Syeda Quratulain Masood, an assistant professor of social justice and social change presented her article “Segregation and Surveillance: Imperial Spatial Formation and Afghan Subjectivity in U.S.-Occupied Kabul,” at Syracuse University on a panel about the sociology of violence. Based on ethnographic research in post 9/11 Kabul, it examines how segregation and surveillance shaped the everyday experience of Afghans under U.S occupation.
Masood’s work examines how the material infrastructures of segregation and surveillance, such as compound walls, checkpoints, and aerial blimps, shaped the lived experience of Afghans during U.S. occupation. Drawing on everyday encounters with these architectures, she explores how spatial and symbolic violence intertwined in ordinary acts of movement, waiting, and self-understanding.