The Centre for Diaspora and Transnational Studies would like to welcome our new faculty member, Tracy Lemos!
T. M. Lemos is a historian of violence and a religion scholar. Originally trained in biblical studies and the ancient history of Israel/Palestine, her research has turned in the past decade to the comparative history of violence and genocide studies. She has published on dehumanization, rituals of violence, gender and violence--focusing especially on masculinity--and how violence relates to and produces social hierarchies of various kinds. She is currently writing a book on healing from dehumanizing violence that examines how communities develop robust modes of resisting dehumanization that are both specific to the forms of violence deployed against them and also reflect and draw inspiration from the responses of other dehumanized communities. The book thus examines healing from dehumanization--or rehumanization--as a transnational and transhistorical phenomenon. Lemos is also interested in the history of kinship and family and has begun a collaborative project with the anthropologist Andrea S. Allen exploring the development of new forms of kinship in queer communities in contemporary Canada and the United States. The project will foreground not just the anthropological aspects of queer kinship but the ethical aspects, as well, highlighting the liberative aspects of queer families but also the ways in which queer kinship sometimes perpetuates cultural, racial, and other hierarchies.
Please join us in warmly welcoming Professor Tracy Lemos!