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Born in 1978, holds a B.A. in History from Tel Aviv University, M.A. in Latin American History, Tel Aviv University, graduate of the thesis completion course at the Department of Politics and Government, Ben Gurion University of the Negev. My thesis research focused on the commemoration of the 1948 War in Kibbutz Nirim, the formation of a unique local ethos and the interaction between national and local aspects within the local narrative. My doctoral research deals with the remembrance and commemoration of local battles that took place in five Negev kibbutzim, and seeks to examine issues such as peripheral and frontier identities, and local, regional and national identities within the kibbutz communities. It also aims to explore the local ethos as a means to cope with the kibbutzim's diminishing cultural, political and economic status in the national arena throughout the years.


Anna Meloch commenced her Ph.D. education at the Department of Politics and Government in autumn 2015. Anna’s future dissertation (under the supervision of Prof. Renée Poznanski) shall explore to what extent the notion(s) of ‘the burden of the past’ as well as countries’ historical commitment; have been forming and/or defining German-Polish-Israeli foreign-policy interactions (along with inward/outward (geo-)political vicissitudes), following the demise of the iron-curtain era. In 2013, Anna graduated with merit (magna cum laude) from the European studies programme (‘the European Forum’), the Faculty of Social Sciences, at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem – submitting a joint Master thesis in co-operation with the Department of Political Science (Chair of European Studies), the Faculty of Social Sciences, at the University of Wrocław (Poland). The thesis was entitled, as follows:  “'Poland-Israel: Relations in Flux?' Polish-Israeli Bilateral Relations in the Face of Polish Europeanization; Changes and Challenges in the New International Arena.” Additionally to the aforementioned Master degree, Anna holds a B.A. in History of Art and French Language and Literature (with an emphasis on French Culture), from the Faculty of Humanities at the University of Haifa. Moreover, Anna has also been studying Computer Engineering at the Technical University of Wrocław (Poland).
Curriculum Vitae


Aya Shoshan is a PhD candidate in the department of Politics and Government. She is interested in organizational structures, internal democracy and forms of decision-making in social movements. She uses sociological theories to explain differences between movements. Her current research focuses on the 15M movement in Spain and the social protests of summer 2011 in Israel. Aya is involved in the establishment of the "Israeli Summer Digital Collection", aiming to preserve and make accessible original materials from the Israeli social protests to researchers and the general public. She completed her B.A. at Yale University and her M.A. in the department of Politics and Government in Ben Gurion.
 
 
My name is Ayala Paz and I'm a PhD student in the Politics and Government department in the Ben-Gurion University of the Negev. My main interest is in Political Theory, Holocaust Memory and the ability of the individual to be a political agent in the modern world. I completed my M.A. in the department, and under the guidance of Dr. Becky kook I researched the contemplation of the political theorist, Hannah Arendt, focusing on the universal memory of the Holocaust and the need to learn lessons exceeding the solution of the Jewish problem. I offered an original reading of Hannah Arendt's book, Eichmann in Jerusalem, as an expression of her perception of the political sphere, the individual's mental and moral activity and totalitarian regimes, in accordance to the way she analyzed them in her book, The Origins of Totalitarianism.
My current research deals with the crisis of humanity in the modern era, according to Arendt's theory which originates in a sharp thinking crisis, and the strong interaction that exists in her theory between critical thought and a moral political action. The research focuses on the meaning and placement of the definition of "the dialogue" in the modern era, according to Arendt's theory, and the absence of the dialogue as a modern phenomenon which constitutes the essence of the crisis which befalls today's humanity. The concepts "Dialogue" and "Resistance" are in the core of the study, and they are discussed through their contemporary aspects, that are relevant to the political day by day existence in democratic societies in our time.
Curriculum Vitae     



Debby Farber is a scholar and curator. Her PhD research in the department of Politics and Government in Ben Gurion, supervised by Prof. Haim Yaacobi and Prof. Amnon Raz-Krakotzkin, concerns the performative practices of border in relation to archival images of the built landscape in the state of Israel, taken between 1949-1967. Debby is interested in the linkages between Visual Culture, History and Political Geography focusing on the visual historiography of Israel/Palestine. She completed her MA with distinction in the Cultural Studies Program from The Hebrew University of Jerusalem and BA in Fine Arts from the Bezalel Academy for Arts and Design, Jerusalem.


Gita Kiperman’s research deals with the connection between the political and therapeutical fields. Her research looks into the practice known as “Re-evaluation Counseling”, which offers a radical combination between psychology and politics through peer counseling. Gita holds a B.A (cum laude) in Psychology, Literature and Gender from Ben Gurion University, an M.A. in Clinical Psychology from Tel-Aviv University, and takes part in various activist organisations.


