Christine Sylvester

Professor Emeritus

Political Science

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Christine Sylvester, University of Connecticut christine.sylvester@uconn.edu

Christine Sylvester PhD, Professor Emerita of Political Science at the University of Connecticut, and Professorial Affiliate of the School of Global Studies Gothenburg University. She has seven single-authored books, three collections of edited works, and one five volume work showcasing key works in Feminist IR. She also has an extensive archive of journal articles on feminist IR; critical development studies; critical IR theory; Zimbabwean politics; art, museums and international relations; and critical war studies. Her latest research is on the politics of memorializing international war and peace and features in Curating and Re-Curating the American Wars in Vietnam and Iraq (Oxford University Press, 2019) and “Making Memorials to the Future,” in Global Studies Quarterly (2023). She has held the Swedish Research Council’s Kerstin Hesselgren Professorship, was awarded an honorary doctorate in social science from Lund University (Sweden), and named one of Fifty Key Thinkers in International Relations, (Griffiths, Roach, Solomon, eds. Routledge, 2009). She is currently editor of the Routledge book series War, Politics, Experience and is working on a co-authored book with two American combat veterans of Afghanistan and Iraq, tentatively titled ‘War in Three Voices’.

Other Books:

Zimbabwe: The Terrain of Contradictory Development. Westview Press, 1991

Feminist Theory and International Relations in a Postmodern Era. Cambridge University Press, 1994

Producing Women and Progress in Zimbabwe: Narratives of Identity and Work From the 1980s. Heinemann, 2000.

Feminist International Relations: An Unfinished Journey. Cambridge University Press, 2002

Art/Museums: International Relations Where We Least Expect It. Paradigm, 2009, Routledge 2015.

War as Experience: Contributions from International Relations and Feminist Analysis. Routledge, 2013.

Edited volumes:

Masquerades of War. editor Routledge, 2015

Experiencing War. editor Routledge, 2011

Feminist International Relations: The Key Works, editor, 5 volumes Routledge, 2010.

Transformations in the Global Political Economy, with Dennis Pirages. Macmillan, 1990.

Selected Articles:

“Zimbabwe’s 1985 Elections: A Search for National Mythology,” Journal of Modern African Studies, 1986.

“Some Dangers in Merging Feminist and Peace Projects,” Alternatives, 1987.

“Empathetic Cooperation: A Feminist Method for IR, “Millennium: Journal of International Studies, 1994. Reprinted in Steven Roach, ed., Critical Theory and International Relations: A Reader (Routledge, 2006) and in Stephen Chan and Cerwyn Moore, eds., Theories of International Relations: Liberalism/Realism/ Reflexivism/Structuralism (I. B Tauris, 2005).

“African and Western Feminisms: World-Traveling The Tendencies and Possibilities,” Signs: Journal of Women in Culture and in Society, 1995.

“Development Studies and Postcolonial Studies: Disparate Tales of the Third World, Third World Quarterly, 1999 (lead article).

“Art, Abstraction, and International Relations,” Millennium: Journal of International Studies, 2001.

“The Art of War/The War Question in (Feminist) IR,” Millennium, 2005.

“Bare Life as a Development/Postcolonial Problematic,” Geographical Journal, 2006. Reprinted in Development in an Insecure and Gendered World, Jacqui Leckie, ed. Ashgate, 2010.

“Tensions in Feminist Security Studies,” Security Dialogue, 2010.

“War Experiences/War Practices/War Theory,” Millennium, 2012.

“Experiencing the End and Afterlives of IR.” European Journal of International Relations. 2013.

“Who Curates Recent American Wars? Looking in Arlington Cemetery and at The Wall That Heals Critical Military Studies, 2019.

Selected Recognitions:

Named again one of 50 Key Thinkers in International Relations (Martin Griffiths, Steven Roach, M Scott Solomon, eds., 2^nd edition, Routledge (2023)

“Curating and Re-Curating the American War in Vietnam” 2018 named one of 20 ‘boundary-pushing’ pieces published in Security Dialogue over 50 years (Michael Murphy, ed. Security Dialogue at 50; Virtual Special Issue, (2019).

Named as one of 50 Key Thinkers in International Relations (Martin Griffiths, Steven Roach, M Scott Solomon, eds., Routledge (2009).

First recipient of the J. Ann Tickner Achievement Award, International Studies Association for pioneering scholarship that pushes the boundaries of the discipline.

Designated Eminent Scholar, Feminist Theory and Gender Studies Section, International Studies Association.