Alina Penkalais a PhD Fellow at Ghent University and the United Nations University Institute on Comparative Regional Integration Studies (UNU-CRIS). Born and raised in Poland she holds a master’s degree in political science from the Jagiellonian University in Krakow. She has worked for the Polish Ministry of Defence as a security policy expert and later in conflict-affected areas, in Georgia for the EU Monitoring Mission, and in Ukraine for the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE). She researches return migration and reintegration processes of women returning to Ukraine and focuses on the role of collective memories in their belonging negotiation.
