Dr Josephine Cornell
Dr Josephine Cornell is a Lecturer in Psychology. Before arriving at BCU in January 2022, she worked in South Africa. Josephine completed her PhD in social psychology at the University of Cape Town in 2021.
Josephine’s work has largely been situated within critical social and community psychology. In particular, Josephine’s research interests are focused on issues of identity, belonging, discrimination, violence, resistance and social change and she frequently employs participatory action research methods, such as Photovoice.
Areas of Expertise
- Social psychology
- Identities
- Qualitative methods
- Visual research methods
- Discourse analysis
Qualifications
- PhD (Psychology), University of Cape Town (UCT)
- Master of Social Science (Research Psychology), UCT
- Bachelor of Social Science Honours (Psychology), UCT
Teaching
- PSY6095 – Applied Social Psychology
- PSY5046 – Qualitative Research Methods and Analysis
- PSY6097 – Dissertation Module (Undergraduate)
- PSY5046 – Dissertation Module (Postgraduate)
Research
- Students’ identities and experiences of belonging and exclusion in higher education
Publications
Cornell, J., Kessi, S., & Ratele, K. (In Press - 2022). Examining the dynamics of belonging and alienation in higher education through photovoice. Health Promotion Practice: Photovoice Special Issue.
Cornell, J., Malherbe, N., Seedat, M., & Suffla, S. (2021, online first). Discourses of gender and political violence in South Africa. Social Politics: International Studies in Gender, State and Society. https://doi.org/10.1093/sp/jxab005
Day, S., Cornell, J., & Malherbe, N. (2021). Discourses of ‘service delivery protests’ in South Africa: An analysis of talk radio. Critical Discourse Studies, 18(2), 245-262. https://doi.org/10.1080/17405904.2019.1676279
Ratele, K., Malherbe, N., Suffla, S., Cornell, J., & Taliep, N. (2021). Three pathways for enlarging critical African psychology. South African Journal of Psychology, 51(3), 430-440. https://doi.org/10.1177/0081246320963201
Ratele, K., Malherbe, N., Cornell, J., Day, S., Helman, R., Makama, R., Titi, N., Suffla, S., & Dlamini, S. (2020). Elaborations on (a) decolonising Africa(n)-centred feminist psychology. Psychology in Society, 59, 1-19.
Cornell, J., Seedat, M., Malherbe, N. & Suffla, S. (2020). Splintered politics of memory and community resistance. Journal of Community Psychology, 48(5), 1677-1695. https://doi.org/10.1002/jcop.22394
Malherbe, N., Day, S., Cornell, J., Seedat, M., & Suffla, S. (2020). Exploring police-protester interactions. Peace and Conflict: Journal of Peace Psychology, 26(3), 236–246. https://doi.org/10.1037/pac0000441
Day, S., Seedat, M., Cornell, J., & Suffla, S. (2019). A multimodal reading of public protests. Environment and Planning C: Politics and Space, 37(6), 1005–1023. https://doi.org/10.1177/2399654418818550
Cornell, J., Malherbe, N., Suffla, S., & Seedat, M. (2019, online first). Reflecting critically on the researcher-participant encounter in focus groups: Racialized interactions, contestations and (re)presentations of South Africa’s ‘protest culture’. Qualitative Research in Psychology. https://doi.org/10.1080/14780887.2019.1577519
Ratele, K., Cornell, J., Dlamini, S., Helman, R., Malherbe, N., & Titi, N. (2018). Some basic questions about (a) decolonizing (Africa(n)-centred) psychology considered. South African Journal of Psychology, 48(3), 331-342.
Cornell, J. & Kessi, S. (2017). Black students’ experiences of transformation at a previously ‘white only’ South African university: A photovoice study. Ethnic and Racial Studies, 40(11), 1882-1899.
Cornell, J., Ratele, K., & Kessi, S. (2016). Intersections of race, gender, and sexuality in student experiences of violence and resistances on a university campus. Perspectives in Education, 34(2), 97-119.
Kessi, S., & Cornell, J. (2015). Coming to UCT: Black students, transformation and discourses of race. Journal of Student Affairs in Africa, 3(2), 1–16.
Cornell, J., Malherbe, N., Ratele, K. & Suffla, S. (In Press - 2022). Whiteness, masculinity and the decolonising imperative. In R. Andreassen, S. Keskinen, C. Lundström, & S. Tate (Eds.), Routledge handbook of new critical race and whiteness studies. UK: Routledge.
Cornell, J. & Kessi, S. (2022). Discrimination in education. In C. Tileagă, M. Augoustinos, & K. Durrheim (Eds.), Routledge handbook of prejudice, stereotyping and discrimination (pp. 167-183). Routledge.
Cornell, J., Kessi, S. & Ratele, K. (2021). Constructing places of belonging and exclusion: A spatial reading of South African university students’ affect and identity. In S. Yamada, A. Takada & S. Kessi (Eds.) Knowledge, school, and social structure in Africa (pp. 85-127). Bamenda, Cameroon: Langaa Publishers.
Ratele, K., Malherbe, N., Cornell, J., Day, S., Makama, R., & Suffla, S. (2020). Putting psychology into question in our context: What is African-centred psychology? In D. Donald, S. Lazarus, & N. Moolla (Eds.), Educational psychology in social context: Ecosystemic applications in Southern Africa (pp. 34-39). Cape Town, South Africa: Oxford University Press.
Cornell, J., Mkhize, L, & Kessi, S. (2019). Envisioning photovoice as decolonial feminist praxis. In F. Boonzaier & T. van Niekerk (Eds.), Decolonial feminist community psychology (pp. 59-76). New York, NY: Springer.
Cornell, J. & Kessi, S. (2018). Black Students’ Resistances to Stigmatizing Discourses in Higher Education: A Photovoice Study. In T. Shefer, J. Hearn, K. Ratele, & F. Boonzaier (Eds.), Engaging youth in activist research and pedagogical praxis: Transnational perspectives on gender, sex, and race (pp. 215-234). New York, NY: Routledge.
Cornell, J., Kessi, S., & Ratele, K. (2018). Dynamics of privilege, identity and resistance at a historically white university: A photovoice study of exclusionary institutional culture. In N. Oke, C. Sonn, & A. Baker (Eds.), Places of privilege: Interdisciplinary perspectives on identities, change and resistance (pp. 173-193). Dordrecht, Netherlands: Sense Publishers.