Razan Ghazzawi

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Razan Ghazzawi

Assistant Professor, WGSS
School of Language, Culture and Society

Waldo Hall 278
2250 SW Jefferson Way
Corvallis, OR 97331
United States

Razan Ghazzawi is a writer, teacher, and a parent of wildlife. They did their PhD in gender studies at the University of Sussex in the UK in November 2022. They just recently finished their postdoc studies at the Forum Transegionale Studien in Berlin, Germany. Dr Ghazzawi's research interests include prison as a site of resistance, everyday protest, autoethnography, and research ethics in wartime. Dr Ghazzawi is working on their first monograph, an ethnographic exploration of sexuality politics in Syria and Lebanon in the context of revolutions, militarism, the ‘war on terror,’ and the ‘refugee crisis.’ 

 

 

Office Hours
By appointment
Research/Career Interests
  • Queer and nonbinary of color critique, postcolonial feminism, authoritarianism, and social movements.
  • Queer IR, gender, politics, checkpoints, prisons, war, and militarization.
  • Queer Marxism, transgender Marxist, feminism, social reproduction theory, sex work, and LGBTQ workers.
  • Queer migration, border policing, and racialization of social mobilities.
Education
  • PhD in Gender Studies, University of Sussex, UK, 2022.
  • MA in Gender, Sexuality, and the Body. University of Leeds, UK, 2016.
  • MA Comparative Literature, Balamand University, Lebanon, 2011.
  • BA English Literature, University of Damascus, Syria, 2003.
Service
  • Peer-Reviewer for AlMashriq Journal (2024).
  • Peer-reviewer for the European Journal of Feminist International Relations (2023).
  • Peer-reviewer for the Women in Middle East Studies Journal (2022).
  • Peer-reviewer for Kohl: A Journal for Body and Gender Research (2019).
  • Postgraduate Member at Large at the ISA LGBTQA Caucus (2022-2023).
Proceedings and Conference Presentations

  • 2024 Panel paper. Palestine as a Point of Departure on Syria. ISA Annual Convention. San Francisco. USA.

  • 2023 Roundtable speaker. Beyond Mourning: Gaza and Queer Theory. MESA Annual Meeting, Montreal: Canada. 
  • 2023 Presenter. Sex Workers Prison Strike in Adra Prison. MESA Annual Meeting, Montreal: Canada.
  • 2023 Roundtable speaker. Arab Mobilities and Exile. Academy Fellow APSA MENA. Montreal: Canada.
  • 2022 Roundtable speaker. Decolonization from the Global South to Global North. ISA: USA. 
  • 2022 Presenter. Queer Protests in Syria. MESA Annual Meeting, Colorado, USA.
  • 2022 Sex Workers Prison Strike in Adra Prison (Syria). BRISMES Annual Meeting, St Andrews.

Honors and Awards
  • Postdoctoral fellowship at the Forum Transregionale Stedium, EUME | 2022- 2023 academic year.
  • ISA’s LGBTQA Caucus Emerging Scholar Award, USA | 2022.
  • Nomination for the Adam Weilar Doctoral Impact Award at the University of Sussex, UK | 2021.
  • Media, Film, and Music School’s scholarship for international Ph.D. students, UK | 2017–2022.  
  • APSA MENA Alumni Grant | 2020 -2021
  • The Arab Council for Social Sciences grant to conduct fieldwork in Lebanon | 2018-2019.
Courses Taught

WGSS/QS 262 Introduction to Queer Studies

WGSS 414 Systems of Oppression in Women's Lives

WGSS 576 Transnational Sexualities

WGSS 617 Multicultural, Transnational, and Queer Feminism II

 

 

 

 


 

Additional Information

Published work:

  • Ghazzawi, Razan. 2024. "RHODA KANAANEH, The Right Kind of Suffering: Gender, Sexuality, and Arab Asylum Seekers in America (Austin: The University of Texas Press, 2023)." Mashriq & Mahjar: Journal of Middle East & North African Migration Studies 11.2 (2024): 160-163.
  • Abu Hatoum, Nayrouz; Ghazzawi, Razan. 2023. “Sumoud-Washing: A Queer Feminist Analysis for the Syrian Palestinian Struggles,” in Kohl: A Journal for Body and Gender Research.
  • Ghazzawi, Razan. 2022. The ‘Un-revolutionary’ Figure, Middle East Journal of Culture and Communication, 15(4), 347-357. doi: https://doi.org/10.1163/18739865-01504008
  • Ahmed Awadallah, Mohammed Kadalah, Afrah Nasser, Razan Ghazzawi. 2021. "Reflections on Exile," Middle East Report 301.   
  • Ghazzawi, Razan. 2021. "Reading the term 'White Syrian' through Fanon: An Anti-Colorist Critique," in Fanon Today:  The Revolt and Reason of The Wretched of the Earth, edited by Nigel Gibson (Daraja Press).