Julia Förster

MA, studied Islamic studies, sociology and Arabic studies at the Friedrich Alexander University in Erlangen-Nürnberg (FAU), the University of Cairo and the Free University in Berlin. Förster’s MA dissertation, entitled ‘The Reform of Sudanese School Textbooks under the Regime of Umar al-Bashir. An Analysis of the Textbook Series Al-Insan wa-'l-Kawn’, addresses current educational reforms in Sudan on the basis of an exemplary textbook series. 

Förster’s research focuses primarily on past and present-day educational policy in the Arabian Peninsula and in Muslim majority countries in Africa. For several years, Förster taught foreign languages to children, young people and adults in Germany and abroad, including one year at a secondary school in Clermont-Ferrand in France. Her work, studies and interest in learning languages enabled her to visit a number of Arabic-speaking and Muslim majority countries, including Kuwait, Oman, Syria, Egypt and Sudan. In 2009 she worked as a site manager in a school, where she organised a summer school programme in the United Arab Emirates. From 2009 to 2010 Ms Förster taught at the Institute for German Studies at the University of Aden in Yemen, where she also began to collect documents and carry out research.

Since August 2010 she has been a research fellow in the 'Images' work area at the Georg Eckert Institute, where she is working on a doctoral dissertation about the Development and Transformation of Yemenite Educational Media. 

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