Profile
Farah Rasmi

Farah Rasmi

PhD Candidate International Relations/Political Science
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Spoken languages
English, Arabic, French, Spanish

PhD Thesis
 

Title: Boundaries of Belonging: Conspiracism, Identity, and Egypt's Cultural Elite

Expected Completion Date: 2027

PhD Supervisor: PhD Director, Michelle Weitzel and Second Reader, Christiana Parreira

My PhD project explores how Egypt's cultural elite construct identity and exercise cultural authority through conspiracism, using it as a mode of meaning-making that channels perceived threat and fuels illiberal ideals. Building on my earlier research on right-wing extremism in Europe and North America, the project treats illiberalism in Egypt as a local instantiation of a broader, transposable conjuncture, extending illiberalism studies beyond its usual North Atlantic focus. 
 

Profile


Farah Rasmi is a PhD candidate in International Relations/Political Science at the Graduate Institute of International and Development Studies, Geneva, and a SSHRC-CRSH Doctoral Fellow, Canada. Her research focuses on political identities and how they are influenced by extremist ideologies and conspiracy theories. She graduated with a Master of Arts in European and Russian Affairs from the University of Toronto’s Munk School of Global Affairs and Public Policy and an HBA in European Studies, Near & Middle Eastern Civilizations, French Literature, and Jewish Studies from the University of Toronto. She has previously worked as a fellow at Ranking Digital Rights, and as an editor at Arab Media & Society Journal at the American University in Cairo. Farah has also interned at the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees in West Africa and at Political Capital Institute in Hungary.
 

RESEARCH INTERESTS
 

  • Conspiracy Theories
  • Right-Wing Extremism
  • Far Right
  • Political Violence
  • Identity Politics
     

PUBLICATIONS AND WORKS
 

  • Weaponizing Media and the Dangers of Subjective Truth: Reflections on the “Arab Media Between Conflict and Peace” panel” Arab Media & Society, Issue 32 (2022-02-28)
  • Beyond the War: The History of French Libyan Relations” Atlantic Council (2021-04-01)
  • The effect of the 2015 refugee crisis on the share of attitude radicals” Political Capital Institute (2018-06-25)
  • The Rise of the Canadian Far-Right” Political Capital Institute (2018-06-20)

 

ACADEMIC  EXPERIENCES
 

  • Editor at Arab Media & Society Journal, at the American University in Cairo
  • Research Assistant to Professor Randall Hansen, Munk School of Global Affairs and Public Policy, University of Toronto, Canada 
  • Research Assistant to Professor Jeannie Miller, Department of Near & Middle Eastern Civilizations, University of Toronto, Canada
     

FELLOWSHIPS, GRANTS AND AWARDS
 

  • SSHRC-CRSH Doctoral Fellow, Canada