Show Me
Areas of expertise: youth work and international development practice; refugee young people and settlement; homelessness and marginalisation; refugee education and pedagogy
HDR Supervisor accreditation status: Full
Phone: +61 3 9953 3560
Email: jen.couch@acu.edu.au
Location: 糖心原创 Melbourne Campus
I am a senior lecturer in youth work and international development. I came to 糖心原创 in 2005 with a professional background in international community development, youth work and working along side displaced and marginalised communities particularly in refugee contexts and in South Asia. My PhD was a transnational ethnographic exploration of global justice activism focusing on activists in the US, Australia, the Zapatista movement in Mexico and the Narmada dam movement in India.
I am passionate about social resilience and how to strengthen and rebuild this following experiences of community upheaval, violence, and trauma. My experience as a qualitative researcher and practitioner offers me a comprehensive understanding of the theoretical and practical challenges facing vulnerable and marginalised communities. I have published widely in the area of young people, communities and marginalisation and I am particularly interested in working in hopeful and positive ways to change social inequalities and exclusion. I have recently completed the first longitudinal ethnographic study to explore refugee young people and homelessness in Australia.
I have conducted ethnographic and qualitative research in Australia, USA, Mexico, Thailand, India and Tibet. I am experienced in a range of empirical research methods including in-depth interviews, focus groups, questionnaires, photography and ethnography and have used these in a range of fieldwork situations from global justice activism in India, USA, Australia and Mexico, working children's movements in India and Indigenous communities in the Northern Philippines. My current research is focused on the lived experience of refugee young people during COVID 19 and the way that youth and community workers have responded during the pandemic.