Katarzyna is a social anthropologist, her research focuses on gender, generation, youth, displacement, refugees, return of dispalced populations, impact of war on gender and generational relations, and identities, access to rights for refugees in urban settings, art and activism in the context of war and conflict. Katarzyna has researched since 2002 on displacement and forced migration issues in Egypt, Kenya, Sudan, South Sudan, Ethiopia, Jordan, Ghana, Kyrgyzstan, and Vietnam. She works with visual media, art-based research, feminist methodologies, and participatory methodologies.

Since 2002, she has been carrying out a longitudinal study of gender relation transformations among Nuer from South Sudan in Egypt, Kenya, South Sudan and in Sudan, Khartoum.

She collaborates often with artists in her research, and engages with art-based research to understand issues of belonging, displacement, mobilities and identities. She also is a film-maker.

Education

2005 – 2010 DPhil Development Studies/Migration/Anthropology at the Institute of Development Studies, University of Sussex, Brighton, UK PhD Thesis: In-Flux: (Re)negotiations of Gender, Identity and 'Home' in Post-War Southern Sudan

1997 – 1999 M.A. in International Relations, The Paul H. Nitze School of Advanced International Studies, The Johns Hopkins University, , Bologna, Italy/Washington, DC

1994 – 1997 B.Sc.(Econ) International Relations, London School of Economics and Political Science, London, UK

Voluntary Activities

Board member of the Khartoum American School – 2014-2016, Khartoum Sudan

Board member and founder of the Barbara Harrell-Bond Foundation – since July 2017

Board member of Association des Mediatrices Interculturelles (AMIC), Geneva, Switzerland – since June 2018

Films

(2018) Barbara Harrell-Bond: a life not ordinary, documentary: producer, researcher and writer; with Enrico Falzetti.

(2016) 2 Girls, documentary, researcher and producer. Received 10 first prizes – see below; screened worldwide.

(2015) "Time to look at girls: Migrants in Bangladesh and Ethiopia", documentary, researcher and producer.

(2005) "The Art of Flight', fabularised documentary about Sudanese refugees in Cairo, researcher and associate producer, Nomads Productions, June.

(2001) "Frankfuhrter Bahnhof" – documentary about homeless people, research and production assistant, ZDF Television, November.

(1999) The Crash" documentary about the international financial crisis, research assistant and production intern, Washington Media Associates, June.

Art Installations

(2019) January-March. "120 cows: violence against women"(120 vaches: des violences faites aux femmes) - St. Font, Lyon, France. Coproduction of the exhibition in collaboration with artists, researchers, refugee women and civil societxy associations.

Languages

• Polish (native), English (fluent), French, German (fluent),
• Russian, Italian (good knowledge),
• Arabic: Sudanese and Egyptian Colloquial and Nuer (basic working knowledge)

Media appearances

• Between the Lines Podcast: S02 Ep 10: Forced Displacement: Why Rights Matter – Lyla Mehta and Katarzyna Grabska. Listen by clicking here.