Overview
I am an anthropologist of the environment, science, and medicine. My current book manuscript is a historically grounded ethnography of agricultural biotechnology in India. Along with asking what a good seed is for farmers and biotechnologists, I trace how knowledge about objects like genetically modified seeds is formed at intersections of practice, people, and time. My next project is an inquiry into the long relation between environmental heat and the body in South Asia. I find historically emerging meanings of words and concepts powerful. My teaching is often grounded in questions of ethics and creative negotiations with power around practices, technologies, and ideas that acquire palimpsests of meanings over time and across place.
I have lived in India, Singapore, and the U.S. I know Bengali, Hindi, English, and I have been learning Mughal Persian for the past few years. My research and teaching are infused with my own senses of self, belonging, and identity.
When I am not teaching or doing research, I am interested in healing plants, stars, and cultural interpretations of dreams.
