I situate my scholarship at the intersection of the global history of sexual science, history of science and medicine, and modern South Asian history. My dissertation, tentatively entitled, Making Sex Scientific: A History of Sexual Science in India (1883-1985) traces the historical processes through which scientific knowledge on sexuality was produced, consolidated and disseminated in India in the course of the 20th century. I argue that as opposed to the history of sexology in the West, sexual science in India was not a niche field confined solely to the clinical chamber of the sexologist or the psychologist. I show that expertise in sexual science in India was constituted by a substantial degree of methodological heterogeneity as a motley set of actors ranging from colonial officers, physicians, psychologists, police officers, criminologists, socio-religious reformers, political figures, and educators came to be identified with sexual science. My dissertation also unpacks the relationship between sexual science and Orientalism, racism, discourses of hygiene, medico-legal jurisprudence, and sex education. I also analyze the evolution of sexual science in post-colonial India particularly focusing on the institutionalization of the field during the period resulting from collaborations with organizations such as the Ford Foundation and International Planned Parenthood Federation.
B.A. St. Xavier's College, Kolkata.
M.A. Presidency University, Kolkata.
A global history of sexual science, Global history of medicine and public health, History of South Asia.
Grader for History of Technology (STSC 003), Spring 2021
Teaching Assistant for Health and Societies: Global Perspectives (HSOC 010), Spring 2020.
Teaching Assistant for Comparative Medicine (HSOC 145), Fall 2019.
Teaching Assistant for The People’s Health (HSOC 112), Spring 2019.
Teaching Assistant for Medicine in History (HSOC 002), Fall 2018.
Conference Presentations
93rd Annual Meeting of the American Association for the History of Medicine- AAHM 2.0(Virtual Conference), "Curing Venereal Disease and Revitalizing the Nation: History of Venereal Disease and Sexology in early Twentieth-Century India," December 4th, 2020.
Rethinking Sexology Project, Wellcome Trust, University of Exeter, and the University of Granada, Spain, “Sexology- A ‘Purely Scientific’ Pursuit of Sex? Obscenity, Censorship and Sexology in 20th Century South Asia,” 17-18th February 2020.
University of Cambridge, Department of History, Gender, Sexuality and History Workshop, “Constructing a 'Modern' and 'Scientific' Sexual Self: Exploring the History of Sexology in early 20th century South Asia,” November 26,2019.
University of Pennsylvania, Gender, Sexuality and Women’s Studies Graduate Colloquium, "Constructing a 'Modern' and 'Scientific' Sexual Self: Exploring the History of Sexology in early 20th century South Asia," November 20,2019.
48th Annual Conference on South Asia, Madison, WI, “Negotiating Vulgarity and Power in the History of Sexology in Modern South Asia,” October 17, 2019.
University of Pennsylvania, Sciences of Difference in South Asia Workshop, “Science of Difference' as a Vision for Social Reform: Eugenics in early 20th century South Asia,” August 19-20, 2019.
University of Toronto, 15th Annual Graduate History Symposium, “Constructing an Alternate Archive on Sexuality in Colonial South Asia,” May 2-3, 2019.