Hagit's research brings together theory, activism and art practices. It concerns open-source, citizen-driven map-making technologies in Jerusalem as an instructive case-study for probing the political and spatial implications of collaborative technologies and Do It Yourself practices in contested urban environments. Hagit's areas of interest are political theory, urban studies, visual culture, citizen science, STS, focusing on material, device-based and everyday forms of political participation in the city. She takes part in the Public Laboratory for open Technology and Science as an active contributor and organizer, and participates in the Photo-Lexic research group, initiated by Dr Ariella Azoulay. Among other publications she published an article that re-defines the concept of “aerial photography” in Mafte'akh, a Lexical Review for Political Thought. Hagit completed her MA with distinction from the Granada Centre for Visual Anthropology, University of Manchester (UK) and BA in Fine Arts from the Bezalel Academy for Arts and Design, Jerusalem.
 
 
 
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Hila Zahavi is a PhD student in the Department of Politics and Government at Ben-Gurion University of the Negev (BGU), Israel. Her main interest is the European Union, focused on the European Higher Education Area, Higher Education Policies, and Normative Power. Her PhD research focuses on the Normative Power theory and the Othering theory in international relations and its implementation in the Global Strategy of Bologna process. In 2012 she was a founding member of the Bologna Training Center at Ben-Gurion University of the Negev.
 
 
My research interest are: African studies, sports, development and migration. In my research I examine the role football academies in Ghana play within the local communities, from the local residents' point of view. This is an ethnographic research that combines observations of the academies' activity (trainings, games) and interviews with owners, directors and coaches, academy boys and girls, the children's parents and different locals surrounding the academy such as fans and store sellers. From the initial field work I have conducted, it seems as football academies facilitate development in different aspects, including sports, education, health, economically and socially.
Curriculum Vitae
 

 

Lia Moran-Gilad is a PhD student at the Department of Politics & Government, Ben-Gurion University of the Negev and recipient of the Kreitman Fellowship Award for Doctoral Studies. Lia’s doctoral thesis, under the supervision of Prof. Sharon Pardo, deals with capacity-building in the European region as evidence for diffusion of Europe’s Normative Power. She holds BA and MA degrees from Ben-Gurion University in the fields of Middle East Studies, Military and Security and International Relations with the focus of her MA dissertation being international monitoring interventions for the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Lia has earned a certification in Special Education from the Levinsky College of Education (with highest distinction) and is a certified Animal-Assisted Therapist. She has published several papers in her areas of interest and received the Inbar Foundation Prize for her publication “Bioterrorism – Clear and Immediate Danger?” (2000).
Over the last decade, Lia held several senior positions at the Israeli Ministry of Defense, the Prime Minister’s Office and National Security Council. She is highly experienced in strategy and policy-making and work with government decision-makers. Under this capacity, Lia has been involved hands-on with key issues in the Israeli agenda, including Foreign and Defense Policy development, The Disengagement Plan and military conflicts (Second Lebanon War and Operation ‘Cast Lead’). Lia was a core member of the Peace Negotiation Team with the Palestinians during the Annapolis peace process. In recent years Lia has specialized in Borders, particularly the MOD’s Crossing Points between Israel and the Palestinian National Authority.
 
Liat Milwidski is a PhD student in the Department of Politics and Government at the Ben Gurion University in the Negev. She has a BA from the Department of Sociology and Anthropology and the Department of International Relations and an MA with an honors scholarship from the Department of Sociology and Anthropology – all in the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. Her MA thesis, supervised by Prof. Judith Shoval, analyzed the case of dual nurses who redefine the boundaries between conventional and alternative medicine. In her current PhD research, supervised by Profs. Dani Filc and Nadav Davidovich, she examines the boundary work between different types of knowledge and perceptions of risk in the case of mobile phones in Israel. At the same time, she coordinates research on Formulating Environmental and Health Policy under Conditions of Scientific Uncertainty, sponsored by the Environment and Health Fund. Liat is the secretary of the Israeli Sociology Society (ISS), co-edits its newsletter Sociology, and coordinates its Health and Medicine professional community. Over the past six years, she has also served as a teaching assistant in MA programs of family studies and organizational consulting and development, as well as the BA program of behavioral sciences at the College of Management – Academic Studies Division.
 
 
Engaged in political geography of divided cities and Jerusalem in particular, focusing on how political power relations are shaping the daily life and produce spatial  segregation and integration. Also interested in the structural interactions between religion, civil society and local politics.
 
