Now that we can understand globalization as denoting shifts in practices of development, in the movement of populations, and in the ways inequalities are mapped, we can appreciate the need to find new concepts and tools for engaging with the global in critical ways.

    Critical Global Studies is about recognizing that interconnectedness brings inequalities in distribution of power and resources. This research circle explores global issues such as emerging development donors, new European migration, e-frontiers, or despatialization of poverty. By drawing on an anthropological sensibility that privileges attentiveness to the contexts in which people experience global processes, our approach recognizes the interconnections between the economic and the cultural and the political, and the importance of adopting an historical perspective.

    Topics explored by members of our Research Circle include:

    • New agendas in migration studies
    • Changing vectors of development
    • Shifting understandings of global health

     

    Research Circle Members:

    Patty A. Gray, Department of Anthropology, National University of Ireland Maynooth
    patty.gray@mu.ie

    Patty A. Gray is a Lecturer in the Department of Anthropology, National University of Ireland Maynooth. She has been carrying out research in and about Russia on a variety of topics for nearly 20 years. She is currently pursuing two parallel interests: Russia's (re)emergence as a donor of international development assistance, and the ways that Russia's entry into the global 'club' of aid donors affects the well-worn development discourse of 'global north' vs. 'global south', 'the west' vs. 'the east', and the popular conception that aid 'naturally' flows from the former to the latter; and Russia's ongoing opposition movement and the creative ways that online social media are used by those who participate (not only Twitter and Facebook, but networking sites that are more exclusive to Russian users, such as V Kontakte and LiveJournal). LINK TO Personal webpage

    Mark Maguire, Department of Anthropology, National University of Ireland Maynooth
    mark.h.maguire@mu.ie

    Mark Maguire is Head of the Department of Anthropology, National University of Ireland Maynooth. He is a social-cultural anthropologist interested in international migration and security, especially counter-terrorism, biometric security, affective computing and the detection of abnormal behavior. He is author of Differently Irish (Woodfield Press 2004) and co-author with Fiona Murphy of Integration in Ireland: The everyday lives of African migrants (Manchester University Press 2012). He is preparing a volume on anthropological and ethnographic approaches to European securitization. Mark has twice held visiting professorships in Stanford University. He is Editor-in-Chief of Social Anthropology/Anthropologie Sociale, the leading Anthropology journal in Europe. LINK TO Personal webpage

    Sabina Stan, School of Nursing and Human Sciences, Dublin City University
    sabina.stan@dcu.ie

    Sabina Stan is lecturing in sociology and anthropology at Dublin City University, Ireland. She completed her PhD at the Universite de Montreal, Canada, on the post-socialist transformation of the Romanian countryside. Her post-doctoral work tackled healthcare reform, with a focus on privatization and the use of information technologies. Dr. Stan's current research interests moved towards the link between migration, healthcare and citizenship from a political economy perspective. She has published L'agriculture roumaine en mutation (CNRS 2005), and articles on post-socialist transformations, healthcare reform and informal healthcare practices in journals such as Dialectical Anthropology, Anthropologica and Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute. Her co-edited volume Life in Post-Communist Eastern Europe after EU Membership was recently published by Routledge (May 2012). LINK TO Personal webpage

    Thomas Strong, Department of Anthropology, National University of Ireland Maynooth
    thomas.strong@mu.ie

    Thomas Strong is a Lecturer in the Department of Anthropology, National University of Ireland Maynooth. He studies the symbolism and sociality of the human body. 'Symbolism' refers to the way that images of and ideas about the body are used as metaphors for conveying important social values, structures, and processes, including processes of historical transformation and change. 'Sociality' refers to the ways in which human social life is always embodied, so that each of our bodies, in health or illness, represents a conduit or site of connection to the people around us, to societies and to states. Dr. Strong pursues ethnographic work on these themes through two principal long-term research topics: modernity in highland Papua New Guinea and the 'government' of HIV risk. His courses have included lectures and seminars at undergraduate and postgraduate levels on: Kinship Today, Contemporary Anthropological Theory, Ethnography of Melanesia, Research Methods, Ethnographic Analysis, Social Change, Affect, Postcolonial Science and Technology, Introduction to Medical Anthropology, Global Health, Advanced Medical Anthropology. LINK TO Personal webpage
     

    PAST EVENTS:

    Rethinking Migration
    3pm, Friday, 9 November 2012
    Royal Irish Academy, 19 Dawson Street, Dublin

    Migration has long been problematized as a key challenge facing modern societies. From emigrant hemorrhages to fears over immigrant numbers, and from border control to the cultural 'values' held at the hearts of nation-states, migration will remain a key issue in the years to come. Scholars from Dublin City University and Maynooth University came together with activists and community leaders to discuss migration research at this event:

    Roundtable 1: What's the matter with Migration Studies?
    Participants: Gavan Titley (NUIM), Issah Huseini (New Communities Partnership), Luke Kasuwanga (Anti-Racism Network), Fiona Murphy (DCU)

    Roundtable 2: Migrations: New Research Agendas
    Participants: Mark Maguire (NUIM), Mary Gilmartin (NUIM), Sabina Stan (DCU), Neil O'Boyle (DCU)

    The discussion panels were followed by the launch of the book Integration in Ireland: The Everyday Lives of African Migrants by Fiona Murphy and Mark Maguire.