Katrien De Graeve is an associate professor at Ghent University, affiliated to the Centre for Research on Culture and Gender. She is the recipient of an ERC starting grant 2019 for her project ‘Later-in-Life Intimacy: Women’s Unruly Practices, Places and Representations’ (2020-2025). She obtained a PhD in Comparative Sciences of Culture from Ghent University in 2012 and she worked as a postdoctoral research fellow, both for the Research Foundation Flanders (2013–2019) and the Helsinki Collegium for Advanced Studies (2013–2014). Her research interests include the anthropology of gender, sexuality and old age, and the anthropology of love, care, families and relationships.

Katrien De Graeve is hoofddocent verbonden aan de Vakgroep Talen en Culturen van de Universiteit Gent en lid van het Onderzoekscentrum voor Cultuur en Gender. Ze ontvangt een ERC Starting Grant (2019) voor haar vijfjarig project ‘Later-in-Life Intimacy: Women’s Unruly Practices, Places and Representations’ (2020-2025). In 2012 behaalde ze een doctoraat in de Vergelijkende Cultuurwetenschappen met een kritisch-antropologische studie van intensieve ouderschapspraktijken in Belgisch-Ethiopische adoptiefamilies. Ze werkte als postdoctoraal onderzoeker, zowel voor het Fonds Wetenschappelijk Onderzoek Vlaanderen (2013-2019), als aan het Helsinki Collegium for Advanced Studies (Finland) (2013-2014). Haar onderzoeksinteresses situeren zich in de antropologie van gender, seksualiteit en oudere leeftijd, en in de antropologie van liefde, zorg, families en relaties.

Projects

Projects as supervisor

Homeward Bound - Her memoir on binds and becoming (2022 - 2028)
Fertility frontiers. A global history of transnational reproduction in Belgium from cross-feminist perspective (2022 - 2022)
Unruly pleasures. Women, aging and the work of intimacy (2021 - 2026)
Later-in-life intimacy. 50+ women's subversive use of space and place (2021 - 2025)
Queering narratives of ageing. Older queer women's unruly sexuality-assemblages (2020 - 2024)
Expert panel intercountry adoption. Historical and socialscientific working group (2020 - 2021)
Later-in-life intimacy. Women's unruly practices, spaces and representations (2020 - 2026)
Between revolution and capitulation: an ethnography of everyday queer world-making in mainland China (2019 - 2025)
Global families, global inequalities. The politics of child relinquishment, search and reunion in transnational adoption (2017 - 2022)

Projects as postdoc

Projects as PhD researcher

Making families. Parenting and belonging in transnational adoption in Flanders (2008 - 2012)

Projects as researcher

Ethics, Culture and Society (2017 - 2026)

Publications

Key publications

Beyond the crazy ex-girlfriend : drawing the contours of a radical vulnerability(2024)
- Katrien De Graeve
Menopausal rage, erotic power and gaga feminist possibilities(2022)
- Katrien De Graeve
- Sara De Vuyst
Intieme revoluties : tegendraads in seks, liefde en zorg(2021)
‘No expectations’: straight men's sexual and moral identity-making in non-monogamous dating(2019)
- Katrien De Graeve
Een pleidooi voor radicale liefde : naar een ethiek van kwetsbaarheid(2019)
- Katrien De Graeve

Most recent publications

Full bibliography

Teaching

Since 2023-24: Co-chair programme committee (co-voorzitter OC) Interuniversity MA Programme Gender and Diversity (UGent, KULeuven, UAntwerpen, VUB, UHasselt)
Since 2020-21: Responsible lecturer ‘Onderzoekstaak’: Ghent University (bridging programme of the MA Gender and Diversity)
Since 2022-23: Responsible lecturer ‘Masterproef’ Interuniversity MA Programme Gender and Diversity (UGent, KULeuven, UAntwerpen, VUB, UHasselt)

PhD Supervision

Completed:

Cawayu, Atamhi – Searching for restoration: an ethnographic study of transnational adoption from Bolivia – defended 21.08.2023

Ongoing:

Arthur, Rebecca Jane – Homeward Bound - Her memoir on binds and becoming (KASK 2022-2028)
Besora Barti, Carla - Erotic wisdom and aesthetics of ageing. A visual anthropological approach (ERC project 2021-2025)
De Pooter, Gabriëlle - 50+ women’s subversive use of space and place (ERC project 2021-2025)
Looman, Nika – Queering narratives of ageing. Older queer women’s unruly sexuality-assemblages (ERC project 2020-2024)
Huang, Haiyan - The discourse of e-commerce live-streamers in China and its influence on viewers (2019-2023; self-funded)

Member Doctoral Advisory Committees (DBCs):

Completed:

Fiorella Bucci – Psychosocial research through Emotional Textual Analysis - defended in 2023 (Ghent University, Faculty of Psychology and Educational Sciences)
Amal Miri – Working 'with' or 'on' Moroccan migrant mothers: mediating structure versus agency in the analysis of marriage migration, gender and integration - defended 2021 (Ghent University, Faculty of Arts and Philosophy)
Maria Judite Mario Chipenembe Ngale – Sexual rights activism in Mozambique: A qualitative case study of civil society organisations and experiences of lesbian, bisexual and transgender persons – defended 2018 (Ghent University, Faculty of Arts and Philosophy)

Ongoing:

