Fields of interest

Min forskning - og deraf følgende vejlederkompetencer - centrerer sig om emnerne: Køn seksualitet, racialisering/national identitet og affekt. Jeg har erfaring med at analysere en bred vifte af kulturprodukter, herunder: Litteratur, litteraturreception, medie­tekster, populærkultur, ministerielle tekster, juridisk lovstof m.m.

Min igangværende forskning finder sted inden for rammerne af forskningsprojektet: Loving Attachment: Regulating Danish Love Migration (LOVA), som jeg er forskningsleder for. LOVA søger at belyse ”tilknytning” som en migrationsregulerende praksis. I en dansk kontekst er ”tilknytning” de seneste 15 år blevet et stadigt væsentligere styringsværktøj i forhold til det, som populært kaldes ”kærlighedsmigration” (f.eks. familiesammenføring, transnational adoption og transnationale ægteskaber). Hvad er forbindelsen mellem det juridiske tilknytningskrav ved familiesammenføring og det øgede psykologiske fokus på tilknytningsforstyrrelser inden for adoptionsfeltet i de seneste år? Og hvad indebærer det, at tilknytning øjensynligt er blevet den skala, ud fra hvilken man vurderer forskellige migranters integrationspotentiale?

Projektet har i 2016 opnået bevilling fra Det Frie Forskningsråd | Kultur og Kommunikation til DFF-Forskningsprojekt 2.

Se mere om projektet her: http://koensforskning.ku.dk/forskning/lova/

Tidligere har jeg beskæftiget mig med følelserne kærlighed og skam. Med udgangspunkt i den såkaldte "affektive vending" inden for kritisk teori, undersøger jeg, hvad hhv. kærlighed og skam ’gør’ ved en række forskellige sociale fænomener som fx politiske debatter og forskellige kulturprodukter. Jeg er optaget af, hvilken rolle følelser spiller i disse kontekster: Hvilken betydning har skam for den måde sexarbejde og asylpolitik diskuteres på? Hvordan struktureres nutidige forestillinger om gode relationer gennem forestillinger om kærligheden som altid-allerede meningsfuld og lighedsskabende (fx den gode familie, det gode parforhold, den gode arbejdsplads, den gode nation)? Kan kærligheden tænkes som en moderne styringsmekanisme, som ikke annullerer, men måske netop naturliggør magtrelationer? Projektet udføres bl.a. i samarbejde med forskergruppen Forskegruppe i affekt.

Min tidligere forskning forener flere retninger inden for identitets- og magtanalyse, men omdrejningspunktet er fortrinsvis en poststrukturalistisk og konstruktivistisk inspireret analyse af subjektivitet. Mine projekter foretager diskursanalyser af kulturelle produktioner af identitet og magt og kombinerer praktisk analyse med introduktion til og videreudvikling af teori.

Mine undersøgelser har især været inspireret af feministisk, queerteoretisk og postkolonial teori og diskursanalytisk dekonstruktiv metode. Min hidtidige forskning har centret sig om hhv. analyser af skønlitteratur og kritisk curriculumanalyse, begge dele med udgangspunkt i danskfaget. I begge tilfælde har fokus været materialets konstruktioner af kønnet, seksuel og (til dels) etnisk identitet.

Teaching

• Gender Research
• Literary analysis
• Queer theory
• Postcolonialism
• Discourse analysis
• Education and education policy in a power perspective
• Theory of science

Short presentation

Areas of interest

My research – and supervisor competences – centres on the topics of: gender and sexuality, ethnicity and racialisation, nationality, affect and power. I have experience from analysing a wide range of culture products, including: literature, literary reception, media texts, popular culture, ministerial texts, legal material, etc.

