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Mallika Shakya

Associate Professor (On Extraordinary Leave)
PhD (London School of Economics and Political Science, 2008)

Contact Details

mallika(at)sau.ac.in
South Asian University ,Rajpur Rd, Maidan Garhi, New Delhi, Delhi 110068
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Profile

Mallika Shakya is an Associate Professor in the Department of Sociology at South Asian University. She was trained in LSE, University of Oxford and University of Glasgow. She works on two distinct themes: (i) social embedding of industrialisation and labour movements, and (ii) poetic imaginations of nation and border in South Asia. Her book “Death of an Industry: The Cultural Politics of Garment Manufacturing during the Maoist Revolution in Nepal” was published by Cambridge University Press in 2018 and is listed as one of the 100 all-time-classics on Nepal. Her writings have been published in leading academic journals focusing on economic anthropology and South Asian studies. She  currently serves as the Editor-In-Charge of Society and Culture in South Asia (SCSA). She also serves in the editorial committees of Dialectical Anthropology (DA), European Bulletin of Himalayan Research (EBHR) and the Human Economy book series (Berghahn Books). She periodically appears in mainstream visual and print media in Nepal and India speaking on social inclusion and justice as well as reciting her poems in Nepali. She pursues interdisciplinary research methods and has been collaborating with poets and fiction- writers, film-makers and artists, and medical professionals especially in her research on the borders within South Asia.

Research Project (Ongoing)

Anti-Microbial Resistance and Labour Migrant across Health Boundaries in Northern South Asia (2021-2026). With Aarhus University, University of Delhi and BP Koirala Institute of Health Sciences. Funded by Novo Nordisk Foundation (NNF) [1.5 million Euros]

Qualifications

  • PhD in anthropology of development from London School of Economics and Political Science , in 2008
  • M.A from University of Glasgow , in 1998

Research Interests

  • Anthropology of work – labour, trader groups and industrial clusters
  • ethnicity and social movements
  • Borderlands
  • Regionalism and the Global South
  • Nepal, India, South Africa

Recent Publications

  • Shakya, Mallika. 2024.  “Beyond Masters: Women’s Shifting Roles in Nepal’s New Neoliberal Garment Industry" in South Asian History and Culture: Taylor and Francis Journal. Vol. 15. Issue 1. pp. 48-64.

  • Shakya, Mallika. 2024. “Narratives of Ageing, Narratives of Nation-Building: Manjul and the Poetics of Dissidence in Nepal" in Society and Culture in South Asia: Sage Publications. Vol. 10, Issue 1. pp. 73-96.

  • Shakya, Mallika and Keith Hart. eds. 2023. "Auto-Ethnography, World History and Humanist Philosophy" in BEROSE Encyclopedie internationale des histoires de l'anthropologie. Keith Hart’s Anthropology: Auto-Ethnography, World History and Humanist (...) - BEROSE
  • Shakya, Mallika. 2023. "Variations of Labour Aristocracy and Union Trajectories across South Asia." Chandana Mathur Ed. "Class within Class: His Interlocutors and Jonathan Parry." Dialectical Anthropology. Vol. 47. Issue 2. June 2023. pp. 139-14.

  • Shakya, Mallika. ed. 2022. “Poetic Imagining(s) of South Asia: Writing Nations through Sensibilities of Resistance” Society and Culture in South Asia: Sage Publications. Vol. 8. Issue 2. June 2022. pp. 163-314.

  • Shakya, Mallika. 2022. Commentary on "Why I Write? In a Climate against Intellectual Dissidence" by Alpa Shah. Current Anthropology: The University of Chicago Press. Vol. 63. No. 5. October 2022.pp. 582-583.

  • Shakya, Mallika. 2020. “The Politics of Border and Nation in Nepal in the Time of Pandemic” in Dialectical Anthropology: Springer Journal. Vol. 44. No. 3, pp. 223-321.

  • Shakya, Mallika. 2020.  “Reading Parijat in Nepal: The Poetics of Radical Feminism Negotiating Self and Nation”, In F. Ibrahim and T. Kothiyal (eds.) South Asian Borderlands: History, Mobility, Affect. Cambridge University Press: Cambridge/NY.

  • Shakya, Mallika. 2020. "Anthropology in the Margins." Visual and New Media Review, Fieldsights, December 10. Cultural Anthropology. https://culanth.org/fieldsights/vanished-searching-for-a-missing-anthropologist

  • Shakya, Mallika. 2019.  “Questioning the MFA Politics of International Garment Trade Through Turbulent Experiences in Bangladesh and Nepal” in South Asian Anthropology, vol. 1, no. 1, pp. 29-40.

  • Shakya, Mallika. 2017 “An Anthropological Reading of the Policies of International Development: Export Competitiveness as a Conjunctural Case Study” in Dialectical Anthropology: Springer Journal, vol. 41, no. 2, pp. 113-128.

