Hannah Davita LudikhuijzeProfile page
Doctoral Tutor (Anthropology)
School of Global Studies
- Doctoral Tutor (Anthropology)School of Global Studies
- +44 (0)1273 877274 Ext.7274 (Work)
BIO
My name is Hannah Davita Ludikhuijze and I was born in the Netherlands. I graduated cum laude from University College Roosevelt, where I followed a Liberal Arts programme with a focus on literature, anthropology, history, philosophy and French. I moved to the UK to do my Master in Arts (with Distinction) at Durham University, where I studied 20th and 21st century literary studies. After this I moved down to Brighton to do my PhD at the University of Sussex, where I was awared the CHASE scholarship (AHRC-UKRI) after my first year.
My research focuses on volunteer tourism in Malawi. My thesis titled: 'The Literary Voluntourist: Revisiting NGO Reading Practices in Rural Malawi' merges anthropology and literarture in search for the 'the literary voluntourist'. The main question that guides my research is whether literature might help to improve volunteer tourism in rural Malawi. Volunteer tourism has been critiqued as neo-colonial and steeped in white saviourism, but I argue that as an ongoing industry, it is important to engage, educate and empathise with those caught up in it – whether as young traveller or as recipient and host. I explore how literature can be used to re-orientate voluntourists' perceptions in a neoliberal context, how anthropological methods can inform reading groups, and what pedagogical frameworks may foster reading to complicate, rather than confirm assumptions.
My thesis is structured to reflect the journey of a typical volunteer as they leave home, arrive, adjust – or not – and then leave. I test the voluntourists’ experiences against the perceptions and interests of Malawian hosts, drawing on interviews and participant observation with locals including teachers, drivers and tourist guides. This structure also reflects my own research journey, as I describe learning from negative findings in a pilot reading group. In doing so, I draw on, but also add to, a range of methods in anthropology, postcolonial studies, education and development.
I have attempted to shed new light on African literatures, and how they might be read, received and responded to by white travellers from the global North, including where inclusive teaching can bring their critical perspectives to life. I have also engaged with the study of Malawian culture and history in novel and productive ways by integrating uMunthu as pedagogy, and by problematising mechanisms of knowledge acquisition by cultural outsiders. As the first study of the effects of literary reading on voluntourism, my thesis offers a practical as well as philosophical intervention into the industry of ‘charitable’ travelling which remains in great need of reform. I therefore concluded my thesis with recommendations for creating ‘the literary voluntourist’, and how this could be implemented by NGOs in Malawi.
ACADEMIC POSITIONS
- Doctoral TutorUniversity of Sussex, School of Media, Arts and Humanities and School of Global Studies, Brighton, United Kingdom1 Jan 2021 - 31 Jul 2024
NON-ACADEMIC POSITIONS
- PGR Senior Research Institute OfficerUniversity of Sussex, School of Media, Arts and Humanities, Brighton, United Kingdom1 Sep 2023 - 1 Sep 2024
DEGREES
- Bachelor of Arts (Cum Laude), Literature, Anthropology, History, Philosophy and FrenchUtrecht University (University College Roosevelt), Middelburg, Netherlands1 Sep 2014 - 31 May 2017
- Master of Arts (with Distinction), 20th and 21st Century Literary StudiesDurham University, Durham, United Kingdom1 Sep 2017 - 31 Aug 2018
- Doctor of Philosophy, EnglishUniversity of Sussex, Brighton, United Kingdom1 Sep 2018
CERTIFICATIONS
- Associate Fellow of the Higher Education Academy (AFHEA)Advance HE, York, United Kingdom8 Mar 2022