Directory

Yusef Al-Jarani is a Gates Cambridge and Harry S. Truman Scholar. In 2013, he co-founded Phoenix Development Fund, a non-profit organization that provides pro bono business development services to community-minded small businesses in the South Side of Chicago. Yusef received his BA from the University of Chicago in Political Science with Honors, after which he spent a year in the UK studying for his MPhil in Development Studies at the University of Cambridge. He has been a practicing attorney since receiving his JD at Yale Law School.

Previous Education

University of Chicago

Links

https://www.linkedin.com/in/yusef-al-jarani

I am a historian of poverty and social exclusion in colonial India, with a focus on South Indian social reform movements between the late nineteenth and mid-twentieth centuries. The transnational circulation of Indian reform movements in Southeast Asia and the social history of the Tamil diaspora are related areas of interest. My current book project traces the history of prohibition's introduction in India, positioning the subject at the intersection of provincial and national politics, and global temperance reform. A second project examines the impact of temperance and prohibition movements, as a subset of dietary reform, in late colonial India and Malaya.My work has been published in Modern Asian Studies and the Indian Economic and Social History Review. I currently convene courses in alcohol and drug history and modern Indian history at Hong Kong University.

Previous Education

National University of Singapore B.A. (Hons) History 2003

Growing up a child of immigrants in the heart of Orange County, I was graced with the so-called hyphenated identity of a Muslim-Syrian-American. That hyphen, the moment of mediation between two seemingly disparate things, has served as the foundation for my academic interests and future aspirations. It fuels my passion for intersectional issues as an activist and advocate for educational and environmental justice in South Los Angeles. It has also fostered an intellectual curiosity that lead me to pursue a double major in Human Biology & Society and Comparative Literature at UCLA, where I was able to conduct research on health disparities while exploring the use of quantitative research methods in the Humanities. As a Gates Scholar, I hope to continue this narrative by pursuing an MPhil in the History and Philosophy of Science and Medicine. My proposed research centers on the theme of translation; I situate this not only as a practice but also as a mediative process that has shaped the development and reification of certain historical, linguistic, and cultural legacies in science and medicine. As an aspiring activist and physician-scholar, I ultimately hope to employ this critical framework and the global network of the Gates Cambridge community in the development and practice of a more socially attuned and interdisciplinary medicine.

Previous Education

University of California Los Angeles

I was born in the second largest city located in a desert after Cairo, towards the end of a never-ending dictatorship. Growing up in Lima, I soon learned that Peru was a country which amalgamated many conflicting realities that were not easily reconciled. My drive to address some of these issues and think laterally has been the stimulus for my work as a researcher, journalist, editor and academic consultant. From a young age, my reluctance to yield to well-demarcated routes has broadened my perspectives and motivated me to find my own path while collaborating with others to create change. Covering dictatorship novels, autobiographical writing and the role of emotions in fiction, my three theses have contributed to advance knowledge at the intersection of literature and sociology. At Cambridge, my PhD project will explore how a group of South American authors grappled with pain and dissatisfaction in their artistic and extraliterary experiences through the diary form. By so doing, I hope to shed light on the value of a sentimental approach to adversity in life-writing, as well as the configurations of masculinity that emanate from it. I am deeply indebted to the Gates Cambridge Trust for giving me this unparalleled opportunity.

Previous Education

Universitat de Barcelona Advanced Literary Studies 2022
McGill University Sociology and Hispanic Studies 2020

Since leaving Syria during the war, my goal has been to try to understand human behaviour in its most fundamental aspects. What is it that makes people think and act, individually and communally, in the way that they do? To this end, I am carrying out a doctorate in biological anthropology, a discipline which seeks to answer these questions through analysis of our physical makeup and deep history. Specifically, through the application of the principles and tools of the evolutionary sciences, biological anthropology aims to uncover ‘human nature’ in its broadest and most universal aspects. My particular area of research is the cause of our success as a species: is this to be attributed more to our powers of theoretical understanding, or to our ability to follow, transmit, and refine cultural norms and practices? I intend to conduct a series of experiments and develop a range of computational models to investigate the issue. I am incredibly fortunate to have the opportunity to work with the Gates Foundation. With their support, I hope to expand our understanding of the human species, i.e. each other, and thereby make a world with fewer man-made tragedies.

