Migration and displacement: My grandmother, Lausanne, and some lessons for the present
Lea Ypi reads from her new book Indignity: A Life Reimagined and reflects on the enduring legacies of migration, displacement, and forced removal. Beginning with the story of her grandmother in the aftermath of the collapse of the Ottoman Empire, she explores how past experiences of exile and resettlement help us confront the moral and political challenges of migration in our own time.

Lea Ypi (FBA, FAE) is Ralph Miliband Professor in Politics and Philosophy at the London School of Economics and Political Science. She is the author of Indignity: A Life Reimagined and Free: Coming of Age at the end of History, both published by Penguin Press as well as Global Justice and Avant-Garde Political Agency, The Meaning of Partisanship (with Jonathan White), and The Architectonic of Reason, published by Oxford University Press. Her work has been translated into more than thirty-five languages and won numerous prizes, including the Royal Society of Literature Ondaatje Prize, the Slightly Foxed First Biography Award, the British Academy Prize for Excellence in Political Science and a Leverhulme Prize for Outstanding Research Achievement. 

The lecture will be followed by a drinks reception ending at 7pm.

Please register to attend
Date: 5 November 2025, 17:15
Venue: Venue to be announced
Speaker: Lea Ypi (LSE)
Organising department: Refugee Studies Centre
Organisers: Professor Catherine Briddick (Refugee Studies Centre, University of Oxford), Professor Tom Scott-Smith (University of Oxford)
Organiser contact email address: rsc-outreach@qeh.ox.ac.uk
Part of: Refugee Studies Centre Public Seminar Series
Booking required?: Required
Booking url: https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/migration-and-displacement-my-grandmother-lausanne-and-some-lessons-tickets-1756373483369?aff=oddtdtcreator
Audience: Members of the University only
Editor: Catherine Meredith