Tyrell Haberkorn

Tyrell Haberkorn is a Professor of Southeast Asian Studies at the University of Wisconsin-Madison (UW-Madison), serving in the Department of Asian Languages and Cultures. Previously, she held a faculty position at the Australian National University (ANU) from 2010 to 2018. Her research focuses on state violence, human rights, and dissident cultural politics in Thailand, particularly since 1932. She coordinates the Justice in Southeast Asia Lab at UW-Madison and is currently writing a history of political imprisonment in Thailand, combining archival research, court observation, and transgressive historiography.

Educated at the University of North Carolina (BA in Cultural Studies and Creative Writing), Cornell University (MA and PhD in Sociocultural Anthropology), she has held prestigious fellowships including the Guggenheim, Radcliffe Institute, and National Endowment for the Arts. Her teaching spans undergraduate and graduate courses on Southeast Asian politics, revolutions, queer studies, and human rights, including 'Revolutionary Asia' and 'Violence, Justice, and History in Southeast Asia.'

Her major works include Dictatorship on Trial: Coups and the Future of Justice in Thailand (2024), In Plain Sight: Impunity and Human Rights in Thailand (2018), and Revolution Interrupted (2011). She has also contributed to critical editions like Reflections of the Past (2011) and Sensate’s 'Unspeakable Things' series. Her research critiques legal impunity, military dictatorship, and authoritarianism while advocating for democratic accountability.

Awarded fellowships from the Fulbright, Einstein Forum, and Australian Research Council, she actively engages in public writing and translations to disseminate Thai dissident voices globally. Her work bridges academia and activism, addressing contemporary Thai political crises and advocating for justice through historical memory and legal reform.