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Himani Bannerji

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Himani Bannerji
Professor, Department of Sociology, York University
E-mail: himanib@yorku.ca

Himani Bannerji is a Professor in the Department of Sociology. Her research and writing life extends between Canada and India. Her interests encompass anti-racist feminism, marxism, critical cultural theories and historical sociology. She has done extensive research and writing on patriarchy and class formation in colonial India as well as in different strands of nationalism, cultural identity and politics in India. Her PhD research on class formation and left cultural politics, particularly on Indian Peoples Theatre Assocation (IPTA) resulted in a book, The Mirror of Class: Essays on Bengali Theatre (Papyrus Publishers, Kolkata 1998). She then continued research on the growing role played by middle class women in shaping the class consciousness and identity formations of the Bengali middle classes. This resulted in a book of essays, Inventing Subjects: Studies in Hegemony, Patriarchy and Colonialism (Tulika, India/Anthem, London 2001). Her further research on the connection between religion, politics and patriarchy and violence against women resulted in the book Demography and Democracy: Essays on Nationalism, Gender and Ideology (Orient Blackswan, India/ Canadian Scholars Press, Toronto 2011). She also co-edited and contributed with S. Mojab and J. Whitehead a volume of essays titled Of Property and Propriety: The Role of Gender and Class in Imperialism and Nationalism (University of Toronto Press, 2001). Other than these writings on South Asia in particular, Dr. Bannerji has written on Canada from an anti-racist feminist and marxist perspective books such as The Writing on the Wall: Essays on Culture and Politics (TSAR, Toronto 1993), Thinking Through: Essays of Feminism, Marxism and Anti-racism (Women’s Press, Toronto 1995), The Dark Side of the Nation: Essays on Multiculturalism, Nationalism and Racism (Canadian Scholars Press, Toronto 2000), and edited and contributed to one of the earliest volumes on antiracist feminism, Returning Gaze: Essays on Gender, Race and Class by Non-white Women (Sister Vision Press, Toronto 1993). Her current research interest is on the social thought of Rabindranath Tagore, a volume forthcoming in 2013. Other than writing and research, Dr. Bannerji is one of the founders and life fellow of the School of Women’s Studies, Jadavpur University, Kolkata and an honourary visiting professor and general council member of International Development Studies Kolkata (IDSK). She has been the recipient of a senior fellowship grant for research on Rabindranath Tagore from Rabindra Bhavan, Visva Bharati, Santiniketan. She has taught in Delhi University, Department of Sociology, Jadavpur University, School of Women’s Studies and Department of Comparative Literature, and Calcutta University, School of Women’s Studies, on a regular basis. Dr. Bannerji has been awarded the Tagore Memorial Prize (Rabindra Smriti Puraskar) from the Government of West Bengal’s literary academy for her work on social and cultural history of Bengal. She has presented as a keynote and plenary speaker on numerous occasions, including as the keynote for the all-India body of Rammohan Roy Library Foundations. She has taught the core course on South Asia in York’s South Asia Studies Programme for a number of years, and continues to introduce both undergraduate and graduate students to South Asian colonial and post-colonial writings.

Keywords: Anti-racist feminism; Marxism; critical cultural theories; historical sociology; class formation; women; India; South Asian Diaspora

Upcoming Events

Apr
25
Wed
10:00 am POSTPONED | YCAR Annual General ... @ Room 519, 5th Floor, Kaneff Tower
POSTPONED | YCAR Annual General ... @ Room 519, 5th Floor, Kaneff Tower
Apr 25 @ 10:00 am – 1:00 pm
This event has been postponed. Details about the rescheduled event are forthcoming. YCAR invites its membership to the 2018 Annual General Meeting (AGM). We will [...]
May
1
Tue
2:00 pm Oil Palm Capital: A Feminist Pol... @ Room 108N, North House, Munk School of Global Affairs
Oil Palm Capital: A Feminist Pol... @ Room 108N, North House, Munk School of Global Affairs
May 1 @ 2:00 pm – 4:00 pm
Oil Palm Capital: A Feminist Political Ecology Lens on Mobile Labour and Accelerated Dispossession in Indonesia @ Room 108N, North House, Munk School of Global Affairs | Toronto | Ontario | Canada
Guest speaker: Rebecca Elmhirst, University of Brighton, United Kingdom Rebecca Elmhirst is a leading feminist political ecologist and human geographer with two decades of research [...]
May
4
Fri
all-day Conference on the Language of Ja...
Conference on the Language of Ja...
May 4 – May 5 all-day
In recent years, culinary linguistics, or ‘the language of food’ (Jurafsky 2014), has attracted the attention of scholars, with an increasing number of publications on [...]
May
10
Thu
4:00 pm Hong Kong and the Golden Mountai... @ Eighth Floor, Robarts Library
Hong Kong and the Golden Mountai... @ Eighth Floor, Robarts Library
May 10 @ 4:00 pm – 6:00 pm
Hong Kong and the Golden Mountain Dream | Elizabeth Sinn | Bernard H. K. Luk Memorial Lecture @ Eighth Floor, Robarts Library | Toronto | Ontario | Canada
Elizabeth Sinn, Hong Kong University In the latter part of the 19th Century, hundreds of thousands of Chinese left China for California, first to “seek [...]
May
11
Fri
3:00 pm Past, Present and Future of the ... @ Room 280A, Second Floor, York Lanes
Past, Present and Future of the ... @ Room 280A, Second Floor, York Lanes
May 11 @ 3:00 pm – 5:00 pm
Korea has a long and proud history of socialist/Communist political radicalism, dating back to the colonial age (1910-45) when the dual (class and national) oppression [...]
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