The focal point of my current research project is the emotions of love and shame. Taking my starting point in the so called "affective turn" within critical theory, I examine what love and shame, respectively, "do" to various different social phenomena such as political debates and various cultural products. I am concerned with the role played by emotions in these contexts: How does love function seen as a modern power technology that does not cancel, but perhaps actually naturalizes power relations? How does the concept of affective attachment shape modern migration politics? What is the significance of shame for how e.g. sex work or asylum policies are discussed as political issues? How are contemporary ideas of good relations structured via ideas of love as always-already meaningful and egalitarian (such as the good family, the good relationship, the good workplace, or the good nation)? The project is undertaken in cooperation with, among others, the Research group in affect.

My research has been inspired especially by feminist, queer-theoretical and de-colonial theory and more recently trans*- and crip-studies and mainly uses discourse analytical and literary analytical methods. My earlier research has centred on analyses of fictional literature and critical curriculum analysis, respectively. In both cases, the focus has been on the constructions of gender, sexual and (partly) ethnic and racial identity.

CV

ACADEMIC DEGREES

2008: PhD, Faculty of Humanities, University of Copenhagen.
2003: MA in Danish and Philosophy.

SUPPLEMENTARY EDUCATION

2017: PhD Supervisor Training Seminar

2012: Management development at UCPH, Core course for research group managers.
2010: Talent lab. Talent development course for talent younger researchers at UCPH.
2010: Teaching and learning in higher education programme, Faculty of Humanities, UCPH.
2009: Course in Peer Reviewed Research articles in English, Centre for Internationalisation and Parallel Language Use, UCPH.

EMPLOYMENT

2013-: Associate Professor, Centre for Gender Studies, Department of Nordic Studies and Linguistics, Faculty of Humanities, UCPH.
2009-2013: Assistant Professor, Centre for Gender Studies, Department of Nordic Studies and Linguistics, Faculty of Humanities, UCPH.
2008-2009: Part-time lecturer, Centre for Gender Studies, Faculty of Humanities, UCPH.
2005-2008: PhD fellow, Department of Nordic Studies and Linguistics, Faculty of Humanities, UCPH.

MANAGEMENT EXPERIENCE AND PROJECT MANAGEMENT

2015: Centre Manager, Centre for Gender Studies.
2013-: Research group manager, Researchers in Affect (an interdisciplinary and cross-institutional/ cross university research group).
2011-: Course coordinator for Gender Studies.

RESEARCH GRANTS AND ACADEMIC HONOURS

2010: The Nordwel Mobility Grant for a three-month Fellowship at The Centre for Gender studies, Department of Interdisciplinary Studies of Culture, NTNU, Norway.
2004: Received the University of Southern Denmark’s Gold Medal.
2003: The KRAKA Award 2003. Annual award for outstanding gender research, The Association for Gender Research.

NETWORKS AND ORGANISATIONS

2013-: The research group for Gender Research under The Bibliometric Research Indicator.
2010-: The National Coordination of Gender Research in Denmark.

SELEECTED CONFERENCES AND RECERCH STAYS
2011: Co-organiser: International seminar on Trans-studies, Faculty of Humanities, UCPH.
2011: Research stay: London: Contact: Yasmin Gunaratnam, Department of Media and Com-munication, Goldsmiths, University of London (2 months).
2010: Co-organiser: Seminar on the queer politics of migration, Faculty of Humanities, UCPH.
2010: Research stay: The Centre for Gender studies, Department of Interdisciplinary Studies of Culture, NTNU, Norway (3 months).

OTHER PROFFESSIONAL CONTRIBUTIONS

2014: Head of PhD assessment committee at INSS, Faculty of Humanities, UCPH.
2008-: Peer reviewer for the international journal Nora. Nordic Journal of Feminist and Gender Research (lev. 2) & for the Danish journal Kvinder, Køn og Forskning (lev. 1).

TEACHING, SUPERVISION AND PEDAGOGICAL EXPERIENCE

2017-: Supervisor of doctoral student, Sofie Jeholm.
2005-: Designing and teaching BA and MA curses, including seminars for PhD-students. Teaching curses on how to write a master thesis. Supervision of BA and MA students.