Kristen Biehl
PhD candidate at the Institute of Social and Cultural Anthropology and the Centre on Migration, Policy and Society (COMPAS), the University of Oxford and doctoral fellow at the Max Planck Institute for the Study of Religious and Ethnic Diversity (MPI MMG) in Gottingen.

This doctoral research addresses two core questions: How are urban contexts of intense migration led diversification socially and spatially experienced? How do changing conceptions and intensifying mixtures of difference relate to particular uses of space and senses of place? The context in which these questions were addressed is a locality of Istanbul known as Kumkapi that is intricately laden with distinct migration, diversity and informality histories, both historical and recent. During the fieldwork in Kumkapi, a combination of ethnographic methods was used including spatial mapping, extensive informal discussions, life story interviews and participant observation, focusing in particular on the scales of housing and neighbourhood. The PhD thesis analyses the intersections between narratives and practices of difference, informality, space and place. Through the lens of migration and diversity, the overall goal of the thesis is to highlight critical transformations in contemporary urban spatiality and governance.