Interview with Jenny Orlando-Salling- Ep. 103

PhD Talk

In today's episode, we interview Jenny Orlando-Salling. Jenny is a PhD Fellow in Law at the University of Copenhagen. Originally from Malta, Jenny has lived, studied and worked in a number of countries eventually settling down in Copenhagen, Denmark where she raises her children. Prior to her PhD, Jenny served as a diplomat in Brussels (at the EU) and Egypt. She holds degrees in Law and Political Science from UCL and the LSE. We talk about her career path, and how she returned to academia after a number of years in the foreign service. We also zoom in to her PhD program, which is combined with an LLM, and the structure of this program, as well as its requirements with regard to courses, teaching, international fellowship, and other milestones in the program.
Jenny's research focuses on colonialism in EU Law. We learn about how her experience as a diplomat shaped her research interests, as well as how the experience of always being on-call as a diplomat influenced how she set boundaries around work when she returned to academia.

Jenny is currently pregnant with her third child and has two daughters (a four year old and a 10 month old). She is married. We learn about her experience as an academic parent, and the differences in support she experienced as a new parent in the foreign service and as a parent pursuing a PhD at a university in Denmark.
To round off, we learn her best advice for PhD students, how Jenny sets boundaries to her work, the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on her research and PhD, and what a day in the life looks like for her.
References

• Jenny's Twitter
• Reimagining a European Constitution
• Understanding Identity and the Legacy of Empire in European Constitutionalism: The Case of Hungary