Helena Hof

Helena Hof (Ph.D.) is a Senior Research Fellow and Lecturer at the Institute of Asian and Oriental Studies, University of Zurich. Helena earned her PhD from Waseda University in Tokyo, Japan where she also worked as a Research Associate at the Center of Asia-Pacific Studies and continues to be an associate member of the Institute of Asian Migrations. Helena is a migration scholar with focus on skilled labor migration in Japan as well as comparative projects on Singapore (previous stays at NTU and NUS), Sao Paulo (visiting fellow at the Center for Metropolitan Studies, USP) and European contexts (visit to the University of Hamburg). As an early career researcher, she was awarded a four-year JSPS grant on skilled labor mobility in global cities which has allowed her to expand her qualitative research experience in Asia and Europe to South America. At the University of Zurich, Helena is working on a book manuscript while serving as a lecturer and developing new collaborative projects, which draw on her expertise in migration and mobility studies, urban sociology, sociology of work, gender and youth. Her most recent publications include ‘The Eurostars Go Global: Young Europeans’ Migration to Asia for Distinction and Alternative Life Paths', published in Mobilities and ‘Opting Out for Getting In: Existential Mobility in European Graduates’ Migration to Asia’, forthcoming in the Journal of Immigrant and Refugee Studies.