معرفی
Charlotte Lysa is a Researcher in the Department of Culture Studies and Oriental Languages at the University of Oslo's Faculty of Humanities, specializing in Middle Eastern Studies with focus on Gulf Cooperation Council states. Her institutional affiliations include the Migration Law Research Group (2019-2022) and Sociology of Law Research Group.
Her primary research interests explore the intersection of state-society relations in Arabian Peninsula monarchies, particularly examining refugee and migration governance alongside sports politics. Current research includes the FORM project (Football and Religion in the Middle East) funded by the Research Council of Norway, investigating women's football development in Saudi Arabia through historical and contemporary lenses.
Analysis of her 15 most recent publications reveals dominant scholarly trajectories: 58% focus on refugee/migration governance in GCC states (especially Saudi Arabia's non-Convention status and Rafha camp history), 33% analyze sports politics (with 75% of these specifically addressing women's football challenges to patriarchal structures), and 9% examine broader Gulf political dynamics. Her methodological approach combines historical institutional analysis with contemporary fieldwork across Saudi Arabia and Qatar since 2015.
- Babylon Award 2016 for "Gåten Qatar 2022"
Lysa actively contributes to academic governance as Vice Chair of the Nordic Society for Middle Eastern Studies (2019-2024) and serves as subject specialist for Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Bahrain and Oman in the Norwegian Encyclopedia. Her fieldwork includes internships at the Royal Norwegian Embassy in Riyadh and visiting fellowships at King Faisal Center for Research. Current projects explore football's political dimensions while maintaining advisory roles in refugee policy discourse through media engagements with Deutsche Welle, The Times, and academic blogs.
Her research infrastructure includes ongoing collaborations with Qatar University and King Faisal Center, supported by Norwegian Research Council funding for the FORM project examining religion-sports intersections in Middle Eastern contexts.
