Research




I conduct critical, interdisciplinary research on international migration and education, especially regarding migration governance, citizenship, and ‘integration’ in the Global North and settler-colonial contexts. My research has focused on international student mobility, higher/adult education,  internationalization, refugee resettlement, and economic immigration. As a Regulated Canadian Immigration Consultant, I also have applied expertise in Canadian immigration and citizenship policy and law.

My current postdoctoral research focuses on narratives of Canadian citizenship under the supervision of Antje Ellermann. It is part of cluster of research on citizenship and belonging in a globalized and digitalized world within the multi-institution Migrant Integration in the Mid-21st Century: Bridging Divides research program, funded by the Canada First Research Excellence Fund.

My PhD dissertation focused on edugration (an amalgamation of ‘education’ and ‘migration’). It argued that the recruitment of international students as (im)migrants has, in some contexts, become a distinct three-step economic immigration process, shifting the role of higher education in society. It framed edugration as a ‘wicked problem’ and thought through its ethical complexities and paradoxes in the Canadian context, particularly related to settler colonialism, surveillance, border imperialism, and mobility justice.

My MA thesis probed the meaning of refugee ‘integration’ by examining the experiences of refugees resettled from Aceh to Metro Vancouver five years after arrival. Through participatory action research, it used interviews and focus groups in coordination with Immigrant Services Society of BC and the Acehnese Canadian Community Society.

I have also worked on additional refugee resettlement research and curriculum design projects with Immigrant Services Society of BC and the Affiliation of Multicultural Societies and Service Agencies of BC in Metro Vancouver, as well as the Cultural Orientation Resource Center at the Center for Applied Linguistics in Washington D.C.

In 2007-08 I held a Fulbright grant in Ankara, Turkey where I studied in the Department of Communication and Design at Bilkent University.

This infographic summarizes edugration in the Canadian context:

 

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