Let's meet our current guests, in Spring 2023:

_________  Abdie Kazemipur (Canada)

Where are you from?
I work at Department of Sociology, University of Calgary, Canada, as a professor and the Research Chair in Ethnic Studies. I am also the Academic Director of the University’s Research Data Centre. Originally, I am from Iran, where I finished my BA and MA in sociology at University of Tehran. I then moved to Canada to finish my doctoral studies at University of Manitoba, after which worked at universities of Lethbridge, Memorial, and now Calgary.

What is currently your main research questions?
I am currently working on three new projects:
- a quantitative study of the socio-economic experiences of Muslim immigrants in Canada, which utilizes a range of secondary data generated by Statistics Canada, as well as a nationwide survey of Muslim and non-Muslim Canadians to be conducted later in 2023;
- a mixed-methods study of the culture of migration in Iran and its consequences for the lives of migrants, non-migrants, and what I have called ‘subjective migrants’;
- a study of the broad societal changes in Iran over the past half a century, and their implications for the future of the country, with a focus on ways to (re)build the communal spirit.

What do you expect from this stay?
As a believer in the value of comparative research, I hope to benefit from brainstorming with, and feedback from, colleagues with shared research interests who are working in different countries. I also hope to build a foundation for future collaborative comparative work in any/all of the above-mentioned areas. I believe in the motto once mentioned by the American sociologist, Martin Lipset: “A person who knows only one country basically knows no country well”.

What has been the most unexpected or surprising aspect of your stay in Paris or Sciences Po so far?
As a first impression of Paris by a sociologist of religion, I have been amazed about the number of large and magnificent churches that exist throughout the city and in close proximity to each other. I am also impressed that despite the secularity of the population and the state policy of laïcité, which have defined the French society for so long, these churches have remained relatively intact and functional throughout the years.

What would you most like to bring back with you once you leave?
A better understanding of the French society and its intellectual history; more familiarity with the French sociologists and their works; and some basic understanding of the French language. 

University of Calgary Webpage - Personal website

Nubin Ciziri (Sweden)  ______________

Where are you from?
Uppsala University, Sweden.

Could you present your scientific field?
Sociology of migration and education with interests in ethnic studies and family sociology.

What is currently your main research question?
I explore how the process of migration characterises refugee families’ structures, practices and resources. I work with the case of Kurds who fled the Syrian war and reside in Sweden.

What do you expect from this stay?
I hope to write my empirical chapters and present them to the group at CRIS, as well as engaging in the seminars and doctoral events with colleagues.

Uppsala University Webpage  - Twitter

 _________ Olof Östergren (Sweden)

Where are you from?
I am Swedish and my academic home is the Department of Public Health Sciences at Stockholm University.

Could you present your scientific field?
Currently I am working on inequalites in social and health outcomes and health heavior during the coronavirus pandemic, mortality from behavioral risk factors for Finnish migrants in Sweden and the reflexive relationships between social and pysiological processes in relation to addictive substances and behaviors. I am also a program coordinator for SWECOV, a national transdisciplinary research program on the coronavirus pandemic. I work primarily with quantitative methods and with administrative register data.

What brought you to CRIS, and why were you interested in being a visiting researcher here?
My research interests combine social sciences and health sciences and I try to learn as much as I can from specialists from different fields. After defending my thesis in Sociology I was a postdoc in the social gerontology unit at Karolinska Instiutet. After that I worked with scientists and civil servants from several different fields at the Swedish govenrment offices, in a inquiry evaluating the political response to the coronavirus pandemic. I recently ended a year long research stay with demographers at INED. I came to CRIS to gain a better understanding of social inequalites.

What would you most like to bring back with you once you leave?
I'd like to develop as a researcher, both in terms of substnative knowledge and in terms of new perspectives on the topics I am working with.

Stockholm University Webpage

What is your topic of study and what is your home institution?

UNC The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill