The LSE Scholars at Risk scheme is an LSE-wide initiative co-ordinated from the Centre for the Study of Human Rights. LSE SAR currently runs three programmes:
Hosting Programme
LSE Scholars at Risk houses, with financial support, scholars whose lives or work are being threatened in their home countries and who have research interests that coincide with those of the School. LSE is currently hosting an Iraqi researcher. We have previously hosted an Ethiopian economist, Iraqi professor of International Relations and a Palestinian economist.
Over time, and with additional and secure funding, LSE hopes to have a community of scholars here able to contribute to their respective fields of research and teaching in a climate of safety and conducive to the flourishing of academic pursuits.
Reconnect with Research
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English language and research classes for refugee and asylum seeking scholars with a social science background
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8 May – 3 July 2012 (eight Tuesday evenings 5.30pm – 7.30pm)
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The deadline for applications has now passed
Reconnect with Research | is an English language course with an academic focus for refugee and asylum seeking scholars. The programme will equip academics with the language skills appropriate for pursuing research work and furthering their academic interests. It includes academic writing, analytical and discursive skills and explores current research to promote research-centered language learning.
The course is for UK-based refugee or asylum-seeking scholars with a social science background who would benefit from enhanced English language support to introduce them to the UK Higher Education system. It will provide access to LSE expertise and resources and, we hope, assist persecuted scholars in returning to academia.
The Reconnect with Research programme is run in partnership with the LSE Language Centre. It is supported by the LSE Annual Fund.
More information about Reconnect with Research Programme.|
Visiting Fellowship +
LSE Scholars at Risk provides Visiting Fellowships for refugee scholars. The scholars, who are based the UK with refugee status, are welcomed into a host department under the LSE Visiting Fellowship scheme and provided with additional support, including grants to enable them to travel to LSE, by the Scholars at Risk programme. They are also given access to one-to-one language support.
We are currently supporting an Algerian researcher of gender relations in the Algerian diaspora and a Sri Lankan reporter of ethics in journalism.
Participants in the Visiting Fellowship + scheme are selected from the Reconnect with Research programme.
Background to LSE SAR
LSE has a long history of protecting scholars against persecution: in response to the persecution of central European scholars by the Nazis the LSE supported the establishment of an Academic Assistance Council (now the Council for Assisting Refugee Academics|) set up to help refugee academics. From 1933 the School invited scholars fleeing the war to continue their work in the safe and stimulating environs of the LSE, among them Karl Popper and George Soros.
The LSE Scholars At Risk scheme originated from a mapping study funded by a Pathfinder grant from the Council for Assisting Refugee Academics and is currently supported by the LSE Annual Fund|.
LSE is connected to an international network of universities and colleges - the Scholars at Risk Network |- that defends the human rights of persecuted scholars worldwide.
LSE SAR Events
Silencing the Classroom: Persecuted academics share their experiences|
LSE Scholars at Risk in partnership with CARA
19 October 2010
Speakers: Mina Al Lami; Dr Shumba Nephat. Chair: Dr Margot E. Salomon
Speaking Out: Academic Freedom in the 21st Century| - 23 March 2010
In this panel discussion, co-hosted with CARA, scholars from Iraq, Thailand and the Cameroon discussed the personal threats and difficulties that they experienced in carrying out their academic work.
Publications by LSE SAR Fellows
Attack from within: Fear of home-grown terrorists has created a battle over multiculturalism'| Mina Al-Lami, Kulturaustausch I (2010), Institut fur Auslandsbeziehungen
(link to Article as published in German)
'The jihadist style-journey: Germany's election and after|' Mina Al-Lami (with Ben Loughlin), Open Democracy, 29 September 2009