Negar Elodie Behzadi

Negar Elodie Behzadi is a Senior Lecturer at the School of Geographical Sciences, University of Bristol. Her research focuses on political ecology, gender studies, and post-Soviet geographies, with a particular emphasis on resource extraction, labor dynamics, and intersectional violence in Central Asia. She holds a DPhil and has been recognized as a Leverhulme Early Career Fellow.

Her work examines the intersections of gender, ethnicity, and power in extractive industries, particularly in Tajikistan. Key themes include feminist counter-topographies, embodied labor, and post-Soviet socio-spatial transformations. Recent publications analyze coal mining communities, the political ecologies of extraction, and the gendered dimensions of honor/shame systems.

• Education:
  • MSc [Discipline unspecified]
  • MA [Discipline unspecified]
  • DPhil [Discipline unspecified]

Behzadi’s research combines ethnographic methods with visual storytelling, as seen in works like Nadirah Coal Woman. She critiques colonial and Soviet legacies in resource governance, advocating for decolonized approaches to spatial justice. Her work bridges feminist theory, political ecology, and postcolonial studies.

• Awards: Leverhulme Early Career Fellowship

Her scholarship addresses urgent issues such as intersectional violence in mining economies and the embodied politics of Muslim femininities, contributing to critical dialogues on resource extraction and marginalization in post-Soviet contexts.