BA, University of Birmingham, 2010
MA, King's College London, 2012
MA, City St George's, University of London, 2013
Sofia Barbarani is a Rome-based writer, editor, and journalist. She joined the faculty at John Cabot University in 2026, where she teaches journalism. She is also assistant editor for the Middle East and North Africa at the Committee to Protect Journalists. Sofia spent over a decade reporting from conflict and war zones, specializing in gender-focused and humanitarian reporting. Since 2022, she has worked in communications, content creation, and advocacy campaigns for the United Nations and international NGOs.
She worked extensively in Iraq, the Kurdistan Region and northeast Syria, where she covered the rise and fall of ISIS and the effects of war on the civilian population. She has also reported from Tunisia, South Sudan, Venezuela, Cuba, Ukraine, Poland, Greece and the UAE, and was Italy stringer for The Independent from 2021 to 2022.
She researched and wrote the 2015 Lonely Planet Iraq chapter and contributed to Youth Identity, Politics and Change in Contemporary Kurdistan (Transnational Press London). She has been nominated for awards for her work in Syria and Venezuela.
