CALL FOR APPLICATIONS: RETHINKING POLITICS AND IDENTITIES/SUBJECTIVITIES AFTER THE WAR IN SUDAN
CALL FOR APPLICATIONS: RETHINKING POLITICS AND IDENTITIES/SUBJECTIVITIES AFTER THE WAR IN SUDAN
Deadline to submit the proposal: August 30th 2024
Curators and Editors: Abbas Reem (Independent researcher), Bassi Marie (Coordinator of CEDEJ Khartoum), Makawi Raga (Researcher at London School of Economics, editor at Africa Arguments)
The French Centre for Economic, Law and Social Studies in Sudan (CEDEJ Khartoum), whose activities are temporarily coordinated from Cairo, launches a call for applications for Research grants for graduate students (PhD and Master students) and researchers at the start of their career who conduct research in the social sciences and humanities on Sudan.
These grants are awarded in priority to Sudanese people who have been displaced and affected by the war, particularly to those who are based in Egypt and Sudan. Applicants who currently have a scholarship with CEDEJ Khartoum are not eligible for the call.
Thematics and Theoretical Framework
In 2023, a war broke out in Khartoum, Sudan’s capital and quickly spread throughout the country. Unlike other conflicts, the urban center featured as the main theater of hostilities. The ensuing and deliberate destruction of public institutions including universities, schools, libraries and archives has major implications for Sudan’s ability to overcome the crisis especially as its educated middle classes exit the country en masse. The long-term repercussions on the cultural scene as well as the ability to document the past and understand the present is another pressing concern, one that drove the launch of this call. The near and long history of Sudan’s struggle to transition into a democracy, including the substantial political episodes that unfolded from the 2018 revolution onward provide a context for the understanding of the current war. Longstanding issues of corruption, uneven distribution of wealth and power, national disintegration, civic fracturing, and paramilitary ascendancy are at the center of the 2018 social movement revolutionary discourse.
This call intends to help contextualize and theorize some of the themes at the heart of Sudan’s political crisis. It also aims to situate some of the more pressing issues that have emerged as a result of the conflict. The following five themes serve as a general framework to encourage more relevant debates around the realities of Sudanese people in exile and at home as well as what the future holds in store for them.
Priority themes
1) Migration and displacement
How the war has affected the migratory routes and experiences of the Sudanese, both in terms of internal and international migration; definitions of migration in relation to experiences of displacement, new subjectivities and transnational border control regimes are sought. Situating revolving identities to escape persecution and exclusion including adaptation of cultural similarities or emphasizing disparities and the politics that enable the transference between the two modes. How are people (ordinary citizens, activists, artists…etc) reacting to their new “refugee status? How is this new process/ incorporated into their everyday practices, and professional and artistic patterns? How and when do Sudanese “refugees” express their autonomy in the face of these forced displacements and controls? How these migratory processes have transformed existing family dynamics in Sudan”
2) Sudanese feminism/women movement: between peace and war discourses
Empirically grounded sociology of Sudanese feminist movements, in Sudan and in exile, formal and informal, radical or more institutional organisations. What is left if any of the 2018 revolutionary feminist discourse after the war and how is it being adapted to fit the post war context? Transnational political exchanges after the war due to mass displacement, where/how feminist debates feature in them and whether they drive the fracturing of the new social movement or better consolidate it within global networks of civic solidarities. How has the war affected the Sudanese feminist agenda and what has forced displacement meant for the viability of its national paradigm? What are the perspectives on the current militarisation of women? Would the current warscape (ie: women feeling unprotected and subjected to SGBV) impact gender power dynamics in the near future?
3) The enabled entrepreneur: Transnational modes of survival after the war
What sources of income and activities have the Sudanese set up to survive? Can we talk about a war economy or a survival economy? How are these survival tactics connected to and enabled through transnational modalities of access and pre-war privileges? Do they reproduces/reinforces pre-existing socio-economic inequalities or reshuffles the deck by allowing new players to emerge? Is post-war economic empowerment available for women and is it playing into new realities for them? How is economic empowerment playing into the family unit? This them e should contribute to theorising the rise of new forms of entrepreneurship with implications for post war reconstruction efforts
4) Overlapping/interactions between Sudanese and Egyptian post revolution solidarities movements
What parallels can be drawn between the social and solidarity movements following the 2011 revolution in Egypt and post 2018 revolution in Sudan and which interactions? Has the war in Sudan and the subsequent mass displacement to Egypt created opportunities for transnational solidarities absent otherwise and if so around what agendas and with what consequences on activism in both countries?
5) Fluid Identities in times of war
How the question of Sudanese identity and belonging is shaped by the war and is being addressed today. What changes have there been since the issue was framed during the revolution? How has the war discourse helped shape the post 2018 political identities towards a convergence or divergence from the goals of the revolution? Is ethnonationalism rising due to the war and how is this manifesting itself inside and outside Sudan?
Grant Information
The amount of each grant is set at 1500 euros . The grant beneficiary will receive 50% of the grant at the signing of the grant contract. He will receive the remaining payment when the final submission is submitted to the CEDEJ Khartoum coordinator – Marie BASSI – and after validation by the scientific committee.
Grants offered are not subject to taxes, and do not include open rights to social security. They are awarded as contributions towards actual research costs.
Grantees will become Associated researchers at CEDEJ Khartoum until the end of 2026. The association will grant them access to Cedej’s library and study center as well as membership to its various academic events on Sudan and otherwise.
What is expected from the grantee?
– Attend a theoretical framework at the onset of the grant to further explore the epistemologies of the postwar social and political context
– By the end of December 2024: Blog piece from 800 to 1000 words
– Between December 2024 and March 2025: Presentation at CEDEJ Khartoum of the general framing, and findings of the research.
– By the end of September 2025: a 5000 Word article (that does not have to be fully academic)
How to apply (before 30th of August)
Proposals and outputs are expected in English. As an exception and to facilitate wider participation we will select one proposal in Arabic. Statistically speaking you have a better chance of being selected if you submit in English, so if you can we encourage you to do so (the quality of the language is not a criterion).
Interested applicants will send an email to direction@cedejkhartoum.com and taysirelhadi@hotmail.com , with the following documents:
- a complete CV (1 page maximum) focusing on research skills.
- a publication no longer than 1000 words
- a research proposal (1page) indicating the main research question, the context, the methodology
The application will be examined by a selection committee in September/October 2025, which will consider scientific interest, feasibility and relevance of the project, the applicant’s ability to implement it.
OpenEdition vous propose de citer ce billet de la manière suivante :
luisaarango2020 (17 juillet 2024). CALL FOR APPLICATIONS: RETHINKING POLITICS AND IDENTITIES/SUBJECTIVITIES AFTER THE WAR IN SUDAN. Researching Sudan - A perspective on contemporary Sudans. Consulté le 8 novembre 2024 à l’adresse https://doi.org/10.58079/1212p