Previous Education

University College London Human Evolution and Behaviour 2024
Heriot-Watt University, Dubai Psychology with Management 2016

In the past year I have dedicated the vast majority of my time to my medical school training. I am in the middle of the year of core clinic clerkships and am definitely missing the more carefree days of formal halls and garden parties in Cam. In my, albeit limited, free time I enjoy spending time with my one year old dog, Rupert, and keeping as activities as I can with running, crossfit and hiking.

Since completing my PhD in Classics in 2011, I have moved between Dublin and London and worked on a number of different projects. I am currently training to be a Classics teacher at King's College, London.

I grew up in Bogotá, the capital of Colombia. I have always been passionate for the wildlife and palaeontology. Despite living in one of the most biodiverse countries in the world, my contact with the nature was limited, and considering that Palaeontology was poorly developed in Colombia, I decided to study Civil Engineering. However, I never lost my passion for science, preferring to read about evolution and fossils than about engineering. After some elective courses, and encouraged by a professor of Biology, I followed my heart and started my Biology career at Universidad de los Andes. At the end of my undergrad, I got the chance to do an internship in Montana, with the University of Washington. Thanks to the scientists I met during my internship, I was able to contact Dr. Edwin Cadena, who helped me to realize that there are tons of fossils in Colombia to study. He also hired me as a research assistant and accepted me as his MSc. Student, at Universidad del Rosario. Now, as a Gates Cambridge Scholar, I´ll be able to pursue my PhD. in Zoology, where by using fossils and molecular data I want to study the tempo and mode of the diversification of colubroid snakes in the Neotropics.

Previous Education

Universidad del Rosario Palaeontology 2022
Universidad de Los Andes Biology 2018
Universidad de Los Andes Engineering 2017

I became passionate about cultural displacement among African immigrants while an undergraduate in Computer Science at the University of Missouri. I subsequently moved to New York where I created cultural programming for the African Diaspora while working as a technologist. I decided then to pursue full-time this passion to serve the culturally displaced, and I enrolled in a Master’s in African Studies at Yale. There, I researched Nigerian immigrant identity in New York, Tokyo and Mumbai under the tutelage of renowned Sociologist, Dr. Elijah Anderson. I seek to build upon this work through my PhD at Cambridge, where I will continue to investigate the assimilation trajectories of second-generation Nigerian immigrants, one of the most educated immigrant groups in the US and UK. My research will measure how their cultural identification patterns influence their assimilation into their host societies and/or Nigeria, particularly through the creation of Black cultural capital. With this research, I hope to ultimately leverage the the talents of the highly-educated, resource-rich Diaspora to help increase access to innovative technical and creative education in Nigeria, particularly for the girl child, who is much less likely to receive an education than her male counterpart.

Previous Education

Yale University African Studies (Sociology) 2019
University of Missouri System Computer Science 2004

I am undertaking an MMus in Choral Studies, having completed my undergraduate studies at the University of Melbourne, Australia. As a choral musician, I have been fortunate to have been heavily involved with Gondwana Choirs, Australia’s national choral organization for young people. I have also worked with the acclaimed Sydney Children’s Choir. At Cambridge, I hope to combine my academic interests in choral music with the practical conducting training. The opportunity to observe different choral musicians at work will provide essential experience to fulfill my aspiration to work as a professional conductor. I am passionate about increasing access to music education and performance opportunities for young people regardless of their physical location or socio-economic circumstance. I am keen to support musical outreach projects with an awareness of historical precedent and rigorous research processes.

I grew up on a small farm in New Zealand, helping my family plant native trees, develop wetlands and transform bare paddocks into an ecological sanctuary. I spent holidays tramping in the mountains, diving in the sea and kayaking on local rivers. These experiences instilled a sense of responsibility for the natural environment and a commitment to sustainability.

