Lyn Ossome | |
---|---|
Born | Kenya |
Occupation | Senior Research Fellow |
Academic background | |
Education | PhD |
Alma mater | University of the Witwatersrand |
Academic work | |
Discipline | Political Studies |
Notable works | Gender, Ethnicity and Violence in Kenya's Transitions to Democracy: States of Violence |
Marilyn ('Lyn') Ossome is an academic, specialising in feminist political theory and feminist political economics. She is currently Senior Research Associate of at the University of Johannesburg and a member of the advisory board for the Strategic Initiative for Women in the Horn of Africa,[1] amongst other accolades. She is an editorial board member of Agrarian South: Journal of Political Economy,[2] and in 2021, she co-edited the volume Labour Questions in the Global South.[3] She serves on the executive committee for the Council for the Development of Social Science Research in Africa (CODESRIA).[4] She is the author of Gender, Ethnicity and Violence in Kenya’s Transitions to Democracy: States of Violence.[5]
Lyn Ossome was born and raised in Kenya.[6] She holds a PhD in Political Studies from University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg.[7] From 2016 to 2021 she was Senior Research Fellow at the Makerere Institute of Social Research, at Makerere University in Uganda.[7] She describes her academic approach as 'a kind of activist-scholarship'.[6]
Ossome's research focusses particularly on gendered labour, queer feminist history and gendered violence, as well as agrarian and land studies.[8] Her work on feminism includes articles on Arab refugee women,[9] Kenyan media and anti-rape discourse,[10] and agrarian movements in Africa.[11]
Her 2018 book Gender, Ethnicity and Violence in Kenya’s Transitions to Democracy: States of Violence examined 'the democratization process and sexual/gendered violence observed against women during electioneering periods in Kenya'.[12] In 2021, she co-edited the volume Labour Questions in the Global South.[3]
She is an editorial board member of Agrarian South: Journal of Political Economy,[2] and serves on the advisory board of Feminist Africa.[13]
In 2016, Ossome was a visiting scholar at the National Chiao Tung University in Taiwan.[14] She was also Visiting Presidential Professor in Women's, Gender and Sexuality Studies at Yale University from 2016-17.[15]
Ossome serves on the board of the International Association for Feminist Economics (IAFFE),[16] and the executive committee of the Council for the Development of Social Science Research in Africa (CODESRIA).[4]