Beaney, Michael; (2024) “Not hired, but hosted”: The identities of displaced academics in UK higher education institutions. Doctoral thesis (Ed.D), UCL (University College London).

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Abstract

This qualitative narrative study examines the tensions and opportunities underlying funded placements that are offered to displaced academics in UK higher education institutions. These placements are offered by humanitarian organisations such as the Council for At-Risk Academics (CARA) and the Scholars Rescue Fund (SRF). Semi-structured interviews were conducted with thirteen PhD students and post-doctoral fellows. All of the study’s participants were displaced either from Syria due to its ongoing civil conflict or from Türkiye following its attempted coup of July 2016. The ‘small stories’ that emerged from the participants’ interviews were used as a means to elucidate their shared understandings of forced migration and placement with funded sanctuary scholarships in host institutions in the UK. Narrative and thematic analyses of the interview transcripts reveal the shared experiences of displaced academics as they move through different zones that are termed as Vulnerability, Assistance, Affiliation and Disaffiliation. Within these zones, a number of tensions and conflicts emerge, such as liminal identity, issues with supervisor relationships and a sense of precarity and marginalisation in host universities. Participants’ stories also reveal positive stories of professional and personal development and a deep sense of gratitude to such organisations for providing them with sanctuary fellowships. Concepts related to transnationalism and Bourdieu’s concepts of habitus, capital, and field, are also used to understand how displaced academics’ identities are impacted by their experiences and how they navigate the social field of higher education. With refugee numbers worldwide currently increasing and universities allocating greater funding for sanctuary scholarships, I argue that placement organisations must aim to place displaced academics in suitable institutional and supervisory contexts, that institution-wide support programmes be put in place to support displaced academics and provide peer support and a sense of belonging, and that greater funding be raised for placement organisations to respond to substantially increased demand for sanctuary scholarships. Such recommendations can ensure that critical scholarship and talent worldwide can be protected against a rising tide of political violence.

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