Despite a biology degree and career as a scientist, I realised engineering would provide a route to more tangible change. I returned to university to study civil engineering and conducted research on water, sanitation and hygiene in the Pacific, and water infrastructure in New Zealand. I also worked in the construction industry as a project manager.

As a postgraduate student at the University of Cambridge, I look forward to researching the complexities of developing resilient infrastructure in the context of environmental and socioeconomic constraints, and rapidly changing conditions.

Infrastructure is the foundation on which society is built, and sustainable development will play a pivotal role in improving outcomes for humanity and the planet.

Previous Education

University of Auckland Civil and Environmental 2022
University of Auckland Musicology 2021

Originally from California, I have been lucky enough to spend the last three years in Barbados studying physical activity and health disparities. I originally came to the Caribbean as a Fulbright Fellow, and was later affiliated with the University of the West Indies, Cavehill. The government of Barbados has recently passed a sugar-sweetened beverage tax and I am excited to focus my PhD with the MRC Epidemiology Unit on a multi-faceted evaluation of this tax. As so many countries around the world face growing concerns around obesity, diabetes and other related conditions, it is important for us to understand which policy tools are effective at addressing these issues at a population level. Before coming to Barbados, I was a Post Bachelor Fellow at the Institute of Health Metrics and Evaluation and focused on the Global Burden of Disease and social determinants of health. I received my MPH from the University of Washington, and have a BA in Economics and Development Studies from the University of California, Berkeley. It is an incredible honor to join the Gates Cambridge community, and I am looking forward to being part of and contributing to such a diverse and committed group of scholars.

Previous Education

University of Washington
University of California, Berkeley

I have always been interested in the areas of the law that regulate scientific development with a focus on commercialisation of technology. The MPhil in BioScience Enterprise explores the business aspects of scientific development and innovation. Through this study, I gained a better understanding of the commercial, scientific and legal dimensions of scientific development and innovation.

Confronting issues that affect women and girls have always been a major part of my development process. Growing up in a small coastal town in Ghana, West Africa, I noticed that girls and boys are treated unequally, and women and men are held to different expectations. So, I chose to focus on gender issues at each stage of my education. At the University of Ghana, where I earned my bachelor's degree, my interests centred on the low participation of women in Ghanaian politics. During my master's, I researched the issue of African women's hair-culture and politics. My work introduced a third stance to the hair debate by arguing that African women do not alter their hair because they want to be white or just as a matter of style. Rather, there are norms in African culture that privilege straight hair over coily hair. At the University of Cambridge's Centre for Gender Studies, I will be looking at how Ewe and Akan cultural norms contribute to gender inequality and technology's impact on gender relations in Ghana. My goal is to produce research work that redefines gender relations, as well as strengthen gender-equality activism in Ghana and beyond. Joining the Gates Cambridge Scholars' community is a dream come true.

Previous Education

Bowling Green State University American Culture Studies 2020
University of Ghana Political Science 2014

Links

https://www.delagoldheart.com
https://web.facebook.com/amemateamelia
https://www.linkedin.com/in/amelia-amemate-01132683

As a scholar of Lebanese origin, born and raised in the diaspora, I have always grappled with the historical processes underlying such displacement, with its multidimensional precarity at home and abroad. My family, like countless others, has suffered tremendously at the hands of a civil war that tore my country apart for 15 years, and left scars persisting into the present. Indeed, the past year and a half have seen the violent eruption of the structural contradictions emerging from this conflict and those which facilitated its emergence in the first place, leading to the contemporary collapse in Lebanon's economy and governance structures alongside the explosion of the Beirut port - the lifeline and microcosm of a country dependent on imported goods, incomes, and capital for its livelihood. Accordingly, I hope to devote myself to understanding the complex origins of these deep-rooted issues, that I may contribute to improving living conditions in my home country. I believe that a critical understanding of the past ought to illuminate genuine paths to reform in the coming time. In other words, Sisyphus' happiness is inseparable from the curse which condemned him to his boulder and the trickery which provoked the wrath of Zeus.

Previous Education

University of Cambridge Development Studies 2020
University of Toronto Economics & Philosophy 2019