Meenakshi Nair Ambujam. "Navigating the Field: Exploring Gendered Dimensions of Fieldwork." TSANTSA - Journal of the Swiss Anthropological Association 26 (June 2021): 186–94.
Meenakshi Nair Ambujam, Ph.D.
Areas of Interest:
- Bureaucracy and Documentary Artefacts
- Land, Dispossession and Adivasi Land Rights
- Everyday State
- Infrastructure and Materiality
- Agrarian Transformations
- Ethnography
- Digital Land Governance Systems
- India
- South Asia
Education:
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PhD in Anthropology and Sociology, Graduate Institute of International and Development Studies, Geneva, Switzerland Dissertation: “Landless with my Title-deed”: Rethinking Landlessness in Adivasi Life, Telangana (India) |
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MA in Development Studies, Tata Institute of Social Sciences, Mumbai, India Thesis: Concept of Citizenship and Land Rights in Adivasi Life: An Analysis of Attappady, Kerala |
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BA (Hons) in Economics, Shri Ram College of Commerce, University of Delhi, New Delhi, India |
Academic Career:
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Research Fellow, Oriental Institute, Czech Academy of Sciences |
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Visiting Assistant in Research, Department of Anthropology, Yale University, New Haven, Connecticut, USA |
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Teaching Assistant, Department of Anthropology and Sociology, Graduate Institute of International and Development Studies, Geneva, Switzerland |
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Teaching Assistant, Department of Anthropology and Sociology, Graduate Institute of International and Development Studies, Geneva, Switzerland |
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Teaching Assistant, Department of Interdisciplinary Programmes (MINT), Graduate Institute of International and Development Studies, Geneva, Switzerland |
Other Academic Activities:
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Section Editor (South and South-east Asia), Grassroots, Journal of Political Ecology |
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Event Coordinator, Department of Anthropology and Sociology, Graduate Institute of International and Development Studies, Geneva, Switzerland |
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Jury Member, Cultural Horizon Prize 2021, Society for Cultural Anthropology |
Academic Awards:
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Institute Gold Medal, Department of Development Studies, Tata Institute of Social Sciences, Mumbai, India |
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Best Student Award, Department of Development Studies, Tata Institute of Social Sciences, Mumbai, India |
Scholarships and Fellowships:
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Award Date |
Period |
Grant |
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Sept 2020 – Jun 2021 |
Doc.Mobility Fellowship, Swiss National Science Foundation, Bern, Switzerland |
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Jan 2019 – Sept 2019 |
Dissertation Fieldwork Grant, The Wenner-Gren Foundation for Anthropological Research, New York, USA |
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Sept 2018 – Jun 2019 |
Institute Scholarship, Graduate Institute of International and Development Studies, Geneva, Switzerland |
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Sept 2016 – June 2017 |
Alumni Scholarship, Graduate Institute of International and Development Studies, Geneva, Switzerland |
Conferences:
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“Disciplinary Silences: Anthropology, Fieldwork and Sexualised Harassment” in the panel Reciprocal Vulnerability: Privilege, violence and practices of care from fieldwork to academia, Annual Meeting of the Swiss Anthropological Association, Neuchâtel, Switzerland |
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“When Documents Fail: Exploring Landed Landlessness in Adivasi Life, Telangana (India)” in the panel Fictive Futures: Technology, Labor and Value of Land, Annual Meeting of the American Anthropological Association, Baltimore, USA [Presenter] |
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“Situating Interconnected Truths in Ethnographies: Knowledges and Practices”, Annual Meeting of the American Anthropological Association, Baltimore, USA [Panel Co-organiser] |
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“Title-deeds, Land Records and Paradoxes”, JPS Writeshop-Workshop 2021, Organised by the Journal of Peasant Studies (Online) |
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“When Documents Fail: Exploring Landed Landlessness in Adivasi Life, Telangana (India)”, South Asia Brown Bag Series, Yale University, New Haven-CT, USA (Online) |
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“Title-deeds, Record of Rights and Paradoxes: Exploring Conditions of Landed Landlessness in Adivasi Life, Telangana (India)”, Programme in Agrarian Studies, Graduate Students Colloquium- Spring 2021 (Online) |
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“When Documents Fail: Rethinking Landlessness in Adivasi Life, Telangana (India)”, in the panel Agricultural Infrastructures in a Failed Ecology, Association of the Social Anthropologists of the UK (Online) |
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“Paper Truths and Land Reforms: An Analysis of Adivasi Life in Attappady, Kerala (India)” in the panel Land Reforms and Fragility, LANDac Annual International Conference 2018, Muntgebouw, Utrecht, The Netherlands |
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“Lost Lands and Endless Claims: A Study of Adivasis of Attappady Hills, Kerala (India)”, 7th Young South Asia Scholars’ Meet, University of Zurich and ETH Zurich, Zurich, Switzerland |
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“Negotiating Claims: Authoring Citizenship and Identity in Adivasi Life, Kerala (India)”, 1st Ireland India Postgraduate Conference on South Asia, Dublin City University, Dublin, Republic of Ireland) |
Invited Talks:
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Episode 1 of Field Stories, Interviewed by Jerika Loren Heinze, Fieldwork Initiative, (Online) |
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“Paper Truths, Land and Claims: Rethinking Restitution in Adivasi Life”, Invited Speaker, CIES Lunch Seminar, Graduate Institute of International and Development Studies, Geneva, Switzerland |
Public Engagement:
- 2 October 2022. “The End of an Era: Roger Federer, Tennis and More”. Medium. Accessed on 6 October 2022: https://documents-meenakshi.medium.com/an-end-of-an-era-roger-federer-tennis-and-more-d5596e135b29
- 21 September 2021. “Writing through a Pandemic: Thesis, Anxiety and Covid-19”, Medium. Accessed on 12 October 2021:https://documents-meenakshi.medium.com/writing-through-a-pandemic-thesis-anxiety-and-covid-19-ba65bb97630c
- 14 June 2021. “Unpacking Negotiations through the Performance of Language and Attire: An Ethnography of Formal and In-Between Spaces during UPR sessions”, Medium. Accessed 29 June 2021: https://documents-meenakshi.medium.com/unpacking-negotiations-through-the-performance-of-language-and-attire-an-ethnography-of-formal-and-77922eeb9096
- 14 June 2021. “An Ethnographic Exploration of the Public Nature of Standards”, Medium. Accessed 29 June 2021: https://documents-meenakshi.medium.com/an-ethnographic-exploration-of-the-public-nature-of-standards-1f442297f197
- 19 July 2019. “The Challenges of Researching as a Woman Anthropologist”, Student Stories (News)-Graduate Institute Communications. Accessed on 02 August 2021:https://www.graduateinstitute.ch/communications/news/challenges-researching-woman-anthropologist
- 7 July 2019. “Navigating the Field: Doing Fieldwork as a Woman”, Medium. Accessed 31 August 2019: https://medium.com/@documents.meenakshi/navigating-the-field-doingfieldwork-as-a-woman-d77d3eebbb1f