Current Editors
LEONIE SHANKS
Leonie Shanks is completing a PhD in the English department at Birkbeck under the supervision of Dr. Joanne Winning. Her thesis focuses on the epistolary correspondence and modernist networks of the marginal modernist Dorothy Richardson, and her research interests include modernist space and place, feminism, psychoanalysis, materiality, network theory and life writing. She also works as an Associate Tutor at Birkbeck. Before beginning her PhD, Leonie trained and worked as a social ethnographer, working with a range of local authorities and other public organisations to gather qualitative data and insights into the ways in which people lead their everyday lives. In this role she particularly specialised in working with families, young people and children across a range of different settings.
ANNA JAMIESON
Anna is an MPhil student in the History of Art department at Birkbeck. Her research focuses on the spectacularisation of female madness in the late 18th and early 19th centuries, focusing on the display and reception of mental health conditions now typified as female, alongside themes of dark tourism and freakery. She is also a part-time writer for various print and online publications, as well as organising events for Sabotage Reviews, an online platform which reviews independent literature: http://sabotagerev
Past Editors
Leah Sidi
Leah is completing a PhD in the English Department at Birkbeck on psychiatric and psychoanalytic discourses in the theatre of Sarah Kane. Her research interests include medical humanities, psychiatric discourses in literature, postmodern dramaturgy, feminist theatre and psychoanalysis. Before starting her PhD Leah worked supporting student activists on feminist and disability rights campaigns.
Jonas Green
Jonas is a PhD candidate at the Department of Psychosocial Studies at Birkbeck, University of London. His research interests include post-Lacanian feminism, spectatorship and film studies. Writing about attempts at traversing gender in the oeuvre by French film maker François Ozon, Jonas’s thesis is reexamining Lacan’s model of sexuation based on feminist explorations of spectatorship.
Claire Horn
Claire is a PhD student at Birkbeck’s School of Law and a teaching assistant in Criminology. She currently studies international laws governing developing reproductive technologies. She is interested in the politics of artificial wombs and issues of gender, race, and sexuality at the intersections of medicine and law. She is also co-editor of What Fresh Witch is This?, an online feminist publishing platform: http://www.whatfreshwitch.com/.
Marita Vyrgioti
Marita Vyrgioti is a PhD Student at the Department of Psychosocial Studies and an Anniversary Scholarship holder from the School of Social Sciences, History and Philosophy, at Birkbeck University of London. She works, under the supervision of Professor Stephen Frosh, on a thesis titled: “Devouring: a psychosocial critique of sovereignty”. Before joining MaMSIE as an intern, she has worked as an Editorial Assistant at Common Ground Publishing and as a Researcher on Educational Programs at the European Public Law Organization. She is also a regular blogger at ohnebinde wordpress, a platform for psychosocial critique.
Ozan Kamiloglu
Ozan is a doctoral candidate and associate lecturer at the School of Law, Birkbeck University of London. He teaches Criminal Law, and his research focuses on the ethics of Human Rights, questions surrounding violence and revolt, and relation between depoliticization and rights struggle. Ozan is also a film maker, and he is a part of the collective that organizes annual International Festival of Cinema and Women, Florence. This is why cinema and crime is also one of his research interest. He regularly writes op-eds and articles to journals.
Fernanda Ribas
Fernanda Ribas is a PhD student in the Politics Department at Birkbeck, University of London, under the supervision of Dr Joni Lovenduski and Dr Rosie Campbell. She is a School of Social Sciences, History and Philosophy (SSHP) Research Studentship award holder currently on the final year of her PhD. She is writing her thesis on the forces influencing the passage of gender-related policy in the Brazilian Chamber of Deputies, and how they are affected by the political context and change in government. She is the current editor of MaMSIE’s blog as well as an Editorial Assistant Intern at Studies in the Maternal. Before joining MaMSIE, Fernanda was a member of the Centre for Studies and Research about Women (NEPEM) at the Federal University of Minas Gerais (UFMG) in Brazil.
Eleonora Bottini
Eleonora Bottini is a PhD student in the Department of Psychosocial Studies at Birkbeck, University of London, under the supervision of Dr Lisa Baraitser and Dr Sasha Roseneil. She is doing her research on violence against women in Italy and the services for women who had undergone violence. She is currently an intern at MaMSIE. She is a psychologist, and before joining Birkbeck she had worked in psychiatric day centres and anti-violence centres in Italy.
Sara Paiola
Sara Paiola is a Mphil/Phd student in the School of Law at Birkbeck, University of London under the supervision of Patrick Hanafin. She is writing her thesis on the relationality between women who are mothers. Her theoretical perspective comes from Italian Feminism of the ’70s and 80’s and mainly from Italian Political philosopher Adriana Cavarero. She is an Editorial Assistant Intern at Studies in the Maternal. In the past she has worked for 10 years in the charity world, first coordinating a project of after-school and holiday activities for refugee children and then she has worked as a Family Learning Worker (Mothers and children) for a Feminist organisation working with women affected by domestic violence and gender violence. In the last four years she has become a mother and, among other things, she has understood the meaning of what is called the ‘work of reproduction.’
Marianna Leite
Marianna Leite was an AHRC SSHP Research Studentship award holder who completed her PhD in Development Studies at Birkbeck College, University of London, under the supervision of Dr. Jasmine Gideon and co-supervision of Dr. Penny Vera-Sanso. She used a Foucauldian discourse analysis to explore the significant shifts in maternal mortality reduction policies over the past decades in Brazil. This research was the extension of the work she conducted as a visiting scholar at the International Gender Studies Centre at the University of Oxford. She was the editor of MaMSIE’s blog as well as in charge of referencing and style for Studies in the Maternal. She also co-organised the Gender and Development research group held at Birkbeck and IOE and is an active member of the Latin American Gender & Social Policy research group co-hosted by UCL and Birkbeck. Before joining MaMSIE, she worked in international development, at various instances, for INTERIGHTS, ActionAid and the Center for Reproductive Rights.
Charlotte Knowles
Charlotte Knowles is a Ph.D. student in Philosophy at Birkbeck College, University of London. She works on Heidegger and feminist philosophy and her thesis is an exploration of Heidegger’s conception of Freedom in relation to theories of autonomy and the question of feminist liberation. Charlotte is an intern at MaMSIE and its associated online peer reviewed journal Studies in the Maternal. She is also a member of the Executive Committee for SWIP UK and recently helped to co-organize the first joint Ireland/UK SWIP conference ‘Politics and Women Across Philosophical Traditions’, which was held at University College Dublin from 9th-10th November 2012. Charlotte dabbled with the idea of posting a picture of herself riding a life-size, ornamental iron pig in Newport city centre as her editorial photograph, but refrained fearing it might make her look unprofessional.
Hélène Draux
Hélène Draux is a third year Ph.D. student in the Cities institute (London Metropolitan University) and lives between Goodenough College and Lancaster. She is currently writing up her thesis on the benefits and limitations of Participatory mapping (PGIS), a project which involved testing different data mapping techniques to support decision-making in the context of a flood-vulnerable open space in Portsmouth. Aside from her Ph.D., Hélène is involved in Studies in the Maternal for MaMSIE. In 2010, along with two other Ph.D. students, Hélène set up an annual conference at London Metropolitan University for postgraduate research students, along with a student-led peer reviewed journal The Metronome. When Hélène is not busy making maps, training for a triathlon, or organising Francophone events in Goodenough College, she can be found trying to bake new dishes. She is still looking for a way to create a 25th hour in the day – as well as a ‘finish’ button for her Ph.D. – and welcomes any suggestions related to these ongoing projects