Migration and Social Justice Study Abroad

Since 2017, I have designed and led two-week Migration and Social Justice study abroads that involve global partnerships with forced migration and refugee studies centers. These interdisciplinary programs prepare students to investigate and respond to migration-related societal challenges, while also bringing together experts and researchers in the fields of migration, asylum, and Indigenous rights-based policy. These experiential learning opportunities develop from my applied programs with the International Rescue Committee in Jordan, where students at The New School critically examined humanitarianism from both a theoretical and hands-on perspective.

In 2021 and 2022, I led study abroads to the University of Oxford. This program focuses on past and present realities of racism, inequality, and empire through faculty, NGO, and activist workshops and immersive field study activities. We went on walks around Oxford to consider aspects such as the politics of imperial commemoration, which gloss over the violence of the UK’s role in transatlantic slavery. Students discussed the resurgence of imperial nostalgia in contemporary immigration debates. We visited stately homes and museums in Oxfordshire to think through imperial legacies and empire at home, as well as debating what a decolonized museum space could look like. We had field trips to Bath and London where we explored the Migration Museum through to artworks in the Tate Modern’s collection. With foodways trips to local markets and eateries down Cowley Road and Brick Lane, students also experienced Oxford and London through the culinary lens of diasporic communities.

In the 2023-24 academic year, I expanded the Migration and Social Justice study abroad to Cape Town with the University of the Western Cape and local NGOs and organizers focused on supporting asylum seekers and refugees, as well as those combatting the legacies of apartheid and effects of gentrification in the city. Students took part in Cape Malay cooking workshops and migration foodways journeys at local markets, topped off with trips to the Stellenbosch and Cape Peninsula regions!

For 2024-25, I migrated the trip to Northern Australia. Collaborating with local NGOs, community organizers, gallery curators, and academics from Griffith University, students explored social justice and rights-based organizing in Brisbane and Cairns. They worked through histories of social inequality and activism, while also enjoying the beauty of the surrounding region, including from the sky!

These study abroads encourage experiential understandings of migration and borders through inclusive and anti-racist pedagogy that challenges common stereotypes of Oxford (and other ‘ivy league’ institutions) as inaccessible.

I am committed to applying for grants to cut costs and provide scholarship opportunities for BIPOC and first generation students.