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CWS

CWS

Centre for Women's Studies

 

Courses offered in Monsoon Semester 2024

Courses offered in Winter Semester 2024

 

Centre for Women's Studies (CWS), JNU, seeks to study questions of gender in an interdisciplinary and comparative framework, thereby providing the space for creating a vibrant community of feminist academics, students, activists and artists concerned with issues of gender, sexuality and wider issues of power in society. Women's Studies in India emerged out of the conjunction of such diverse forces as the women's and democratic struggles, as well as state initiatives that critically examined the status of women in the country. The past three decades have witnessed the influence of these trends within academia, leading to path breaking feminist research in different disciplines, particularly in the social sciences and humanities. The growth of Women's Studies Centres/ Programmes in different Universities (and some autonomous research institutions), all over the country has demonstrated recognition of the issues that have been highlighted by the women's movement and feminist research over the past many years..

History: The Centre was launched in 2000 when Prof. Utsa Patnaik, the then Dean, along with Prof. Zoya Hasan and others established the Women’s Studies Programme (WSP) with UGC funding in the School of Social Sciences. The Programme, an integral part of the School of Social Sciences, was conceived of as a distinct space for engaging questions relating to women and gender, both in teaching, and research. In addition to faculty members, WSP has had, until 2013, a Professor of the School appointed as its Director on a rotational basis, to co-ordinate the overall functioning of the Programme. Professors Zoya Hasan (CPS), Jayati Ghosh (CESP), Tanika Sarkar (CHS), Maitrayee Chaudhuri (CSSS), Saraswati Raju (CSRD), and Kumkum Roy (CHS) have all been associated with the Programme as its Directors and have helped to give it a distinctive, interdisciplinary, character. In 2013, once the WSP became a full Centre of the School of Social Sciences, Prof. Shefali Jha (CPS) was appointed as its first Chairperson. The CWS currently has five faculty members and is in the process of expansion. Click for more....

A warm welcome to the modified and updated website of the Centre for East Asian Studies. The East Asian region has been at the forefront of several path-breaking changes since 1970s beginning with the redefining the development architecture with its State-led development model besides emerging as a major region in the global politics and a key hub of the sophisticated technologies. The Centre is one of the thirteen Centres of the School of International Studies, Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi that provides a holistic understanding of the region.

Initially, established as a Centre for Chinese and Japanese Studies, it subsequently grew to include Korean Studies as well. At present there are eight faculty members in the Centre. Several distinguished faculty who have now retired include the late Prof. Gargi Dutt, Prof. P.A.N. Murthy, Prof. G.P. Deshpande, Dr. Nranarayan Das, Prof. R.R. Krishnan and Prof. K.V. Kesavan. Besides, Dr. Madhu Bhalla served at the Centre in Chinese Studies Programme during 1994-2006. In addition, Ms. Kamlesh Jain and Dr. M. M. Kunju served the Centre as the Documentation Officers in Chinese and Japanese Studies respectively.

The academic curriculum covers both modern and contemporary facets of East Asia as each scholar specializes in an area of his/her interest in the region. The integrated course involves two semesters of classes at the M. Phil programme and a dissertation for the M. Phil and a thesis for Ph. D programme respectively. The central objective is to impart an interdisciplinary knowledge and understanding of history, foreign policy, government and politics, society and culture and political economy of the respective areas. Students can explore new and emerging themes such as East Asian regionalism, the evolving East Asian Community, the rise of China, resurgence of Japan and the prospects for reunification of the Korean peninsula. Additionally, the Centre lays great emphasis on the building of language skills. The background of scholars includes mostly from the social science disciplines; History, Political Science, Economics, Sociology, International Relations and language.

Several students of the centre have been recipients of prestigious research fellowships awarded by Japan Foundation, Mombusho (Ministry of Education, Government of Japan), Saburo Okita Memorial Fellowship, Nippon Foundation, Korea Foundation, Nehru Memorial Fellowship, and Fellowship from the Chinese and Taiwanese Governments. Besides, students from Japan receive fellowship from the Indian Council of Cultural Relations.