Between international students and refugees: Research methodology in migration studies

Based on her experience studying migration since 2013 and migration in Japan since 2017, Polina Ivanova (Ritsumeikan University, Kyoto, Japan) will discuss research methodology in migration studies, challenges she had to confront at different stages of her journey as a doctoral candidate and a postdoctoral researcher, and the ways her scholarship has informed her teaching practices. Her PhD dissertation examined thirty civil society groups supporting international students in the Kansai area of Japan while her first postdoctoral project looked into the effects of the pandemic on both students and their support organisations. In addition to her single-authored studies, Polina has worked jointly with multiple research partners across borders and disciplines on topics of international student campus satisfaction, loneliness, human security and human rights of refugees and asylum seekers in East Asia. She will share her experience with collaborative projects, shedding light on their attractive sides and potential pitfalls. As a predominantly qualitative researcher with extensive experience of fieldwork, she will compare ethical clearance process in three different countries. She will share her tips on working with major academic publishers as an author and as an editor. The talk will also touch upon topics of decolonising methodology in migration studies and realities of the ‘digital turn’ during and after the pandemic.

Polina Ivanova is a postdoctoral researcher at Ritsumeikan University (Kyoto, Japan) where she obtained her PhD in International Relations in March 2021. She is currently based in Brussels, Belgium as a Bluebook trainee at the Directorate-General Home and Migration (DG HOME) of the European Commission and is continuing working remotely as a visiting researcher at the Institute of International Relations and Area Studies of Ritsumeikan University. Her research interests lie in the area of international migration focusing on international student mobility and more recently on refugees and asylum seekers in Japan. Her forthcoming book “Civil society and international students in Japan: The making of social capital” (Routledge, 2023) is based on her doctoral dissertation examining interaction between civil society groups and international students in the Kansai area of Japan and her postdoctoral research on the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic. In addition, Polina participated in four collaborative projects with research partners from Japan, Australia, United Kingdom, United States and published six peer-reviewed articles and two policy briefs based on this work. Her current project is an edited volume on refugees and asylum seekers in Japan and Taiwan contracted with Palgrave Macmillan and bringing together 22 researchers and human rights activists from Japan, UK, US, Taiwan, Indonesia, and Czech Republic.

Der Vortrag findet in Präsenz statt. Ort: Japan-Zentrum der LMU, Seminargebäude am Englischen Garten, Oettingenstr. 67, 80538 München, Raum 131.