Dr. Jelena Golubović’s doctoral thesis, Zones of Violence: Serb Women inside the Siege of Sarajevo, explores themes of victimhood, complicity, and retribution. Going beyond the rigid framework of victims and perpetrators, her research helps to understand the complexities of suffering during as well as after times of war. Her thesis has garnered interest from several influential academic presses for publication. Articles based on this research have been published in Ethnicities and Anthropological Quarterly, winning four article awards (from ISA, ASA, BASEES, and ASN) and two honourable mentions.

External examiner, Erin Baines, University of British Columbia, says Golubović’s thesis “offers an original consideration of the experiences of an important and understudied war-affected group, Bosnian Serb women, during the siege of Sarajevo between 1992 – 1995. It comprehensively engages with literature on the anthropology of war, victim perpetrator studies, and women’s experiences in conflict and post-conflict settings.”

In addition to her creative and humanizing approach to her research, Golubović is also an incredible educator. With an exemplary teaching record, designing and teaching three undergraduate courses, she also seamlessly transitioned from in-person to online teaching. Golubović also served as an editorial assistant for both Anthropologica and American Ethnologist, hosted the New Books Network podcast channel, “New Books in Eastern European Studies,” and was a winner of the Global Affairs Canada / SSHRC International Policy Ideas Challenge.

Associate Professor and Graduate Chair, Pamela Stern, offers that in selecting candidates for a Dean’s Convocation Medal, it was a “unanimous choice of the Sociology and Anthropology Graduate Program Committee for this nomination... Dr. Golubović is both an outstanding and productive scholar as well as valued contributor to both our department and the discipline.”

Supervisors Parin Dossa (Professor of Anthropology) and  Michael Hathaway (Associate Professor of Anthropology) describe Golubović as “ambitious, creative, and tirelessly driven, she has made a great contribution to SFU during her graduate career and will soon become a recognized alumna generating a legacy of rich and influential scholarship…Her critical and ingenious contribution lies in her competency for fine-grained ethnographic research that goes beyond dichotomies with their tendency to divide societies in times of war and its aftermath. Her ability to raise unsettling questions is admirable.”

Golubović says, “I am honoured to receive this recognition. The PhD program has afforded me precious time to think about complex issues that civilians face in war. I am grateful for the support of my committee, Dr. Parin Dossa and Dr. Michael Hathaway, as well as Dr. Pamela Stern and the SA Department more broadly. I also want to thank my family and especially my parents. And lastly, to say that this research could not exist without the women who participated in it, and shared their stories with me.”

Golubović is looking forward to starting as a Banting Fellow at the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy at Tufts University in September.