Dr Monja Stahlberger

Postdoctoral Research Associate

‘This is an ambitious project, spanning multiple time periods and looking in-depth at the experiences of many refugee movements to Britain. The potential contribution of our work for research, government policy and the institutions that work with and support refugees is significant’.

Nation of Refuge project is far removed from an ivory tower approach to research. It’s about knowledge exchange, community engagement and the voices of people with lived experience. And we’ll bring archive material alive through making it visible and talking about it in the mainstream.’

 

Monja will lead on Strand 1 of the research: Refugee movements to Britain in the 1930-1950s: a focus on children and young people 

Monja’s research examines children and young people’s experiences as refugees in Britain from the 1930s to early 1950s. She compares the accounts of children and young peoples’ personal experiences with how they were represented and perceived in Britain. For example, by the media, the government and the British people. She will also contribute to the research themes led by the other strands of work.

 

I’m excited about the opportunity to:

• enable our research to include less-explored archive sources using my working knowledge of old German cursive script.
• further expand my work about the emotion and development of displaced children within this project, examining how growing up is impacted by being a refugee.
• Put children’s voices at the centre of my research, ensuring they are listened to. This is essential given young refugees are often believed to have little agency in what happens to them as a refugee.