Academy Fellow

Farida Fozdar (aka Tilbury) is Professor of Sociology and Dean, Global Futures (Humanities) at Curtin University. She is among Australia’s leading authorities on issues of migration, race relations and multiculturalism. Her current role as Dean, Global Futures, aims to support students, communities and policy makers to tackle key social and geopolitical challenges of our times in positive ways.

Farida uses qualitative and quantitative methods to understand how racial, ethnic, national and religious identities are constructed, issues around refugee and migrant settlement in Australia, and approaches to engaging cultural diversity to promote social inclusion, including multiculturalism and anti-racism. She also has an interest in global citizenship and cosmopolitanism. She has published extensively in these areas.

Farida has a particular interest in discourse analysis, seeking to understand how identities are constructed, and how racism and nationalism are perpetuated, and challenged, through language. Rather than using a deficit approach, she has sought to recognise strength and resilience among ethnic minorities, and the role of mainstream society in building social cohesion. Her contribution has been in identifying the taken-for-granted ways in which social exclusion based on race and ethnicity is perpetuated, and exploring ways to promote inclusion.

Grounded in connections with government and communities, her work is often used to inform policy and practice eg. through invitations to contribute to parliamentary inquiries, and most recently being referenced in the report (Sept, 2025) of the Special Envoy to counter Islamophobia; as well as being highly cited by academics. Farida takes an applied approach in much of her work including undertaking social research consultancies. She also supports the work of younger scholars through mentoring and co-publication, and has supervised two dozen PhD students.

Farida has received over $2.1 million in grants to research topics ranging from refugee employment; refugee mental health and belonging; nationalism and racism; evaluations of re-settlement programs; training, education and employment issues for migrants; intercultural confidence among university students; creating inclusive school environments; analysing the national curriculum; and the experience of being mixed race. Her 4 year Australian Research Council Future Fellowship explored contemporary Australian identity and cosmopolitanism. She is currently working on two ARC Discovery Projects, The Political and Economic Agency of Africans in Australia and Navigating being a Transnational Muslim in Australia in an Era of Hyper-Security.

While her work focuses on Australia, her international impact is evident in invitations to contribute to Encyclopaedias, Handbooks, and edited collections, and as a keynote speaker. Farida was recently (2025) invited to speak to the UNHCR annual Consultation on Refugee Resettlement and Complementary Pathways.

Farida is an active member of The Australian Sociological Association, co-convenor of the annual WA Migration Update for academics, policy makers and communities, and initiated the Sociology Out West network to offer networking opportunities to WA sociologists from academia and industry. She has also held roles as Deputy Head of School, acting Head of School, and chair of Culturally and Linguistically Diverse Working Groups at two institutions.

2024- present Dean, Global Futures (Humanities), Curtin University

2022-2025 - Level E, (Professor, Sociology and Global Futures), Curtin University

2016-2022 - Level D-E (Associate Professor; Professor, 2021), Anthropology and Sociology, University of Western Australia

2011-2016 - Australian Research Council Future Fellow, Anthropology and Sociology, University of Western Australia

2003-2011 - Level B-D (Lecturer; Senior Lecturer; Associate Professor), Sociology and Community Development, Murdoch University

ARC Future Fellowship (2011-2016)

The Australian Sociological Association

The International Sociological Association

AusMob (Australian Mobilities Research Network)

John Barrett Award for Australian Studies (best paper, Journal of Australian Studies) (2017)

Murdoch University VC’s Research Excellence Award, ‘Outstanding Research Development’ (2009)

Fozdar, F (2025), ‘True blue Aussie Muslim’: young Muslim men talking about Australia and their place in it, in Possamai, A and Tittensor, D (eds), Muslims in Contemporary Australia, Brill.

Fozdar, F (2023) Belonging in the land down under: Black Africans in Australia, International Migration, 61(1):23-38. https://doi.org/10.1111/imig.12862

Geibel, M., Fozdar, F., & McGaughey, F. (2024). ‘No way. You will not make [insert country here] home’: Anti-asylum discursive transfer from Australia to Europe. Current Sociology, 72(7): 1279–1300 00113921231194093. Shortlisted for 2024 Current Sociology best paper award.

Fozdar, F (2021) Re-imagining the world: Australians’ engagement with postnationalism, or Why the nation is the problem, Journal of Sociology 57(1): 146-164

Fozdar, F., & Israel, M. (2020). ‘Sociological Research Ethics: Contributions and Controversies’. In Iltis, A. S. & MacKay, D. (eds.) The Oxford Handbook of Research Ethics. Oxford University Press.