Susanne Åsman

Social Anthropology
MS/PhD student

About

Speaks Nepali and writes Devanagari, basic knowledge in Tamang language. Interested in contemporary Asian art & fascinated of Tibetan Buddhist death rituals.

Areas of interest

Trafficking/ migration for sex work/ trafficking discourses and the implications of its discursive practices in anti-trafficking initiatives and interventions/post sex trafficking and health/ health/ body politics/ gendered mobility/ gender/identity/ relatedness/ masculinities and sexualities/ Asia, Nepal, India

Current research

'Gender, agency and trafficking among Tamang in Nepal: The narratives, experiences and practises of Mumbai returnees'
Funded by Sida-sarec.

In a dominating trafficking discourse among anti-trafficking organisations the central districts in Nepal are presented as severely affected by trafficking to Mumbai’s red light district in India. On the women’s return to Nepal, it is claimed that they are rejected from their families and excluded from their villages because of the stigma associated with trafficking and sex work. They are presented as trafficking victims, victimized and in need of rehabilitation and reintegration.

During a 15-month period, ethnographic fieldwork was conducted in one of these districts, Sindhupalchowk, as well as at the brothels in the red light district in Mumbai. It emerged that from the women’s and the villager’s perspective, the situation was quite different. In stark contrast to the dominating discourse, the women who had migrated and worked with sex work were accepted and returned after several years to stay more permanently in the village. During the years in Mumbai a transnational social space connected the village and Mumbai with networks of relations and practices.

The project examines women’s migration as remembered and narrated in the village as a process in time, as wome’s migration has been going on in this way for several generations. It also explores women’s migration as a constantly ongoing contemporary spatial process, from the natal house in the village to the brothels in Mumbai and the return to the village again. In focus are women’s subjective and narrated experiences of belonging, relatedness and identityformation and their lived everyday practices in these different places. It also inquires into the social meaning of women’s migration for sex work in this context set against a background of a dominating trafficking discourse.

'Post sex trafficking, rehabilitation and health in Nepal'
Funded by Gothenburg University.

'Strengthening Health Education, Supporting Research, Monitoring Health in Nepal'
A project within a multidisciplinary platform project under “The Global University”, (The Sahlgrenska Academy, Faculty of Arts, Faculty of Social Sciences, Nordic School of Public Health, IT University at Chalmers)

'Children and their growth in an environment with honour and rumour communication in Sweden'
Funded by Siftelsen Lars Groschinskys Minnesfond.

'Rumour communication and honour related violence'
A project within Andreas Nordin’s project,

Teaching and tutoring

Teach at different courses and supervise at the undergraduate level at Gothenburg University, and since 2007 teaching at and head of the course "Trafficking…"at Museion, School of Global Studies, University of Gothenburg.

Field experience

• Minor Field Study (MFS) in Nepal 1999, funded by SIDA
• One year of field work in Nepal and in Mumbai and Kolkata in India, 2005-2006 within the Ph D project, funded by SIDA-SAREC
• Guest researcher at Tribhuvan University in Kathmandu in 2008

Selected conferences & presentations

"Circular Migratory Flows of Women: Local Social Memory of Changes in Women's Migration in Time and Space", SASON conference, Kathmandu, Nepal, 11-13 December 2006.

"Gendered Modernity, Positioning and Local Social Memory of Changes in Women's Migration" Second Gendering Asia Network Conference, Centre for Asian Studies, Akureyri, Iceland, 1-3 June 2007.

"Gender, Agency and Changes in Women's Migration in Time and Space", International Convention of Asia Scholars at Kuala Lumpur Convention Centre, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, 2-5 August 2007.