Participant Info
- First Name
- Shriya
- Last Name
- Patnaik
- Country
- Switzerland
- State
- AL Alabama
- shriya.patnaik@graduateinstitute.ch
- Affiliation
- PhD Candidate at The Graduate Institute for International Studies, Swiss Government Excellence Scholar
- Website URL
- https://www.graduateinstitute.ch/academic-departments/shriya-patnaik
- Keywords
- International History, Gender and Sexuality Studies, Human Rights, Minority Rights, Oral Histories, Social and Cultural History, Imperial History, Postcolonial Studies, British Colonial History, South Asian Studies
- Availability
- Media Contact
- Additional Contact Information
- PhD
- PhD
Personal Info
- Photo
- About Me
Shriya’s research focuses on the historical genealogy surrounding discourses related to prostitution, trafficking, and sex-worker rights in colonial and postcolonial India. In particular, she focuses on the now-extinct matriarchal community of temple-dancers called Mahari-Devadasis in Orissa (a matrilineal community categorized as ‘religious prostitutes’ in colonial India), along with their legal and healthcare rights under international humanitarian conventions. Her research is methodologically reliant on oral histories, colonial-period archival records, along with UN/ILO humanitarian conventions on the rights of marginalized communities in the Global South. Shriya has pursued her Bachelor’s in History from Cornell University, and has subsequently pursued her Masters’ in International History with a focus on Gender Studies from the Columbia University-London School of Economics dual degree MA-MSc program. Besides her academic interests, Shriya has actively worked in the public policy and NGO/development sectors in India on gender and human rights initiatives, and these experiences have played a crucial role in shaping her research focus on women’s rights and minority rights initiatives in postcolonial societies at a transnational scale. In terms of her linguistic abilities, she is fully-proficient in Hindi and Oriya, has medium-proficiency in Sanskrit, and beginner-level proficiency in French. Shriya is also a PhD affiliate with the Graduate Institute Gender Centre.
- Recent Publications
- Shriya Patnaik, “The Lost Life Stories of Mahari-Devadasis in Postcolonial India (1947-2015)”, Borderlines (2021): https://www.borderlines-cssaame.org/posts/2021/5/24/the-lost-life-stories-of-mahari-devadasis-in-postcolonial-india?fbclid=IwAR2XgDC9WpEwaG1fj2Ohj_KvqmNVIrEMb5SYaPsHhgrtEI16LU5zTlgFv0M
- Shriya Patnaik, “Marginalizing the Matriarchal, Minority Subject: A Critical Analysis of Human Rights and Women’s Reform Projects in Colonial and Postcolonial India through the Case-Study of the ‘Mahari-Devadasi’”, Electronic Journal of Social and Strategic Studies, Special Issue (2021): pp. 59-88. (DOI: 10.47362/EJSSS.2021.2105): https://doi.org/10.47362/EJSSS.2021.2105
- Shriya Patnaik, “The Invisible Voices of India’s Informal Sector Sex Workers”, LSE South Asia Centre Blog (2021): https://blogs.lse.ac.uk/southasia/2021/03/22/the-invisible-voices-of-indias-informal-sector-sex-workers/?fbclid=IwAR3Z3Zr4yirSxGjAxrAj7bh-7g3cSgvX0QTXDNNZSuIs_Mbq11pX79Vw2tI
- Shriya Patnaik, “The Missing Life Stories of India’s Sex Workers”, Graduate Institute Gender Centre (2020): https://www.graduateinstitute.ch/communications/news/missing-life-stories-indias-sex-workers?fbclid=IwAR1EBjCvP1f5NlSei-4iFhpcvHa4gXs2w-iphGuxaCORnAYrPRlJxv42vG0
- Swiss Network of International Studies Podcast: https://snis.ch/awards/the-minority-question-a-critical-analysis-of-gender-human-rights-and-womens-reform-projects-in-colonial-and-postcolonial-india-through-the-figure-of-the-mahari-devadasi/?fbclid=IwAR164y3lN_Rvo3oZ23tpK7HyXZp-xmRkmjKD_qQEMWrEkwQ5qz6HnlBSR3M
- Media Coverage
- Country Focus
- Expertise by Geography
- Asia, British Isles, India, United Kingdom
- Expertise by Chronology
- 5, 6, 7, 8, 9
- Expertise by Topic
- Colonialism, Emancipation, Gender, Human Rights, Labor, Law, Libraries & Archives, Local & Regional, Public History, Sexuality, Sexual Violence, Urban History, Women
