Sofya Shahab

Project Title: Weaponising Affects: Creating, Destroying and Reconfiguring Heritage through Daesh

Supervision Team: A/Prof Ben Isakhan, Prof. Andrea Witcomb, & A/Prof Melinda Hinkson

Biography: Sofya Shahab is a PhD candidate at the Alfred Deakin Institute for Citizenship and Globalisation, Deakin University, as part of the project Measuring Cultural Property Destruction in Iraq and Syria. Her research employs an anthropological lens to explore the weaponisation of affect, its modes of transmission, and experiences of violence through a focus on the heritage destruction undertaken by Daesh. Sofya has over seven years of experience working in fragile and conflict affected contexts across the Middle East and has a BA in English Literature and Politics from the University of York and an MSc in Social Anthropology from Oxford University.