Monday, August 22, 2011

About

About Rooster Rouser:
This blog features random musings about my interests in human rights, women's rights, gender, transitional justice, and political theory. The earlier posts in this blog (from February to March 2010) chronicled my time at the WILPF (Women's International League for Peace and Freedom) Practicum in Advocacy at the UNCSW (United Nations Commission on the Status of Women). Posts from May to June 2011 chronicled my time spent researching women's organizations in Bosnia and Herzegovina (BiH). Posts starting in October 2011 will chronicle my time as a Fulbright U.S. student in Rwanda.

About the Author, Laura Roost:
I am a Political Science Ph.D. Candidate at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln with concentrations in political theory and international relations and graduate specializations in Women’s and Gender Studies (M.A.) and Human Rights and Humanitarian Affairs (Ph.D.). My research interests include gender and transitional justice, women’s rights and human rights, and feminist political theory.

BiH Wrap-up Discussion

Thanks to the UNL Department of Political Science Senning Summer Fellowship, and the Forsythe Family Program on Human Rights and Humanitarian Affairs Summer Fellowship, I was able to complete my initial research in BiH. I was able to get a fantastic overview of the status of civil society and peacebuilding in Bosnia and Herzegovina in the first week of my travel and in the final week and a half I was able to interview select women's NGOs, shadow one NGO in particular, and observe a couple events organized by women's NGOs. It was an extremely productive research trip and I look forward to future research visits to BiH to continue to understand the role that women's organizations and women's issues play in the state. I have been left with a large amount of information to process, particularly regarding themes such as competing women's issues and the impact of ethnic politics on women. More will undoubtedly be written about this and other research travels in the future, so stay tuned!