Southeastern Louisiana University Assistant Professor of Sociology and Criminal Justice Joshua McDermott has been selected to receive a Fulbright U.S. Scholar fellowship. He will conduct research and teach in the Sociology Department at Njala University in Bo, Sierra Leone, the country’s third largest city and largest city in the South of the country.
According to Fulbright Director of Academic Relations Julie Taylor, Fulbright Scholar Awards are prestigious and competitive fellowships that provide unique opportunities for scholars to teach and conduct research abroad.
“Fulbright scholars play a critical role in U.S. public diplomacy, establishing long-term relationships between people and nations,” Taylor said. “Alumni include 62 Nobel Laureates, 89 Pulitzer Prize winners, 80 MacArthur Fellows, and thousands of leaders and world-renowned experts in academia and many other fields across the private, public, and non-profit sectors.”
McDermott’s research focuses on the nature of irregular and informal work in Africa, like work done outside of formal wage work, such as street vending. He plans to continue his research in Sierra Leone, looking at the political behavior and views of college educated young people who are forced to survive in the informal economy. While there, McDermott also plans to finish the field research and writing for his first book.
“Research on informal labor markets in the rapidly automating global economy is timely and important,” said Sociology and Criminal Justice Department Head Kenneth Bolton. “Dr. McDermott’s theoretical insight and unique skill set allows him to investigate the impact of economic restructuring on the experiences of workers, as well as their ability to organize, struggle and define their lives. He is very deserving of this honor, which will also benefit the university and our students.”
When asked why he thought he was selected for the fellowship, McDermott said he thinks it’s because informal and irregular work is a central and understudied issue in global and domestic politics and economics.
“Around 90 percent of people in Sierra Leone do not have formal jobs. Surviving in the informal sector entails precarity and poverty, and a majority of the world’s workers work informally,” he said. “So I think there is a growing recognition of the need to address and understand why informality is so prevalent and how it impacts political stability, economic development, and individual lives and communities.”
McDermott said he feels lucky and privileged to be able to spend an academic year conducting field research in a place he loves (Sierra Leone) because it is an opportunity not many people get.
“I am really excited to be able to build connections between students and faculty in Sierra Leone and the students and faculty at Southeastern,” he said. “I think there are so many learning opportunities that can arise from building connections between Njala and Southeastern, and I hope to facilitate that in any way I can.”