Li Ya Chu – Sex workers in contemporary Taiwan in a Buddhist perspective (Ghent University, Faculty of Arts and Philosophy)
Lara Jacxsens - Negotiationg the making of new types of families, parents and family relations: a normative and empirical analysis (Ghent University, Faculty of Arts and Philosophy
Yoni Lefèvre – A design-led exploration of intimacy and sexual expression within the context of residential care for individuals of advanced age with high support needs (Luca School of Arts, Campus Design in Genk)
Ophélie Mercier - Revolution from afar: Egyptian artists in Europe after the 2013 turn (Ghent University, Faculty of Arts and Philosophy)

Fiorella Bucci – ‘The symbolic polysemy of language. Psychosocial research and intervention through Emotional Textual Analysis (ETA)’ - defended 2023
Amal Miri – ‘Marriage Migration: Integration, Identity and Empowerment among Muslim Women in Belgian Society’ - defended 2021
Maria Judite Mario Chipenembe Ngale – ‘Sexual and reproductive rights of lesbian and albino women. A qualitative analysis of organisations and individual life experiences in the cities of Maputu and Nampula, Mozambique’ - defended 2018

Courses:

Activities

Services

Co-chair Programme Committee (OC) Interuniversity MA Programme Gender and Diversity (UGent, KULeuven, UAntwerpen, VUB, UHasselt) (since October 2023)
Secretary Examination Committee Interuniversity Master Gender & Diversity (UGent, KULeuven, UAntwerpen, VUB, UHasselt) (2019-2023)
Member Policy Cell Department of Languages and Cultures, UGent (since February 2022)
Member Ethics Committee Faculty of Arts and Philosophy, UGent (since September 2021)
Member Committee Diversity and Inclusion of the Faculty of Arts and Philosophy, UGent (since 2021)
Member Diversity Team Faculty of Arts and Philosophy, UGent (2014-2021)
Member Editorial Team DiGeSt: Journal of Diversity and Gender Studies (since 2014)
Editorial Assistant DiGeSt: Journal of Diversity and Gender Studies (2015-2019)
Member of the Editorial Committee of Leuven University Press (2018-2021)

Member selection committees:

Member NWO Vidi Committee Social Sciences and Humanities - Panel Cultural Sciences and Linguistics 2022-2023

Referee for grant applications:

Swiss National Science Foundation (2023)
NWO (2022)
ZonMw, the Netherlands (2020)
ZonMw, the Netherlands (2018).

Member PhD examination committees:

Jury member:

Anne Nobels - Prevalence and Impact of Sexual Violence in Older Adults - defended September 2022 (Ghent University, Faculty of Medicine and Health Sciences)
Thi Duyen Phuong - National identity in Vietnam’s EFL textbooks, 1980s to the present – defended March 2022 (Ghent University, Faculty of Political and Social Sciences)
Memory Mulalo Livhuwani Mphaphuli - A balance of stories: a contemporary narrative of the social construction of heterosexuality within black South African families - defended August 2021 (Ghent University, Faculty of Arts and Philosophy)
Hasan Isikli - Memory and Awareness of Place. An Anthropological research into memory and identity-processes in Izmir city and the International Izmir Festival – internal defense November 2015 (Ghent University, Faculty of Arts and Philosophy)

Study Programme Representative ("rapporteur"):

Eline Huygens - Living a Catholic life: Understanding the intimate lives of young Catholic women in Flanders – defended June 2023
Ladan Rahbari - Gender, Sexuality and the Moral Body: A Qualitative Study of Perceptions and Experiences of Body Management among Women in Iran and Iranian Migrant Women in Belgium – defended May 2019
Lydia Namatende - Agency with Interstices of Subordination: Female Teacher Educators’ Gendered Lived Experiences in Uganda – defended November 2016
Hendrika Petronella van den Brandt - Religion, Secularity and Feminism in a West-European Context. A Qualitative Study of Organisations and Activism in Flanders – defended December 2014

Membership in Research Groups and Expertise Centres

since 2014: Centre for Research on Culture and Gender, UGent – Executive Member
since 2017: ECSO (Ethics, Culture and Society) – Executive Member

2015-2023: Sophia Belgian Network for Gender Studies – General Assembly Member

2015-2017: Sophia Belgian Network for Gender Studies – Board Member

2015-2020: Centre for Parenting Culture Studies, University of Kent (UK) - Associate

2014-2019: U4 Network Gender Studies – Organizing Committee

2013-2017: Steunpunt Adoptie - Board Member
2011-2015: Centre for Studies in African Humanities (CESAH), UGent - Member
2010-2015: Ghent Africa Platform (GAP), UGent – Member Executive Committee

2008-2014: Centre for Intercultural Communication and Interaction (CiCi), UGent – Executive Member

Peer Review Work

Referee for: Adoption & Culture: Journal of the Alliance for the Study of Adoption and Culture; American Anthropologist; Annals of Medical and Health Sciences Research; Anthropology and Medicine; Anthropology Matters; Area; Childhood: A Global Journal of Child Research; DiGeSt: Journal of Diversity & Gender Studies; Journal of Consumer Culture; Journal of Family Issues; Journal of GLBT Family Studies; Medical Anthropology; Lambda Nordica; NORA - Nordic Journal of Feminist and Gender Research; PoLAR: Political and Legal Anthropology Review; Sexualities; Social and Cultural Geography; Sociological Quarterly; Sociological Research Online; The Journal of the Royal Anthropology Institute; Women’s Studies International Forum