C²DH Scholar at Risk Fellowship 2026 – Dr. Hanan Alawna

We’re looking forward to welcoming Dr. Hanan Alawna as Scholar at Risk Fellow in 2026.

Dr. Alawna is a Palestinian scholar specializing in literary and cultural studies, gender studies, and digital activism. She holds a PhD in Literary and Cultural Studies from the University of Szeged, Hungary, where her research examined Middle Eastern women’s writing and its challenge to Orientalist and patriarchal representations. She is currently a Research Fellow at the Columbia Global Center | Amman.

During her two-month fellowship at C²DH, Dr. Alawna will advance her project “Digital Resistance: Palestinian Women’s Activism in Online Spaces.” Her work explores how Palestinian women—particularly journalist and filmmaker Bisan Owda—use digital platforms to document lived experiences of war, challenge dominant media frames, and create feminist archives of testimony and resistance. While at the Centre, Dr. Alawna will connect her research with broader debates in contemporary history, digital memory, and public history, and deliver a scholarly presentation on her ongoing project at C²DH.