Dr Laura Mills
Associate Lecturer
Research areas
My research interests are interdisciplinary, drawing on International Relations (IR), social and political theory, critical security studies, international political sociology, cultural studies, and cultural and public diplomacy. My work explores two largely under-analysed areas of enquiry in IR ? the cultural and the everyday ? and argues that culture and everyday life are co-constitutive of global politics. Theoretically, my research engages with and seeks to contribute to contemporary cross-disciplinary debates regarding identity, difference, global governmentality, performativity, everyday practice and power. Empirically, my research monograph examines the everyday sites, practices and performances of three US cultural diplomacy programmes launched after 9/11. Challenging mainstream IR approaches to cultural diplomacy and their preoccupation with soft power, the monograph seeks to provide a much-needed critical purchase of post-9/11 American cultural diplomacy. More recently, my research has been exploring further entanglements of culture, everyday life and global politics through the examination of the themes of war, aesthetics, and militarisation, and security and counter-terrorism.
Selected publications
-
Empire, emotion, exchange: (dis)orienting encounters of/with post-9/11 US cultural diplomacy
Mills, L., 22 Jun 2020, In : Cultural Studies. Latest ArticlesResearch output: Contribution to journal ? Article
-
Openings
Mills, L. & Cole, L., 17 Jan 2020, In : Contemporary Voices: The St Andrews Journal of International Relations. p. 1 2 p.Research output: Contribution to journal ? Article
-
Feminist labour at the ISA: White manels, the politics of citation and mundane productions of disciplinary sexism and racism
Mills, L., Åhäll, L., Cook, S., Guerrina, R., Haastrup, T., Masters, C., Särmä, S. & Wright, K. A. M., 26 Jun 2018, The Disorder of Things.Research output: Other contribution
-
Making a meal of it: Food, conflict and politics in the Travel Channel's Breaking Borders
Mills, L., 2017, (In preparation).Research output: Working paper
-
PREVENTing Pedagogy? Implications of the UK?s Counter-Terrorism and Security Act in Higher Education
Mills, L., 2017, (In preparation).Research output: Working paper
-
Spectacle, sport and subjectivity: aesthetic (dis)embodiment and the Invictus Games
Mills, L. J., 2017, (In preparation).Research output: Working paper
-
Hip-Hop and the US State Department: taking diplomacy to the Next Level?
Mills, L., 2016, (In preparation).Research output: Working paper
-
Responding to #AllMalePanels: A Collage: ?Good point well made!? Episodes in Everyday Academic Life
Mills, L., 2016, In : International Feminist Journal of Politics. 18, 3, p. 480-482Research output: Contribution to journal ? Article