Alyssa Paylor

Alyssa Paylor is a Ph.D. graduate who is trained as a critical peace studies scholar and a four-field anthropologist who specializes in ethics, emotion, and politics. Her dissertation, “'We Exist!' The Materiality of Respect in Israeli-Palestinian Peacebuilding," investigates how Palestinian and Israeli participants of peace programs use the material environment in their judgments of one another as they assess who is an ethical person worthy of respect.

She also holds a B.A. in anthropology and political science from the University of Colorado-Boulder, and an M.A. in anthropology and a Master of Global Affairs with a concentration in peace studies from the University of Notre Dame.

Alyssa is the recipient of numerous research grants, a Notre Dame Presidential Fellowship, and held the Mullen Family Fellowship in 2021-2022. She co-coordinates the SWANA Working Group in the Liu Institute at the University of Notre Dame, the Gender Studies Graduate Research Workshop, and is a Graduate Fellow in the Kellogg Institute for International Studies.

Prior to graduate school, Alyssa worked in adult non-formal education and peace education in Northern Thailand and Myanmar. She also has more than 10 years of experience supporting program design, new business development, and donor reporting for non-profit organizations in Palestine-Israel and Myanmar.