Sophie Thomas
Research Area
Research Stream
Program
Education
Master of Arts, Intercultural & International Communication, Royal Roads University
Bachelor of Integrated Studies, Anthropology extended minor, University of the Fraser Valley
Indigenous Maps, Films, Rights, and Land Claims Certificate - School of Land Use and Environmental Change, University of the Fraser Valley
About
Sophie began her PhD in socio-cultural anthropology in 2023. Her studies are concerned with the impacts, tensions, and possibilities revealed through historical and contemporary power and policy processes. Specifically, the understanding of Aboriginal Rights and Title, Indigenous Laws and governance, and concepts of reconciliation at the municipal level of government in British Columbia. She uses multi-sited ethnographic fieldwork and comparative policy analysis to examine how, and whether, municipal policy-making in BC is changing since DRIPA was passed into law in 2019.
Through their research, they look to develop alternative approaches to social policy development that recognize the cultural context and lived experiences of policy interventions, while acknowledging how uneven power relations and bureaucratic memory shape the behaviours of policymakers.
Research
Intergovernmental relations; policy analysis; ethnography; bureaucratic memory; colonialism and decolonization
Graduate Supervision
Dr. Carole Blackburn