  • Shakya, Mallika. 2017. (co-authored with John Clammer) “Introduction to the Special Issue: Economic Anthropology and Development Alternatives – Rethinking and Re-Politicizing Theory and Practice” in Dialectical Anthropology, vol. 41. no. 2, pp. 87- 96.

  • Shakya, Mallika. 2017. “Reading Parijaat and BP Koirala: Belonging and Border in the Twentieth Century Nepali Novels” in Economic and Political Weekly, vol. LII, no. 15, pp. 53-60.

  • Shakya, Mallika. 2011. “Bridging the Design Gap: The Case of Nepali Clothing Industry.” In Journal of Modern Craft: BERG, vol. 4, issue 3, pp. 294-395, BERG: London.

  • Shakya, Mallika. 2011. “The World Bank and Private Sector Development: Is ‘Doing Business’ an Extension of the Structural Adjustment Programme or a Departure?” In St Antony’s International Review (STAIR): Special Edition on International Financial Institutions in an Age of Crisis, vol. 7, no. 1, pp. 30-47, St Antony’s College: Oxford.

  • Shakya, Mallika. 2010. “Capitalism, Ethnicity, and the Rising Wave of Communism in Nepal.” In Himalaya: American Association of Nepal and Himalayan Studies. vol. 28, no. 1 & 2. (Reprinted: Lawoti, M. (ed.). Ethnicity, Inequality and Politics in Nepal. Social Science Baha: Kathmandu.)

  • Shakya, Mallika. 2007. “Our Hymns are Different but Our Values are the Same:  Traditional Rituals in Modern Garment Factories in Nepal.” In European Bulletin of Himalayan Research: vol. 31, spring, pp. 67-82, CNRS: Paris.

  • Shakya, Mallika. 2004. “Nepalisation of an Indian Industry:  The Fast Evolving (and Dismantling) Ready-Made Garment Industry of Nepal” in Contributions to Nepalese Studies, vol. 31, no. 3, pp. 265-291, Tribhuvan University: Kathmandu.

  • Shakya, Mallika. 1999. “Economic Liberalisation and Nepal.”  The Organisation, Vol. 2, July-September, pp. 24-38. ODC Publications: Kathmandu.

 

Recent Books, Edited Special Issues, and Book Chapters

BOOK

    • Shakya, Mallika. 2018. Death of an Industry: The cultural politics of garment manufacturing during the Maoist revolution in Nepal. Cambridge University Press, May 2018.

    EDITED SPECIAL ISSUES IN JOURNALS

    • Shakya, Mallika. Ed.  2022. “Poetic Imagining(s) of South Asia: Writing Nations through Sensibilities of Resistance” Society and Culture in South Asia: Sage Publications. Vol. 9. Issue 1. July 2022.

    • Shakya, Mallika and John Clammer. Eds. 2017. “Economic Anthropology and Development Alternatives: Rethinking and Re-Politicizing Theory and Practice” in Dialectical Anthropology. Vol. 41. No. 2. June 2017. 


      BOOK CHAPTERS

      • Shakya, Mallika. 2020. “Reading Parijat in Nepal: The Poetics of Radical Feminism Negotiating Self and Nation”, In F. Ibrahim and T. Kothiyal (eds.) South Asian Borderlands: History, Mobility, Affect. Cambridge University Press: Cambridge/NY

      • Shakya, Mallika. 2016. “Labour Militancy in Neoliberal Times: A Preliminary Comparison of Nepal with South Africa,” In J. Gledhill (ed.). World Anthropologies in Practice: Situated Perspectives, Global Knowledge. Bloomsbury: NY/Oxford.

      • Shakya, Mallika. 2016. “A Country of Rumours: Making Sense of a Bollywood Controversy on the Garment Shop Floors in Nepal,” In M. Hutt and P. Onta (eds.). The Creation of Public Meaning in Nepal: Case Studies from a Nation in Transition. Cambridge University Press: Delhi.

      • Shakya, Mallika. 2014. “Marwari Traders Animating the Industrial Clusters of India-Nepal Border,” In K. Hart and J. Sharp (eds.) The Human Economy: Perspectives from the Global South. Berghann Books: Human Economy Series. (second edition being printed)

      • Shakya, Mallika. 2013. “Nepali Economic History through the Ethnic Lens:  Changing State Relationships with Entrepreneurial Elites.” M. Lawoti and S. Hangen (eds.) The Changing Face of Ethnic Movements in Nepal.  Routledge London: Politics and International Relations Series.

      • Shakya, Mallika. 2011. “Apparel Exports in Lesotho: The State’s Role in Building Critical Mass for Competitiveness,” in P. Chuhan-Pole and M. Angwafo (eds.) Yes Africa Can: Success Stories from a Dynamic Continent. pp. 219-230, The World Bank: Washington DC.

      • Shakya, Mallilka; Himes, James and David Parker. 2000. “Economic Dimensions of the Conventions on the Rights of the Child” in A. Petren and J. Himes (eds) Children’s Rights: Turning Principles into Practice, Falth & Hassler: Sweden.
    Last Updated : 21 Oct 2024