Grant for Research on Queer Refugees

The GEST programme at the University of Iceland has been awarded a three-year research grant from the Icelandic Research Fund for the project Queer Refugees in Queer Utopias: Inclusions and Exclusions. People who flee persecution because of their sexual orientation or gender identity and expression (SOGIE) constitute a particularly vulnerable group of migrants in asylum, integration, and deportation processes. Through qualitative methods, the aim of the project is to generate knowledge on the social experiences of SOGIE refugees in Iceland, with an international focus towards Italy and Greece. It involves policy-relevant research that seeks to enhance political understanding of this specific group of refugees and improve their conditions.

 

The project was initiated by GEST, which will also manage it; it is headed by project and research manager Thomas Brorsen Smidt as well as the principle investigator Guðbjörg Ottósdóttir from the Faculty of Social Work at the University of Iceland. Other team members are sociologist Árdís Kristín Ingvarsdóttir and anthropologist Linda Sólveigar- og Guðmundsdóttir, in addition to Maja Hertoghs from the Department of Public Administration and Sociology at Erasmus University Rotterdam. Together the research team constitutes the Icelandic branch of QUEEN (Queer Refugee Research Network). It was established in October 2019 when GEST organized a two-day workshop at the Nordic House in Reykjavik with the participation of experts from all the Nordic countries to discuss the prospects of collaborating on research related to SOGIE refugees. Over the next three years, GEST is looking forward to connecting and collaborating with other QUEEN members at the University of Oslo, Uppsala University, Aalborg University, and the Migration Institute of Finland