportive services is the reentry services provider. Reentry, however, represents a context in which care and carceral governance intersect, calling into question whether care can, in fact, replace punishment. My dissertation will contribute to the theorization of care for a population that is highly vulnerable to the unequal distribution of care and protection. Such understanding also has implications for informing improved reentry policies and practices that can reduce post- incarceration recidivism and produce more equitable reentry outcomes.
Valdovinos is a doctoral candidate in public sociology and a Dean's Challenge Scholar. Her research is focused on issues of safety, health, and wellness in policing, corrections, and prisoner reentry. Maria’s dissertation addresses the question of how existing and envisioned institutions, systems, and policies can best organize the provision of care for the incarcerated/formerly incarcerated with a focus on the extremely consequential period between pre-release, entry into community corrections, and eventual release into the community.