It all started in August 2018 when Noor Jdid (PhD candidate in Gender Studies at PRIO and SKOK, UiB) moved to Bergen. Being used to having a regular Migration research group meetings as well as a PhD network at PRIO, she missed a similar offer in Bergen. She discussed this idea with Amany Selim (PhD candidate in sociology at UiB), a fellow migration researcher. Selim then connected Jdid with Susanne Bygnes, who was then the coordinator of the network for International Migration and Ethnic Relations (IMER), consisting of mainly senior scholars.
Seeing this as a great initiative, Bygnes and Jdid organised an informal meeting inviting PhD students working on topics of migration and ethnic relations. This first meeting on the 4th of September was attended by over 15 junior scholars from a wide range of disciplines. During this meeting, Jdid introduced her idea of creating the junior scholar network with activities such as weekly ShutUpAndWrite (SUAW) sessions and monthly seminars. A few weeks later, Jdid met Ann-Cathrin Corrales-Øverlid (PhD candidate in Latin American Studies at the Department of Foreign Languages, UiB), who soon after became an integral member of the network, driving it forward.
The SUAW sessions started running every Friday from 9am to 4pm with great success and attendance. The network grew fast, becoming more established with Noor Jdid and Ann-Cathrin Corrales-Øverlid as coordinators. We soon noticed the importance of the SUAW sessions not only as a place to receive motivation and inspiration for writing, but also a space to help and support each other in navigating academia as well as exchanging ideas. We also realised that there was a wish and need to have longer and in-depth academic discussions. Thus, we invited Marry-Anne Karlsen to discuss the importance of including gender in migration research. We also had Marta Bivand-Erdal to talk about employing a transnational lens in migration research.
In addition to weekly SUAW sessions, the network has had several writing retreats outside Bergen. Such writing retreats have a considerable positive effect on writing productivity as well as social relations within the network. In addition to working several days in more or less ‘isolated’ cabins with few distractions and commitments, we have the chance to be inspired by natural surroundings and support each other in the writing process.
In Spring 2019, the University of Bergen Priority Area ‘Global Challenges’ allocated funds to promote scientific inter-Faculty cooperation in 2019. And, we are happy to announce that we have received funding, and that UiB Global Challenges are very interested in working closely with our network granting us yearly funding for our activities. This will facilitate our work immensely, and may open up possibilities for us to be not only a local network of support, but an active interdisciplinary and interinstitutional research network, as well as a platform for interaction, support and collaboration for all Norwegian junior scholars of migration and ethnic relations.
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As of June 2019, the plan for fall 2019 is as follows:
- September: PhD-relay for PhD-candidates in Bergen working with migration and ethnic relations. Organized by IMER (Marry-Anne Karlsen).
- September: Seminar with Pierrette Hondagneu-Sotelo, University of Southern California. Topic: TBA
- October: Seminar with Stine H. Bang Svendsen, NTNU. Topic: Decolonial perspectives.
- November: One-Day conference for PhD-candidates in Norway working with migration and ethnic relations.
- December: Seminar. Speaker and topic TBA.
(November and December may be subject to change, final schedule with exact dates will be posted here on our blog).
Post written by: Zubia Willmann Robleda
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