Refuge, How the State Shapes Human Potential

The Department of Anthropology is hosting a colloquium titled, "Refuge, How the State Shapes Human Potential," with Heba Gowayed.

Drawing on a global and comparative ethnography, this talk explores how Syrian men and women seeking refuge in a moment of unprecedented global displacement are received by countries of resettlement and asylum—the U.S., Canada, and Germany. It shows that human capital, typically examined as the skills immigrants bring with them that shape their potential, is actually created, transformed, or destroyed by receiving states’ incorporation policies. Since these policies derive from historically informed and unequal approaches to social welfare, refugees’ experiences raise a mirror to how states (re)produce inequality.

The colloquium will be held in Room 8417 Social Sciences, and a small reception will follow.

About Heba Gowayed

Heba Gowayed is an associate professor in the Department of Sociology, CUNY Hunter College & Graduate Center. Heba’s research, which is global and comparative, centers the lives of people who migrate across borders, and the unequal and often violent institutions they face. She is author of an award winning book Refuge, published with Princeton University Press, which explores how states shape the potential of people pursuing refuge within their borders. She is currently working on her second book, The Cost of Borders, which theorizes borders as series of costly, and often deadly, transactions.

For more on her academic and public writing check out her website at hebagowayed.com.

Host or Publisher IRIS NRC