Research
I study the forming of meaning understood as everyday practices, with a focus on identity construction among the majority of the population and ethnic minorities in Norway. My work is concerned with how these groups express, uphold and develop their everyday life in the outskirts of, or in the extension of, organised religion, both in private and public places (public institutions, public urban and natural landscapes). I am especially interested in how the agency is influenced by social structures like hierarchy, authority, gendered social relationships, as well as global tendencies particularly migration and consumption. Most of my scholarship centres on negotiating of identity and how the sense of belonging creates and maintains ritual actions, emotions, and space. I have been focusing on how young people, newly established parents and bereaved people assign meaning to ritual actions in response to changes in life courses and social contexts.