Sophie Harman, Ph.D.

s.harman@qmul.ac.uk

Queen Mary University of London

Phone: 00447779111715

Address: School of Politics and International Relations, Queen Mary University of London, Mile End Road

City: London, England - E1 4NS

Country: United Kingdom

About Me:

Professor of International Politics specialising in global health politics, visual method and film, and feminist international relations. BAFTA nominated (2019) for work as Producer and co-writer of feature film Pili, recipient of PSA Joni Lovenduski Prize for outstanding professional achievement by a mid-career scholar (2018) and Philip Leverhulme Prize (2018), and founding member of the BISA and ISA Global Health working group sections. I know lots about: the politics of COVID-19, HIV/AIDS and Ebola; global health funders such as the World Bank and the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation; global health security; women, gender, and global health; how to produce and distribute a film. I also know lots about editing journals, being a woman in academia, mentoring, judging book prizes, teaching International Relations.

Research Interests

African Politics

Health Politics and Policy

Foreign Aid

Gender and Politics

Film And Politics

Visual Politics

HIV/AIDS Africa

Ebola

Gender

COVID19

Coronavirus

Global Health Security

My Research:

I conduct research into global health politics, visual methods, African agency, and feminist International Relations. This has specifically focused on: How institutions of global health governance advance political agendas through specific health strategies, How global health is used to reconfigure aspects of the African stateHow African Agency is expressed in international relationsThe illegitimacy of the Bill and Melinda Gates FoundationThe flawed nature of performance and results based financingCivil Society participation in HIV/AIDS programmesMulti-level and multi-sectoral governanceConspicuous Invisibility of Women and Gender in Global HealthCivil Military relations in the 2014/15 Ebola ResponseHow to co-produce academic researchHow to produce a feature film and get it distributedI have experience conducting extensive fieldwork in the Kenya, Sierra Leone, Switzerland, Tanzania, Uganda, US, UK, and Zambia. I used mixed methods, and have conducted over 300 semi-structured interviews with policy-makers, practitioners, activists, and community workers working in all aspects of global health from the HIV/AIDS response in Washington, to community health workers in Kenya, to military actors in Sierra Leone. My research is multi-level: if I investigate a problem - e.g. why are women disproportionately affected by HIV/AIDS than men? - I want to talk to diverse women living with HIV/AIDS and the people who are supposed to help them both nationally and globally.In 2016 I developed an innovate method of research: a co-produced narrative feature film, Pili. The film was co-produced between me and film-makers and women living in rural Tanzania. The film has won awards and was nominated for a BAFTA in 2019. I have advised the UK government on COVID19 and Global Health Security and UN Women on the gendered impact of pandemics in the context of COVID-19.