EVENT DATE: October 14, 2021
TOPIC: Extremism and Technology

The speaker for our Webinar on Thursday Oct 14 was Dr. Amarnath Amarasingam, Assistant Professor in the School of Religion. He is also a Senior Research Fellow at the Institute for Strategic Dialogue, and an Associate Fellow at the International Centre for the Study of Radicalization. His research interests are in radicalization, terrorism, diaspora politics, post-war reconstruction, and the sociology of religion.

Dr. Amarasingam is an experienced field researcher, having conducted hundreds of interviews for his PhD dissertation on social movement activism. He has conducted numerous social media and in-person interviews with current and former foreign fighters in countries throughout the world, including Sri Lanka, Syria, Iraq, Somalia and Israel/Palestine. He has been interviewed on CNN, PBS Newshour, CBC, BBC, and a variety of other media outlets.

Professor Amarasingam’s research focus is terrorism and political violence; social movements; religion and politics in the Middle East; diaspora politics and activism; hate movements and the far-right. He is considered a “go-to” source of expertise in the area of extremist ideological beliefs.

This will be an excellent opportunity to get a look at extremist movements on both far-right and far-left sides of the spectrum.