Sofie Mortensen

Sofie Mortensen is a Danish Carlsberg Foundation Internationalisation Postdoctoral Fellow in ESPM. She is a feminist geographer and political ecologist focusing on the interwoven material and emotional consequences of agrarian change and migration. Drawing on ethnographic and participatory visual methods, her research documents the gendered and racialized forms of exploitation that migrant workers face in Thailand’s agro-industry, while dreaming of rural returns to Myanmar. Within that, she is interested in questions around the role of land and rural areas in youth future imaginaries as well as expressions of agency in extremely constrained contexts. Her current research zooms in on the power dynamics in smart agriculture value chains, specifically the position of Thai farmers and migrant workers hybrid maize seed production, questioning its potential for uplifting rural livelihoods and for who.

Education

2024, PhD Geography, Department of Food and Resource Economics, University of Copenhagen, Denmark

2017, MA International Development and Management, Lund University, Sweden

2015, BA International Development and Geography, Roskilde University, Denmark

Research Lab

Professor Youjin Chung’s Critical Ruralities Lab

Selected Publications

• Mortensen, S., S. A. H. Lin, & F. Questiaux. 2026. Double Struggle: Locating gendered relations of (re)production and agency among super-exploited Myanmar migrant laborers in the Thai agro-industry. Feminist Economics. https://doi.org/10.1080/13545701.2026.2747910 

• Mortensen, S., F. Questiaux, J. Vorburger, S. Barber, & H. O. Faxon. 2026. Visualizing nature: A review of photovoice as a method for understanding environmental change. Environmental Science & Policy 175: 104298. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.envsci.2025.104298

• Law, N. P. T., S. Mortensen, & C. Middleton. 2026. A Critical Sister: Public Authority and the Role and Position of the Karen Women’s Organisation, Myanmar. Gender & Society 40(1): 38-67. https://doi.org/10.1177/08912432251415175

• Mortensen, S. 2024. Labor Abroad as a Struggle for Land: Young Migrants’ Dream of a Rural Return to Myanmar. Antipode 57(6): 2168-2189. https://doi.org/10.1111/ANTI.13095

• Mortensen, S. 2024. Rightless Rurality: The Illegalization of Burmese Migrant Laborers in Thailand’s Agro-Industry. Journal of Peasant Studies 51(7): 1508-1529. https://doi.org/10.1080/03066150.2024.2340648

• Mortensen, S., & F. Questiaux. 2024. Extending the Ethnographic Toolbox: Photovoice and Everyday Experiences of Marginalized Groups. Gender, Place & Culturehttps://doi.org/10.1080/0966369X.2023.2298788

Selected Honors and Awards

• Awarded best dissertation at the Department of Food and Resource Economics and nominated for best dissertation at the Faculty of Science, University of Copenhagen (2024)

• The Carlsberg Foundation’s Internationalisation Fellowship

• Horizon 2020 Marie Sklodownska-Curie TALENT PhD grant