Steering group

Tania is a Politics student at the University of Edinburgh. She has been involved in feminist organising and student activism throughout her time at university, including through her presidency of the Edinburgh University Feminist Society, where she has worked on initiatives addressing gender-based violence, feminist education and women’s liberation. Her interests include gender justice, gender-based violence, feminist politics, and the experiences of marginalised communities. 

Her research interests span the nineteenth to twenty-first centuries in global, world and transnational perspective, as well as postcolonial, archive, museum, and memory studies. She is currently interested on the psychiatric treatment of queer desire and gender during the Cold War, and some of her research will be published in her forthcoming book, Aversion Therapy: Sex, Psychiatry and the Cold War (Cambridge).

Dr Wannes Dupont is an Associate Director of GENDER.ED. 

He previously taught at Yale-NUS College (Singapore), Utrecht University (Netherlands), and the University of Antwerp (Belgium). His work, publications, and teaching primarily concern the European and global history of sexuality, and the intersections of biopolitics and religion.

At IASH, he supports the work of visiting scholars and helps to present regular events across the College of Arts, Humanities, and Social Sciences and beyond.

She is a Senior Lecturer in Sociology and Principal Investigator of the project Teaching Feminisms, Transforming Lives. Her work demonstrates the importance of understanding gender politics at the intersections of caste, class, race/ethnicity and religion in women’s and social movements, in development policies and practice, in everyday social relations, and in the global dynamics of knowledge production.

Hemangini is a Senior Lecturer in Gender and Global Politics at the School of Social and Political Science. She has a PhD in Women’s Gender and Sexuality Studies. She researches and has teaching interests in transnational feminisms, postcolonial and decolonial theory, and gender and sexuality in the South.

Hemangini is also an ‘Annual Research Showcase’ and ’16 Days Blogathon’ Event Lead, and the Co-Convener of ‘Understanding Gender in the Contemporary World.’

She is one of the Co-Directors of GENDER.ED, and is a Chancellor’s Fellow in Sociology, School of Social and Political Sciences. 

Her research explores the socio-legal regulation of (primarily) women’s bodies, the politics of knowledge production, and feminist utopian thinking. She is particularly interested in reproductive and sexual governance and justice, and prefigurative policy reform.

Rachel originally trained as an archivist, and now manages archivists, librarians, and curators responsible for the University’s cultural heritage collections and welcomes IASH fellows to the Centre for Research Collections at the University. Rachel is Chair of the UK UNESCO Memory of the World Programme.

As Dean of Research, she is keen to promote research and engagement on issues of gender and sexuality across all of the arts, humanities and social sciences disciplines covered in the College.

Toby's interests include human rights documentation, the prohibition of torture, and freedom of conscience, and he has published widely on these topics. Running throughout his work has been an emphasis on the wider social and cultural significance of legal claims.

Ewan has helped build the award-winning map of Scottish witch trials – the Scottish Accused Witches project – using WikiData.

Having recently completed her PhD in the College of Science and Engineering, Joana brings experience as a researcher, educator, and student advocate to the role.

Her priorities include supporting ethical and accessible approaches to Artificial Intelligence use in learning and teaching, championing compassionate communication that helps students better understand and engage with University priorities, and supporting the delivery of high-quality education that provides clear value for students. She is also committed to improving the postgraduate student experience by advocating for clearer education pathways, stronger support, and a more consistent learning experience for postgraduate students. 

Dr Zubin Mistry is a Lecturer in Early Medieval European History. He is a historian of early medieval Europe between 500 and 1000 whose work focuses in particular on reproduction.

His research uses topics like abortion and infertility to think about religious beliefs, legal regimes, political culture and medical practice.

Zubin was the interim Associate Director for Semester 1 of 2025/26, whilst Wannes Dupont was on research leave.

She is interested in film’s engagement with religion and spirituality, representations and constructions of gender in visual culture, the Iranian performing arts and religion, contemporary expressions of Islam in art and material culture, and Persian literature.

Dr Kaveri Qureshi is one of the Co-Directors of GENDER.ED and a Senior Lecturer at the Global Health Policy Unit, which lies within Social Policy at the School of Social and Political Science.  

She works on intersectional inequalities in health, work and family life, and on the relationships between health and family. She also leads lines of inquiry around intersectional inequalities and coloniality within wider collaborative projects. She is the author/editor of more than ten books or journal special issues, including two monographs: Marital breakdown among British Asians (2016), and Chronic illness in a Pakistani labour diaspora (2019).