Our People
Behind every great initiative, is an incredible group of people who make it happen.
Dr. Lisa-Jo K. van den Scott
Director
Dr. Lisa-Jo K. van den Scott is an associate professor in the Department of Sociology at Memorial University. Her interests include space and place, time, qualitative methods, symbolic interaction, culture, and science and technology studies. She has published in journals such as The Journal of Contemporary Ethnography and The American Behavioral Scientist. Dr. van den Scott co-edited The Craft of Qualitative Research and co-authored Qualitative Research in Action, 4th ed. She is currently the editor-in-chief of Symbolic Interaction. In addition, Dr. van den Scott has long been involved with the Annual Qualitative Analysis Conference, affectionately known as “the Canadian Qualitatives.”
Pouya Morshedi
Researcher
Pouya Morshedi is a Ph.D. candidate (ABD) in sociology at Memorial University of Newfoundland and Labrador. He is a qualitative researcher specializing in the sociology of space and place, the sociology of cinema, and the sociology of revolution. In his dissertation, he investigates the changes in the cinematic representation of home during the 1979 revolution in Iran. Pouya is one of the co-organizers of the Qualitative Analysis Conference from 2022. He also serves as an anti-racism, representation, and diversity committee member at the Society for the Study of Symbolic Interaction (SSSI). Pouya is one of the co-founders of Avalon Research Society.
​
Foroogh Mohammadi
Researcher
Foroogh Mohammadi is an Assistant Professor of Sociology at Acadia University. She is a qualitative researcher specializing in the sociology of migration, home, space, place and racialization. She has published articles in English and Persian academic journals such as Qualitative Sociology Review and Space and Culture. In her most recent research, Foroogh investigated how Iranian immigrants create, develop, or resist a sense of belonging to home in Canada through a symbolic interaction perspective. The Institute of Social and Economic Research (ISER) has awarded her a fellowship supporting her research. Foroogh is a co-founder of the Avalon Research Society and she puts her effort into developing a network of scholars whose areas of focus involve studying the social aspects of space and place as an inseparable part of our social interactions.