Samia Dinkelaker joined the department of Global Political Economy of Labour under the Consideration of Gender Relations in October 2026 as a substitute professor.

She studied political science (diploma, equivalent to a master’s degree) at Freie Universität Berlin. 

She earned her PhD at Osnabrück University with a dissertation on the migration of Indonesian domestic workers titled “Negotiating Respect(ability). A Transnational Ethnography of Indonesian Labour Brokerage.” 

From 2019 to 2021, she was a research associate at the Institute for Migration Research and Intercultural Studies (IMIS) at Osnabrück University. From 2021 to 2022, she joined the Chair of Critical Development Studies at University of Passau, also as a research associate.

From 2022 to 2024, she held postdoctoral positions at Academia Sinica and National University of Taiwan (both in Taipei) and conducted research on the conditions and struggles of migrant workers from Indonesia in Taiwan. 

From 2024 to 2026, she was a postdoctoral fellow at the Asia Research Institute at the National University of Singapore, where she continued her research on the political economy of migration in East Asia. 

More information: samiadinkelaker.net

 

  • Work and Migration
  • Political economy of migration, including in Southeast and East Asia
  • Racialised capitalism
  • Workers’ power and subjectivities
  • Ethnographic research methods

Editorship

Dinkelaker, Samia, Huke, and Olaf Tietje. 2021. Nach der „Willkommenskultur“. Geflüchtete zwischen umkämpfter Teilhabe und zivilgesellschaftlicher Solidarität. Bielefeld: transcript. https://doi.org/10.14361/9783839454145-001

Stodulka, Thomas, Samia Dinkelaker, and Ferdiansyah Thajib. 2019. Affective Dimensions of Fieldwork and Ethnography. New York: Springer. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-20831-8

Contributions to journals and edited volumes

Lan, Pei-Chia, Samia Dinkelaker, and Chih-Hsuan Chang. 2026. “From Migrant Workers to Future Immigrants? ‘Guest Worker’ Programs in Contemporary Taiwan and Post-World War II West Germany.” Historical Social Research 51(1), 200–227. https://doi.org/10.12759/hsr.51.2026.08

Dinkelaker, Samia. 2025. “‘Stres’ and Self-protection: Migrant Workers Facing Everyday Violence in Taiwan’s Fisheries.” International Sociology 41(1), 49–67. https://doi.org/10.1177/02685809251359270

Dinkelaker, Samia, and Ralf Ruckus. 2024. “Anmerkungen zur Klassenzusammensetzung indonesischer Wanderarbeiter*innen in den Fabriken Taiwans.” In Klassensolidarität, Autonomie, Selbstorganisation. Erfahrungen und Reflexionen von unten, edited by M. Lautréamont, 32–48. Münster: Unrast.

Dinkelaker, Samia. 2024. “Striving for Control over Migrant Labour and Lives: Indonesian Factory Workers in Taiwan.” Work in the Global Economy 4(1), 52–69. https://doi.org/10.1332/27324176Y2024D000000016

Tietje, Olaf, Samia Dinkelaker, and Nikolai Huke. 2021. “Umkämpfte Teilhabe.” In Nach der „Willkommenskultur“. Geflüchtete zwischen umkämpfter Teilhabe und zivilgesellschaftlicher Solidarität, edited by Samia Dinkelaker, Nikolai Huke, and Olaf Tietje, 7–22. Bielefeld: transcript.
https://doi.org/10.1515/9783839454145-001

Braun, Katherine, and Samia Dinkelaker. 2021. “Schutz für geflüchtete Frauen* im Spannungsfeld von besondere Schutzbedürftigkeit und restriktiven Migrationspolitiken.” In Nach der „Willkommenskultur“. Geflüchtete zwischen umkämpfter Teilhabe und zivilgesellschaftlicher Solidarität, edited by Samia Dinkelaker, Nikolai Huke, and Olaf Tietje, 65–88 . Bielefeld: transcript.
https://doi.org/10.14361/9783839454145-004

