From the Director
The
Autumn semester has started with several SASNET-related activities
with speakers from across the world giving presentations on current
and past events in South Asia. Two journalism students at the
Department of Media and Communication have received travelling grants
to go to Sri Lanka for field work on the country’s ongoing economic
and political challenges. Congratulations to Sofia Nyström and Ida
Nilson. We wish them all the best for their travels. One PhD student
in Water Resources Engineering at Lund University has been awarded
the 2025 SASNET PhD Travel Grant. The
funding will support a two-week research stay at Jadavpur University
in Kolkata, India, to study extreme river flows in relation to
climate change. Congratulations to Fainaz
Inamdeen
on the grant and for his research on this important topic.
SASNET
is further sponsoring two major events this Autumn. On 14 October we
are co-organizing a panel debate on
the theme “
Sino-Indian Relations in the Light of Global Conflict”.
The event will take place in collaboration with the Centre for East
and Southeast Asian Studies and the Association of Foreign Affairs at
Lund University. On December 4-5, SASNET is hosting
an international symposium on the theme "
Authoritarianism,
democratic decline and democratic resurgence in South Asia" with
the aim to foster interdisciplinary dialogue and critical reflection
on the current state of democracy in South Asia. It seeks to blend
cutting-edge research with practical solutions, ensuring that diverse
perspectives and experiences on authoritarianism and democracy are
represented.
We
also have several talks on South Asia related matters in the months
to come with Professor Navtej Purewal speaking on ‘The Politics of
Culture and ‘Development‘: Dystopian Presents and Imaginaries of
the Future in the Commemoration of the Partition of
1947’(co-organized with the Dept. of Sociology, Lund); Professor
Atreyee Sen from Copenhagen University who will speak on her recently
awarded ERC-project: ‘Anger,
Legitimised: Amplified
anger and its rhetorics of legitimation in the 21st century’
(co-organized with the Gender Division. in Lund); and Professor Rudra
Sil on ‘What comparative area studies (CAS) bring to the table’,
(co-organized with the Centre for East and Southeast Asian Studies).
In the pipeline is also a talk by the winner of the ‘Best Thesis
Award’ in October and a plenary on ‘Journalism and the freedom of
press in South Asia’ in November, and much more.
I
wish you all the best for the months to come and hope to see many of
you at our own and co-organized events.
Catarina
Kinnvall
Director
of SASNET
