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Research team

Prof Niamh Reilly

Principal Investigator

Gender-based violence and migration in Ireland (GBV-MIG Ireland)

Biography

Prof Niamh Reilly has published widely on issues of human rights and gender; feminist political and social theory; religion in the public sphere; transnational movements and the United Nations; and women, peace and security. Her books include: Women's Human Rights: Seeking Gender Justice in a Globalizing Age (Polity Press, 2009);  Demanding Accountability: The Global Campaign and Vienna Tribunal for Women's Human Rights (UNIFEM 1994) (Co-author: Charlotte Bunch); and two edited collections, Religion, Gender and the Public Sphere (Routledge 2014) (Lead editor) and The Human Rights of Women (Springer, Major Reference Works, 2019).

Dr Vesna Malesevic

Co-investigator

Gender-based violence and migration in Ireland (GBV-MIG Ireland)

Biography

Vesna Malesevic’s principal areas of research expertise are: the social construction of sexuality, non-heterosexuality, and gender; cultural construction of binary gender categories and the stigmatisation of the 'Other'; religion and sexuality within minority ethnic groups; secularisation, neo-secularisation and manifestations of the secular and sacred in society; religion and religious organisations, particularly the Catholic Church; and the sociology of medicine and health and healthcare.  Vesna is an experienced social researcher with particular expertise conducting research on issues of sexual health and rights with young adults and with vulnerable groups in Ireland (e.g., LGBTQI and Irish Traveller communities). Her work has been published in volumes by Routledge and Springer, as well as in the Irish Journal of Sociology and  Europa Ethnica.

Dr Nasrin Khandoker

Post-doctoral Researcher

Gender-based violence and migration in Ireland (GBV-MIG Ireland)

Biography

Nasrin Khandoker is a Post-doc fellow in the GBV-MIG project, a seven-country study on migration and gender based violence funded by EU Gender Net Plus. She is also an associate professor in the department of Anthropology, Jahangirnagar University (currently on leave).  She completed her PhD at the Department of Anthropology, Maynooth University in 2019. Her PhD was funded by the Wenner-Gren Wadsworth fellowship from US and the John and Pat Hume scholarship from Maynooth University.  Her PhD research was a post/decolonial study of female sexual subjectivity and desire as expressed through Bangla folk songs. She has also written articles on issues such as the critique of identity politics in relation to the Trans/Hijra community in South Asia, critiquing the idea of ‘women empowerment’ in development discourse and the consumerist aggression on the female body. Nasrin produced and directed a short documentary about the feminist use of symbols in Ireland, titled, “Claiming Body, Claiming Symbols.” Her research interest Gender and sexuality,  Sexual subaltern, Emotion and affect, Post-colonial critiques. Nationalism, Identity politics, Intersectionality and Subjectivities

Dr Orla McGarry (2019-2021)

Lecturer and Postdoctoral Research Associate

Gender-based violence and migration in Ireland (GBV-MIG Ireland)

Biography

Orla McGarry is a sociologist with extensive experience conducting research with migrant and ethnic minority groups. She was awarded a PhD in 2012 (NUI Galway) for her work on identity formation and cultural adaptation among migrant teens in rural Ireland. Orla is currently a lecturer in the School of Political Science and Sociology, NUI Galway and a post-doctoral researcher on the GBV-MIG Ireland project.  She has also conducted in-depth research on the health care issues and access of vulnerable migrants through the Graduate Entry Medical School, University of Limerick from 2018 to 2019.  Orla was a postdoctoral researcher on the Horizon 2020 YMOBILITY project which examined motivations and needs underpinning contemporary migration processes for mobile youth across Europe. In 2013-14, she was a research associate with the FP7 RESTORE project, which used a novel Participatory Learning Action methodology to examine and address communication barriers affecting migrant health in Ireland. Orla has published articles in the Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies and the International Journal of Social Research Methodologies among others, and contributed chapters to collections by Manchester University Press, Palgrave Macmillan and other outlets.  She has also contributed to media debates on migration and its societal impact in contemporary Ireland.

Dr Anne Egan (Summer 2021)

Post-Doctoral Researcher

Gender-based violence and migration in Ireland (GBV-MIG Ireland)

Biography

Anne Egan is a post-doctoral researcher attached to the GBV-MIG project.  She was awarded her PhD by the School of Law, NUI Galway in 2008.  During this research on fathers’ rights, she was the first person from an academic institution in Ireland to be granted permission to attend family courts as a researcher. She has lectured over a wide range of disciples, including law, nursing and adult education. Anne is at present a part-time teaching assistant in the School of Political Science and Sociology, NUI Galway where she teaches on the topic of domestic violence over a range of postgraduate and undergraduate programmes. Anne has previously published in the Irish Journal of Family Law and Northern Ireland Legal Quarterly. An article on the impact of the pandemic on domestic violence victims will be published by the Irish Journal of Family Law in late 2021. She was a member of the Executive Council of Treoir, the National Federation of Services for Unmarried Parents and their Children, from 2012-2015.