Dinkelaker, Samia, and Helen Schwenken. 2020. “Fragmentierter Schutz an der Schnittstelle von gewaltförmigen Geschlechterverhältnissen und restriktiven Asyl- und Aufenthaltspolitiken.” Bürger und Staat 3/2020: 160–66. http://www.buergerimstaat.de/3_20/migration.pdf

Stodulka, Thomas, Samia Dinkelaker, and Ferdiansyah Thajib. 2019. “Fieldwork, Ethnography, and the Empirical Affect Montage.” In Analyzing Affective Societies. Methods and Methodologies, edited by Antje Kahl, 279–95. London and New York: Routledge. https://doi.org/10.4324/9780429424366

Thajib, Ferdiansyah, Samia Dinkelaker, and Thomas Stodulka. 2019. “Affective Dimensions of Fieldwork and Ethnography.” In Affective Dimensions of Fieldwork and Ethnography, edited by Thomas Stodulka, Samia Dinkelaker, and Ferdiansyah Thajib, 7–22. New York: Springer. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-20831-8_2

Mattes, Dominik, and Samia Dinkelaker. 2019. “Failing and Attuning in the Field.” In Affective Dimensions of Fieldwork and Ethnography, edited by Thomas Stodulka, Samia Dinkelaker, and Ferdiansyah Thajib, 227–31. New York: Springer. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-20831-8_20

Dinkelaker, Samia. 2018. “National Belonging and Violent Norms of Gendered Migrant Citizenship. Indonesian Migrant Domestic Workers’ Appropriation of a National Ritual.” gender[ed] thoughts. New Perspectives in Gender Research 1/2018: 8–21. https://doi.org/10.3249/2509-8179-gtg-5

Dissertation

Dinkelaker, Samia. 2020. Negotiating Respect(ability). A Transnational Ethnography of Indonesian Labor Brokerage. Osnabrück: Osnadocs.https://doi.org/10.48693/21.

 

Other contributions

Dinkelaker, Samia. 2025. “Rethinking Labour Migration Regimes Through Embodied Experience—A Research Project Among Indonesian Migrant Workers in Taiwan.” ARIscope, July 28. https://doi.org/10.25542/a6m9-xd50

Dinkelaker, Samia, and Ralf Ruckus. 2025. “Taiwan’s Regime of Temporary Migrant Labor: An Overview.” Asian Labour Review, July 7.
https://labourreview.org/taiwans-regime-of-temporary-migrant-labour/

Dinkelaker, Samia, and Ralf Ruckus. 2025. “Taiwan’s Regime of Temporary Migrant Labour: Timeline of Changes” Asian Labour Review, July 7.
https://labourreview.org/a-timeline-of-taiwan-regime-of-temporary-migrant-labour/

Dinkelaker, Samia, and Ralf Ruckus. 2024. “‘We still have a long way to go’ – Interview with TIWA on their Activity and Changes in Taiwan’s Migration Regime since the1990s.” Asian Labour Review, March 4. https://labourreview.org/a-long-way-to-go/

Dinkelaker, Samia, and Ralf Ruckus. 2023. “Sweatshops and Assembly Halls. The Class Composition of Indonesian Migrant Workers in Taiwan’s Manufacturing Industry.” Asian Labour Review, November 30. https://labourreview.org/sweatshops-assembly-halls/

Dinkelaker, Samia, and Ralf Ruckus. 2023. “Indonesian Migrant Labor in Taiwan’s Racialized Capitalism. Preliminary Notes on a Research Project.” positions politics, March 29. https://positionspolitics.org/samia-dinkelaker-ralf-ruckus-indonesian-migrant-labor-in-taiwans-racialized-capitalism-preliminary-notes-on-a-research-project/

Dinkelaker, Samia. 2017. “Migrantinnen – Besonderheiten weiblicher Migration,” Federal Agency for Civic Education, November 30. http://www.bpb.de/gesellschaft/migration/dossier-migration/223157/migrantinnen