The “On Displacement” speaker series highlights researchers for whom issues of displacement are part of their work. The inaugural panel in this series, to be held March 10 from 5:30 to 7:30 p.m., will feature discussion among several Virginia Tech scholars.

The panelists include:

  • Rachel Lin Weaver, an assistant professor in the School of Visual Arts, who explores displacement and community art for social justice;
  • Anamaria Bukvic, an assistant professor in the Department of Geography, who researches climate change, coastal flooding, and decision-making;
  • Mel Jones, associate director of the Virginia Center for Housing Research, who focuses on housing evictions;
  • Gena Chandler-Smith, an associate professor in the Department of English and an expert on the history of African American migration; and
  • Cana Itchuaqiyaq, a scholar who will be joining the Department of English in the fall of 2021 and who focuses on climate change and indigenous communities.

The virtual event is sponsored by the Center for Refugee, Migrant, and Displacement Studies; the Office of Inclusion and Diversity; the Institute for Society, Culture and Environment; the Office of Outreach and International Affairs; the College of Liberal Arts and Human Sciences; and the Department of English.

Brett Shadle, professor and chair of the Department of History and a founding member of the Center for Refugee, Migrant, and Displacement Studies, will lead the online discussion.

The concept of displacement helps scholars focus on the temporal aspects of place within displacement, and the work of the Center for Refugee, Migrant, and Displacement Studies therefore emphasizes “the immediacy of relocation, the kairotic and active moment of movement,” defining displacement as a process rather than a destination, steeped in narrative, ideology, and epistemology.

Displacement studies, then, includes interdisciplinary and transdisciplinary research, art, and stories focused on the rhetorical, global, local, historical, structural, and intersectional issues of displacement.

To participate in the event, register here.