Marie Knakkergaard

Internship in Myanmar

Marie is spending the third semester in Marie Knakkergaard eating (Vietnam)Myanmar where she is contributing as an intern to a research project set up as a collaboration between DIIS (Danish Institute for International Studies) and the local research institute Enlightened Myanmar Research.

"I have long been interested in Southeast Asia and I have lived on the Thai/Myanmar border twice before, working with refugees from Myanmar. I knew I wanted to do an internship in Myanmar already before I applied for the MSc in Global Development. While looking at different options I came across a research project on justice and security in Myanmar by coincidence. Although they weren’t looking for an intern I contacted them and argued for a position!
I live in Yangon, but my work allows me to travel to different parts of the country to do research in areas controlled by armed groups as well as government held areas. My work gives me the opportunity to experience the large cultural, ethnic and linguistic differences in the country first hand. I am currently working on processing the data from a larger survey we have conducted to test some of the preliminary findings of a qualitative research project.
As a part of my job I am participating in various research-sharing meetings with the UN, researchers, NGO’s etc. and also write various smaller independent reports.
When returning to Copenhagen, I will write my thesis in extension to the research project I have been a part of in Myanmar and plan to use the data obtained during my
internship."

Landscape in Vietnam