Meet the Team
Research Associate
Dr Catriona Turnbull
Project Lead
Dr Catriona Turnbull leads this research project. She is an Australian Research Council Discovery Early Career Research Award (DECRA) recipient and a Research Fellow in the ECU Research Program in Migration, Diversity and Care. Cat is a sociologist and anthropologist with research interests in migration, ageing, care workforce, transnational caregiving, and the abuse of older people. She has expertise in qualitative methods, including ethnography, narrative and life history interviews, and has previously held an ECU Vice Chancellor’s Research Fellowship and a Forrest Prospect Fellowship, and received the 2021 Jean Martin Award from The Australian Sociological Association.
Dr Richa George
Dr Richa George is a Postdoctoral Research Associate on the SOMA project and a sociologist of digital media and gender. Her research examines marginalisation, intersectionality and the ways identities and inequalities are negotiated across digital, cultural and institutional contexts. She has particular interests in masculinities, belonging and culturally diverse experiences, including those shaped by migration. Richa is a methods enthusiast and has expertise in qualitative methods, including digital ethnography, interviews, focus groups, and multimedia analysis.
Doctoral Researcher
Oanh Nguyen
Oanh is a PhD candidate in the School of Arts and Humanities at Edith Cowan University, based in the Research Program in Migration, Diversity and Care. Her research investigates how the abuse of older adults is understood, recognised and responded to in migrant communities in Australia. She is interested in how these understandings take shape across Australian, homeland and transnational contexts. She uses ethnography and other qualitative methods, grounded in long-term engagement with community settings. Her wider research interests include ageing and care, migrant settlement, and social justice.
Project Officer
Ruiyao Luo
Ruiyao Luo is a PhD candidate within the Research Program in Migration, Diversity and Care at Edith Cowan University. Her research explores the lived experiences of Asian 'middling' migrants in Australia's aged care sector. She brings a decade of experience as a media professional and holds interdisciplinary academic training across gender studies, journalism and communication, and law.
The SOMA Project has also benefited greatly from the contributions of ECU Social Work placement students, who have supported the project in a range of ways. We extend our warm thanks to Corinne McKenzie Davidson, Dipen Pandey, Camila Lazo Nino De Guzman, and Muhtaseem Awsaf for their ongoing valuable contributions to the project.