Research

RESEARCH & TEACHING INTERESTS

Gender and Politics, African Politics, International Relations, Comparative Politics, Environmental Politics, Feminist Political Theory, Development Studies, Field Research Methods, Qualitative Research Methods, Writing for the Social Sciences, Gender and Development

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Summary

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My research explores social transformation and resilience in communities affected by environmental or public health crises. My dissertation examines women’s pathways to empowerment in the context of gendered demographic change in African rural communities. The central question of the dissertation is whether and how male absence due to HIV/AIDS and male climate-induced migration leads to transformational power shifts in established social systems. I conducted 18 months of ethnographic fieldwork in rural communities in Kenya and Morocco in order to understand the dynamics of gendered power, adaptation ,and transformation occurring within social systems as a result of these environmental and health stressors.

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This dissertation also identified areas of further inquiry about the processes and mechanisms that enable transformation towards climate resilient systems. My recent involvement with a USAID funded project explored the ‘triple-nexus’ of climate change, gender, and state fragility in the Sahel, and paralleled many of the themes of my dissertation research across cases in West Africa. Since completing my doctorate, I have extended the lens of my research beyond community level contexts to bring institutional systems at the state and international levels into greater focus. I have published work in Disasters and Renewable Agriculture and Food Systems exploring institutional pathways to improving transformational mechanisms within resilience policy. In particular, I'm interested in understanding transformative mechanisms that facilitate institutional learning and community engagement. My postdoctoral research at the University of Connecticut built off my dissertation and later work on social transformation; it has involved building a theoretical framework that dissects the processes and mechanisms necessary for building resilience through transformative governance in wastewater systems in New England.

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I have also been deeply engaged with the ontological, epistemological, and methodological processes required for decolonizing knowledge systems within academia. I contributed a chapter to an edited volume on the decolonizing of theories and methods in International Relations. In this chapter, I share a participatory visual research methodology that I developed over the last ten years based on illustrated storytelling called Community Concept Drawing (CCD). This methodological work contributes to a critical ontological shift within the social sciences that looks to co-produce knowledge alongside research participants as a collaborative, iterative, and reflexive process. I have used the method to research the concept ‘empowerment’ in Africa, South Asia, the MENA region, and the United States. I have published articles in Field Methods and Sustainability detailing the CCD method and insights from its implementation in Kenya, Morocco, Senegal and Nepal. My current research uses the CCD method to understand how coastal communities interpret the concept of ‘resilience’- data collection for this multi-national project is already underway in multiple sites in the US and West Africa and anticipated data collection in Latin America and Europe will likely begin in 2025. This global data set of coastal resilience using CCD will allow for a comparative framework for understanding “resilience” policy globally.

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FIELD RESEARCH

• South Africa: January-May 2007

• Jordan: May- June 2012

• Kenya: July-August 2013; May 2014; January-June 2015

• Morocco: December 2012; January 2013; October-November 2013; July- December 2014

• Nepal: November 2017

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DEVELOPMENT RESEARCH EXPERIENCE

Sahel Triple Nexus Study (USAID/INRM/DAI)                                                             2022-2023

Washington, D.C., Sahel partner countries, Connecticut

• Participated in the Sahel Triple Nexus Study investigating the impacts of climate change, state fragility, and gender inequity. 

• Led the design of research methodology of this project. 

• Involved in selecting and advising consultants during the research project.

• Conducted a literature review on gender inequity in the Sahel, and in the five countries of interest. 

• Facilitated interviews with implementing partners in each of the Sahel countries of interest in this study.

• Analyzed the qualitative data from the interviews for each of the countries and contributed to the written report and case studies which were the final outputs of this project. 

• Presented study findings in a Sahel Regional Workshop (November 2023)

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Building Resilience and Adaptation to Climate Extremes and Disasters (DFID)      2015-2018

Florida; United Kingdom

• Developed questions and indicators for gender analysis for team field research in Burkina Faso and Ethiopia

• Conducted policy analysis of development programming to enhance gender equity among BRACED partners and project activities

• Identified gaps in gender equity within institutions and provided recommendations for increasing gender equity and capacity for gender analysis among partners

• Planned gender trainings and activities for implementing partners’ workshop in Burkina Faso

• Contributed to peer review manuscripts on project findings 


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Water and Livelihoods Initiative (WLI) (ICARDA) Graduate Research Assistant             2012

Amman, Jordan

• Conducted a desk review of WLI project activities and identified points of entry for improving gender equity and capacity building among partnering institutions within ICARDA

• Trained Jordanian agricultural extension workers on gender analysis and qualitative tools and methodologies for six weeks

• Facilitated focus groups alongside NCARE staff to conduct needs assessments with partner farming communities with a gender focus

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Climate Change and Food Security (CCAFS)                                                       2012-2014

Morocco, Kenya

• Identified indicators for gender analysis for wheat producers in Morocco

• Developed qualitative tools for assessment of empowerment in stakeholder communities in Morocco (6 weeks)

• Conducted focus groups and interviews to evaluate gendered access and utilization of climate information services in Kenya (8 weeks) 


• Developed and implemented quantitative instrument to assess linkages between climate information services, climate smart agriculture practices, and food security 


• Developed a research protocol to integrate processes of reflection within social science research

• Developed gender analysis training modules with a particular focus on gender equity and climate information services 


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