Dr Tessa Altman PhD, MA
Honorary Research Fellow, Centre for Political Ethnography
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Tess Altman is an Honorary Research Fellow at the Centre for Political Ethnography, University of Southampton.
Tess conducts research on humanitarianism for and with migrants in hostile policy climates. Her ESRC Posdoctoral Fellowship at the University of Southampton extended the findings of her PhD in Anthropology at UCL, titled “The domestic humanitarian: Responsible neighbours, fairness and ambivalence in urban Australia”. Tess examined the political and moral subjectivities of volunteers supporting people seeking asylum in Australia as well as the gendered and racialised dimensions of humanitarianism.
During her ESRC Fellowship (with mentors David Owen and Jack Corbett) Tess conducted follow-up research in Australia and comparatively applied her research insights through engagement with the UK Sanctuary movement. Tess hosted a public roundtable and set up a working group to establish Southampton as a University of Sanctuary.
Tess advocates for collaborative methods and pedagogical tools, such as hosting performance ethnography workshops and helping establish a new fieldwork curriculum for PhD students at UCL Anthropology.
Tess also has experience working in government as a senior policy officer on multiculturalism and social cohesion, in NGOs and peak bodies such as the Red Cross and Volunteering Australia, and as a research consultant for NGOs.
Tess currently works as a Research and Policy Manager in the Australian migration and settlement sector, where she recently founded a Regional Settlement Research Network.
Academic Qualifications
PhD in Anthropology, University College London (2019)
MA in Cultural Anthropology and Development Sociology, University of Leiden (2012)
Honours in Social Anthropology, University of Auckland (2009)
Bachelor of Arts, Australian National University (2007)