 
Stemming from my experience as an architect and urban planner, my research explores the relationship between urban informality, planning knowledge and expertise and human and civil rights struggles. Working within a comparative urbanism framework, my dissertation project focuses on the production of urban environments in Israel/Palestine and United-States/Mexico border regions. The findings of my study on current planning processes in Arab Jerusalem’s neighborhoods have been recently published in Environment and Planning A (2013). I hold a B.Arch (Summa cum Laude) from the Technion - Israel Institute of Technology, and an M.A. (Summa cum Laude) from Ben Gurion University.
 
 
Naama is a doctoral student at the Department of Politics and Government at Ben Gurion University in Israel, and a visiting researcher at the Department of Anthropology, Archaeology and Sociology at James Cook University in Townsville. Naama holds an MA in Sociology and Anthropology from Tel Aviv University. Her thesis dealt with perceptions of sovereignty by two juxtaposed groups – settlers in the outpost Amona and demonstrators against the Separation Wall in Bil’in. Naama’s PhD research is a comparative study of indigenous mobilities to settler cities in Israel and Australia. After having completed her fieldwork in Israel, Naama is currently conducting a second period of field research in the city of Townsville in northern QLD. Alongside her studies Naama maintains strong ties to local civil societies; she is a human rights activist with extensive professional experience in non-governmental organizations.
 
 
My research combines the fields of politics and science and technology studies. I aim at understanding how risk is configured, managed and understood in the field of personalized medicine. I focus specifically on the role technological information artifacts play in this process. The case study for my research is a clinical trial involving a method for the personalized treatment of cancer. In the trial an algorithm was developed to assess the efficacy and risks of drugs for each individual patient, based on her specific genetic and molecular make-up.
I hold an MA degree in sociology from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. My thesis focused on the development of the concept of citizenship in the European Union from a historical-institutional perspective. I also hold an MSc degree in information systems management from the London School of Economics. My dissertation there explored the standardizing effect on clinical healthcare work of an ERP system implementation. I have professional experience in both sociology and information systems.
I am married to Leah, and we live in Rehovot,  where we raise our energetic daughter.
Research interests: political sociology, political and social theory, science and technology studies, politics and sociology of medicine, information systems research.
 
 
Netta Isralowitz' is a P.H.D Candidate in Ben-Gurion University in the Department of Politics and Government. My  B.A. is  in Behavioral Studies from Tel-Aviv Academic College, and my M.A. degree is  from Ben Gurion University in Conflict Management and Resolution. My M.A. Thesis research focused on The Difference in Attitudes among Israeli and Palestinians regarding the Israeli-Palestinian Conflict. My doctoral research will focus on the issue of political culture, and will examine whether Asian foreign students from who come to Israel to study, experience self empowerment which leads to a change in self-expression values and democratic values.  
Curriculum Vitae 

 
My PhD research is focused on independent migration of unaccompanied children and adolescents in Southern Africa. My main focal point is Zimbabwe as source and transit country for many migrants and asylum seekers. I'm interested in understanding the ways in which local perceptions of childhood and adolescence influence migration and the dynamic between these realities and international policy making.
 
 
 
My primary researches are focusing on Latin America Jewry and the contemporary Jewish immigration to Israel from Latin America. The main interest I have concern with the production of collective identity of the Latin American migrants to Israel by the government but also from the migrants perspective as well. I also observe the social relation emerges from the encounter between the Latin migrants and other members from different social groups in Israel. Except of my research about contemporary immigration from Latin America, I am interesting in the history of Latin America Jewry and particularly its life under military, sometime anti-Semite, terror regime at the second half of the twentieth century.
In addition to my interests above I am currently participating in research about the separation wall/fence at the Israel-Palestine border. I mostly interest in the non-physical aspect of borders, meaning the social production and socialization processes of borders that justify its existence.
 
 
I hold an M.A. in public policy and a B.A in social work from Tel-Aviv University and am currently a PhD student in the Department of Politics and Government at Ben-Gurion University of the Negev, under the guidance of Prof. Dani Filc and Prof. Nadav Davidovich. My professional experience includes 12 years of work in NGO's in the field of education and health. My current research is on the evolution of the discourse on health inequalities in Israel since the late 70's, amongst different actors in the health field. In addition, my research interests include health policy, the social determinants of health and economic, social and cultural human rights.

 
 
 
 
Yoav Freidman is a doctoral student in the Department of Politics and Government at Ben-Gurion University in the Negev (BGU). Yoav is a graduate of the 'European Forum' MA program at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem and holds a BA in European History from BGU.
His research asks to conceptualize the Bologna Process and the establishment of the European Higher Education Area (EHEA) in light of normative theories and the regime theory. 
Yoav worked as a research assistant and project coordinator at the Centre for the Studies of European Politics and Society (SCEPS) from 2009 and currently works as a project coordinator at the Bologna Training Center (BTC) and serves as a member at the European Student Association Pool of QA Experts.