Leiden University Post-Doctoral Fellowship for CHSS Fellow
Congratulations Dr. Amrita Pritam Gogoi
We are thrilled at Amrita Pritam Gogoi’s selection for the post-doctoral fellowship programme at IIAS, Leiden
Dr. Amrita Pritam Gogoi is a CHSS fellow from the inaugural batch of the SIDA-AAS-SPPU “Researching Marginalities” Workshop held in September 2022. She has recently been awarded a 12-month residential Post-Doctoral Fellowship Programme at the International Institute for Asian Studies (IIAS) at Leiden University, in the Netherlands. Since her association with the SIDA-AAS-SPPU project on “Cultivating the Humanities and Social Sciences and Supporting Underrepresented Scholars of Asia” (CHSS), Amrita has been actively engaged in academic as well as community collaborative activities through workshops, surveys and publications. As part of the CHSS network, Amrita participated and helped organize three workshops with Savitribai Phule Pune University (SPPU).
The CHSS project also gave her the opportunity to present her research at two AAS conferences: the 8th AAS-in-Asia Conference on “Memory, Preservation and Documentation” held at Kyungpook National University, South Korea, in June 2023 and the AAS 2024 Annual Conference held in Seattle, Washington, in March 2024. She has also recently been invited to speak at the 9th Annual Conference of the Memory Studies Association, “Beyond Crises: Resilience and (In)Stability,” next July, in Prague, Czech Republic. Amrita currently teaches political science at Dibrugarh University, the easternmost public university in India. We are thrilled at her recent selection for the post-doctoral fellowship programme at IIAS Leiden. Supporting and mentoring her has been a very fulfilling experience for us. We wish her success in all her future endeavors.
Amrita Gogoi
CHSS 2022 SPPU Workshop Fellow
Nationality: Indian
Affiliation: Dibrugarh University, Assam, India
Research interests: women and gender studies, Nepalese female guerillas, memory
Amrita Gogoi
Dr. Amrita Gogoi joined the CHSS Project in September 2022, as a mentee in the inaugural batch of the “Researching Marginalities Workshop” at SPPU. The project also supported her participation in two AAS conferences; one at the 2023 AAS-in-Asia, and the second at the AAS 2024 Annual Conference in Seattle, WA. Participating in the workshops and conferences along with the continuous mentoring have equipped her with enhanced reading, writing, thinking, and analytical skills. The project gave her the confidence and clarity to complete her doctoral writing projects and undertake new initiatives. One of them was to lead a group of 34 volunteers to undertake a health survey in Baghjan, Tinsukia, where in 2020 an oil inferno led to devasting effects on the people and ecology of this easternmost region of Assam.ream academic platforms.
In 2024, she collaborated with SOIL, a farm, art and craft studio in Dibrugarh, Assam, to curate a self-financed residential workshop for researchers, artists, farmers, and activists working on food and ecological conservation. She also successfully signed a book contract with Lived Places Publishing, LLC, New York, with contributions from the workshop participants. CHSS was able to create a safe space for her to share and listen to fears, excitements, dreams and hopes with mentors and fellow researchers who have all been instrumental in shaping the trajectory of her work.
Over the years, the benefits of the project have extended to many others in the region. Not only has the number of participants from the Northeastern part of India increased, but the project has also reached out to her university. In collaboration with SPPU, she organized a research methodology workshop for 30 researchers from different departments. Dibrugarh University is located in the easternmost fringe of India and it is characterized by high levels of poverty. It has also been severely affected by more than four decades of armed conflict and natural disasters. Starting with the support to one individual, CHSS has expanded its positive impact to help nurture a region that has long remained forgotten in scholarly exchange.
