Dr. Nicolas Mabillard, MA

Department of African Studies, University of Vienna

Nicolas Mabillard is currently senior research fellow at the University of Vienna's Department for African Studies (03.2021-08.2022). His area of expertise lies in sociology and in the sociology of childhood. In 2021, he successfully defended his PhD on working children’s rights in Senegal. Currently he is conducting a qualitative sociological field research on Senegalese migrant families’ children between Vienna, Austria and Dakar, Senegal. The aim is to further the existing knowledge on the ways in which children contribute to the social reproduction – and change – of their family’s social status in both Senegal and Austria. Nicolas is studying how these children – often sent for a long period of time in Senegal and brought back to Austria after having been socialized there – enact their parent’s commitment to their family – or lineage – in Senegal while they live in a different country. In this process, the children learn and mobilize at least two sets of values and identities. He is investigating how they give meaning to the different expectations that they try to live up to in these contexts.

Email: nicolas.mabillard@unige.ch