SOAS, University of London (The School of Oriental and African Studies)

Overview

Centre for Palestine Studies (CPS)

PhD Student Associate Member

Name:

Kim Jezabel Zinngrebe

Email address:

566041@soas.ac.uk

Thesis title:

Perceptions and practices of citizenship among Palestinian feminists in Israel

Internal Supervisors

• Laleh Khalili
• Ruba Salih

Biography

Kim is a first year PhD candidate at the Centre for Gender Studies at SOAS, University of London.  She holds a BA in Modern History and Politics (London), an MSc in Politics and Government in the European Union (LSE) and an MPhil in Modern Middle Eastern Studies (Oxford)

PhD Research

My research investigates how Palestinian women citizens of Israel who identify themselves as ‘feminists’ experience, conceptualise, and practice ‘citizenship’ and analyses the extent to which these processes challenge current citizenship discourses in Israel. Due to their frustrations with both the national and local systems of government, Palestinian feminists are virtually absent from conventional forms of political participation in Israel. Yet, there is a massive and ever-growing mobilisation of Palestinian feminist activists within Israel’s civil society that strives to advance Palestinian women’s status within Palestinian communities as well as Israel as a whole. In a context in which the artificial constructions of public/private spheres are insufficient units of analysis as Palestinian feminists constitute real political actors, a conceptual gap appears between existent analytical categories put forward by political scientists and sociologists and real citizenship activities on the ground. Instead of looking at the different layers of discrimination that have commonly been summarised as based upon the patriarchal nature of the nation-state, being part of a national minority, and being part of ‘traditionally-minded’ Palestinian communities, this paper takes into account the marginalised inclusion of Palestinian women as 'citizens of Israel' and assesses the way in which Palestinian feminists bargain with the openings between different layers of oppression and facilitation of their citizenship. In particular, the role of real ‘space’ as the very materialisation of citizenship agency will be explored highlighting the struggles to produce, regulate, and reproduce ‘space’ as a social relationship inherent to power and property dynamics closely bound up with the forces of production.

PhD Affiliations

Doctoral Studentship Evangelisches Studienwerk Villigst (funded by the German Protestant Church), awarded 2012