Hafsah Siddiqui, BA (Hons), MA

PhD student

Urban-political geographer interested in class and citizenship in the Global South.

Biography

Career

• (2021) Postgraduate Teaching Assistant, Department of Geography, University College London. Module: Cities, Space, and Power, MSc Urban Studies Program
• (2018-2019) Teaching Assistant, Department of Geography, University of Toronto. Course: Foundations of City Studies
• (2016-2018) Research Assistant, Department of Sociology, University of Toronto

Qualifications

• (2019) MA in Geography, University of Toronto
• (2018) BA (Hons, with High Distinction) in Human Geography, Sociology, and Writing & Rhetoric, University of Toronto

Awards and scholarships

• (2021) Conference Best Paper Award, Revisioning Peri-Urban Futures International Conference, Anglia Ruskin University and The Royal Academy of Engineering, UK
• (2020) Philip Lake Fund, Department of Geography, University of Cambridge
• (2019) Gates Cambridge Scholarship, Gates Cambridge Trust, University of Cambridge
• (2018) Joseph-Armand Bombardier Canada Graduate Scholarship, Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council, Government of Canada
• (2018) Sir Bertram C.A. Windle Graduate Scholarship, St. Michael’s College, University of Toronto
• (2018) University of Toronto Entrance Award, School of Graduate Studies, University of Toronto
• (2018) College Silver Medal Award, St. Michael’s College, University of Toronto
• (2018) C.L. Burton Trust Fund In-Course Scholarship, St. Michael’s College, University of Toronto
• (2017) John Horner Undergraduate Scholarship in Geography, Department of Geography, University of Toronto
• (2016) Outstanding Performance Award in Human Geography, Department of Geography, University of Toronto

Research

Social segregation and political fragmentation are more pronounced now than ever before, particularly in cities of the Global South. My PhD research focuses on how political alliances can be employed as a tool for empowering the urban poor in the context of housing inequality and forced evictions from informal settlements in Pakistan. Specifically, my work investigates the cross-class solidarities that facilitate informal settlement dwellers’ resistance to eviction, against the backdrop of state-driven urban redevelopment. I consider whether such coalitions can contribute to a more democratic political system by enhancing marginalised groups’ claims-making abilities and helping them assert their status as legitimate urban citizens.

This empirical research contributes to the postcolonial call for non-Northern knowledge production within urban theorising, and highlights the complexities of ‘overlapping’ politics within practices of urban governance and mobilisation. The theoretical framework is informed by, and will ultimately contribute to, scholarly work in urban theory, urban social movements and claims-making, the politics of ‘rights’, and the concept of ‘citizenship’.

Other research interests include the politics and history of urban planning, and qualitative research methods.

Publications

Articles

• Siddiqui, H. (2019) ‘Disgraced, dispossessed, displaced: Delhi’s global city aspiration and the city’s slum dwellers’, The Toronto Urban Journal, 1(1), pp. 23-32.

Conferences and workshops

• “The Importance of Research Brokers for Third-Culture Researchers: Experiences Conducting Doctoral Fieldwork,” Royal Geographical Society Postgraduate Mid-Term Conference. April 2023.
• “Towards a Conceptualisation of Alliance Politics: A Case Study of Mobilisation in Urban Pakistan,” Political Studies Association Annual Conference. April 2022.
• “Transformational Politics at the Micro-Level: A Case Study of an Urban Movement in Islamabad, Pakistan,” British Association for South Asian Studies Annual Conference. March 2022.
• “Beyond Class-based Binaries in Political Mobilisation: A Case Study of Islamabad, Pakistan,” Indian Institute for Human Settlements ‘Beyond Binaries’ Conference. January 2022.
• “The Politics of Urban Mobilisation: The Anti-eviction Movement in Islamabad, Pakistan,” Indian Institute for Human Settlements PhD Workshop. January 2022.
• “The Politics of Urban Mobilisation: The Anti-eviction Movement in Islamabad, Pakistan,” The Lisbon Early-Career Workshop in Urban Studies. November 2021.
• “Living on the Margins: Citizenship and Claims-making in Peri-Urban Pakistan,” PIVOT Revisioning Peri-Urban Futures International Conference. October 2021.

Teaching

• Supervisor, Part IA People, Place and the Politics of Difference – Paper 1E Contemporary Urban Geographies (Lent 2021, Easter 2021)
• Supervisor, Part IB Citizenship, Cities and Civil Society (Michaelmas 2020, Michaelmas 2021, Lent 2022)
• Supervisor, Part II Global Urbanism (Michaelmas 2019, Easter 2020, Michaelmas 2021)

External activities

• (2023- Present) Member, South Asia: Women in the Field group, Centre for Research in the Arts, Social Sciences and Humanities, University of Cambridge
• (2020- 2021) Outreach Officer, Gates Cambridge Scholars’ Council
• (2019- 2020) First Year Human Geography PhD Co-Representative, Graduate Student Committee, Department of Geography, University of Cambridge
• (2019- 2020) Member, Critical Approaches to ‘Vulnerability’ in Empirical Research group, Centre for Research in the Arts, Social Sciences and Humanities, University of Cambridge