Short Biography

Since April 2025 Karim Zafer is working as a research assistant/postdoc for anthropology in the Department of Sociology/Ethnology at the University of Trier. Before that, he worked as a project manager at the International Office of the University of Cologne and as head of the liaison office of the University of Cologne in Cairo.

In April 2024, Karim Zafer completed his doctorate in anthropology at the University of Cologne on the topic of “Unaccompanied Minors and Youth Refugees Making a Family and a Future”. From 2018 to 2023, he  worked as a research assistant at the Department of Social & Cultural Anthropology at the University of Cologne. He completed the interdisciplinary master's degree "Culture and Environment in Africa" in 2016 at the University of Cologne. He wrote his master thesis on "Perceptions of Sexual Harassment and the Islamic religious discourses in Cairo".

His PhD research focused on unaccompanied minor and youth refugees in Germany and their family- and future-making processes. 

Thematic Interests and Regional Focus

(Forced) Migration Studies, Youth Studies, Transnationalism.

Europe, North Africa and the Middle East.

Courses and Seminars

WiSe2023/34 - SoSe2024: Dialogue on Migration Governance in the Euro-Mediterranean Region

SoSe2022: Anthropology of forced migration (BA) 

SoSe2022: High-Risk Migration (MA)

SoSe2021: Youth in the Middle East

Ws. 20/21: High-risk migration

SS. 20: Youth from and in the Middle East

WS.19/20: Anthropology of forced migration

SS.19: Political and lived Islam in Egypt

WS. 18/19: (Forced) Migration and Family