Sinead D'Silva

Profile

I am a social researcher functioning between human geography and sociology, drawing heavily on critical approaches across these disciplines, and any other that contributes to a critical reflection on the world we live in. My academic background has focused on two key areas, which have been pursued simultaneously: 

1. Student experiences of Higher Education, and the evaluation of relevant policy and provision.

Drawing on a critical approach towards the current functioning of Higher Education, my PhD at University of Leeds (2019) focused on student decision-making processes as they transitioned from their final year of their STEM degrees to graduate life. Here I considered the ways in which young people narrated the complexity of their internal conversations (Archer, 2007; 2012) with regards to their construction of futures for themselves, framed in the context of a neoliberalised higher education system within a ‘Knowledge Economy’. Here I drew attention to the incongruency of the employability agenda through the existence of the bias towards STEM knowledge, the role of place in decision-making regarding graduate futures and young people’s own sense of their futures under late capitalism.

Alongside, I carried out research on inclusive assessment, employability, curriculum evaluation, and equality and inclusion, all from the perspective of students’ experiences. This included the implementation of the Leeds Curriculum Evaluation at University of Leeds, and also supported research for the Why is my curriculum White project by Leeds University Union. I also carried out the evaluation of the cross-institution White Rose Industrial Physics Academy after the project came to its completion in 2022.

2. Community, social justice and action

I was part of the steering groups for the Leeds Inequalities Research Network (2017 – 2019) and Partnerships for Social Justice (2020-2021).

Between 2020 and 2022, I carried out an European Union Horizon 2020 Research and Innovation programme Individual Fellowship, based at Institute of Social Science, University of Lisbon (Portugal). I focused on youth negotiating their position as being employed in the contentious tourism industry in their 'home' locations of Goa (India) and Lisbon (Portugal), negotiating landscapes of touristification and neoliberalisation while making sense of their futures through new economies in rapidly changing job landscapes, whilst simultaneously making space for themselves (link to project here). Alongside this, I was involved in community-scholar social action, which continues into my current research interests.

Research interests

My most recent focus is on the ways in which people relate to place (land, culture, society) and imagine futures on their own terms. I currently am Research Fellow on the project ‘Evaluating the impact of the ‘One-Stop-Shop’ model for climate hubs in Leeds as an innovative public asset to implement a just climate transition (link here), and have been part of the Remaking Places network here at the Unviersity of Leeds (here’s a blog post I wrote).

Alongside this, I deploy my knowledge of social justice and resistance, built through academic learning and community-based lived experiences, to contribute to community social action. I have collaboratively authored reports against disastrous infrastructure projects planned through the Western Ghats of India to highlight the potential environmental and sociocultural implications of such projects. Relatedly, I have delivered presentations on the combined use of art and science by youth in environmental resistance in Goa. Here I draw on social ecology, decolonial feminism, and thinking related to anarchist and anti-capitalist movements.

Overall, I adopt a critical approach to the ways in which state and market converge to create narratives of futures articulated in disconnection from those whose lives it impacts.

Student education

I am presently an Academic Personal Tutor, and assist on stustainability and climate change-related modules.

Research groups and institutes

• Social Justice, Cities, Citizenship