About

I earned an M.A. degree in International Peace Studies from the University of Notre Dame and an M.A. degree in Strategies and Methods of Nonviolent Social Change from the University of Belgrade. I received a B. A. from University of Belgrade, majoring in Special Education and Rehabilitation.

I am a biocultural anthropologist specializing in migration and refugee studies. My dissertation research work focuses on understanding the social processes and meanings underlying routinized social practices (RSPs) and their biological impacts, especially within encampment settings. By taking a within and cross-site comparisons approach on two refugee populations in Serbia and Kenya, I combine ethnographic analysis with physiological biomarkers to examine the impact of everyday lived experiences on social systems, values, identities, and health.

PhD Year
2021
Thematic Interests

What captured the very core of the unsettled interest of mine was the outburst of Middle Eastern and African refugee influx to the Western Balkans in June 2015, the region that constitutes a safe passageway to the EU. Nonetheless, there are over 600,000 encamped refugees in Sub-Saharan Africa. My research aspiration is to examine the complexity of migratory phenomenon by comparing and contrasting experiences of encamped and transitory refugees in East Africa and Eastern Europe. I also want to examine the ways in which refugee camps in developing countries shape most Western images and solutions of the refugee phenomenon, although there is a growing use of refugee detention centers in developed nations, as an ephemeral answer to contemporary refugee problem. The anthropological analytical framework I employ represents a basic structure for grasping the dynamic between biological and human cultural systems in the state of forced/transit migration. By engaging and conjoining biological and human cultural concepts I seek to understand how refugees, who survived wars, cope with the immense changes brought by forced displacement while struggling to restructure their identity and place at both individual and collective levels. I also seek to understand the patterns and processes not only of the forced/transitory migratory movement but also at play in refugees’ resettlement and integration practices.

Current Research

refugees, displacement, forced migration, lived experiences, physiology, demogracy, participation, human dignity, human rights

Regions
Research Tags