Richa Nagar

Richa Nagar (born 1968, in Lucknow, India) is a scholar, creative writer, educator, and theatre-worker who is Professor of the College in the College of Liberal Arts at the University of Minnesota. Nagar's creative and scholarly work makes multi-lingual and multi-genre contributions to transnational feminism, social geography, critical development studies, and critical ethnography. Her research has encompassed a range of topics including: politics of space, identity and community among communities of South Asian origin in Tanzania; questions of empowerment in relation to grass-roots struggles in the global South, principally with the Sangtin Kisan Mazdoor Sangathan (SKMS) in Sitapur District, India; the politics of language and social fracturing in the context of development and neo-liberal globalization; and creative praxis that uses collaboration, co-authorship, and translation to blur the borders between academic, activist, and artistic labor. She has held residential fellowships at the Center for Advanced Study in the Behavioral Sciences (CASBS) at Stanford in 2005-2006, at the Jawaharlal Nehru Institute of Advanced Study (JNIAS) at New Delhi in 2011-2012, and at the Centre for Humanities Research at the University of the Western Cape in 2013. She was named Honorary Professor at the Unit for Humanities at the Rhodes University (UHURU) at Rhodes University in South Africa in 2017, and her work has been translated into several languages including Turkish, Marathi, Italian, German and Mandarin.[1][2][3][4][5][6]

Work on the Politics of Place and Identity among 'Asians' in Tanzania

Richa Nagar's historical, geographical, and feminist exploration of the politics of place, identity, and community among 'Asians' in Tanzania is based on a "large number of life histories as well as participant observation" among Hindus, Khoja Shia Ithna Asheris, Goans and Sikhs, chiefly in the city of Dar es Salaam.[7][8] This body of work is "significant for its geographical focus"[9] and "provides a useful and very necessary corrective to the misperceptions"[10] that "construct[ed] all Asians as a monolithic category."[11] It highlights how "processes at multiple scales intersect and shape the negotiation of geographic and social space among different diasporic South Asian groups in their neighborhoods"[12] while also "explor[ing] many relevant dimensions of the researcher-narrator relationship...[Nagar attends] to the processes involved in navigating within and across Dar's many Asian and African communities, with their particular spaces, boundaries, markers of identity, and hierarchies of power."[7]

Coauthoring Across Research and Activism

In 2004, Nagar published with eight rural women activists or Sangtins, the Hindi book, Sangtin Yatra[13] which refers to a "journey of solidarity, reciprocity, and enduring friendship."[14] The eight activists—Anupamlata, Ramsheela, Reshma Ansari, Richa Singh, Shashibala, Shashi Vaish, Surbala, and Vibha Bajpayee—collaborated with Richa Nagar to explore questions of power, location, and difference in their own lives through personal storytelling, while also engaging with issues of inequity and discrimination in NGOs that seek to empower poor rural women in the global south.[15] This discussion of NGOs triggered a backlash against the authors, which is examined in the English version of the book, Playing with Fire: Feminist Thought and Activism Through Seven Lives in India (2006). Playing with Fire "challenges academic protocol and activist verities alike" and "grapples with creative solutions, such as upending hierarchies of skill and knowledge in organizations, as well as means to fight organizational dependency on donors...Every chapter makes for fascinating reading as the women emerge in their complexity, in their specificity, and in their international context that still includes outside donors driven by their own interests."[16] The book "asks us to think in radically new ways about responsibility, access, research, agency, authorship, subjects, and audience. It contributes to the vibrant discourse on the politics of research particularly between the 'north' and 'south' [and] pushes at the boundaries of this discourse as it demonstrates different ways of engaging in collaborative work that challenges the separation between 'the academy' and 'political organizing'."[17][18]

The debates triggered by Sangtin Yatra and Playing with Fire helped to build Sangtin Kisaan Mazdoor Sangathan or the Sangtin Farmers and Laborers Organization (SKMS) in the Mishrikh and Pisawan blocks of Sitapur District of Uttar Pradesh.. Nagar's book with Richa Singh in Hindi, Ek Aur Neemsaar: Sangtin Atmamanthan Aur Andolan (2012) tells the story of the birth and growth of SKMS. Playing with Fire and Sangtin Yatra have been translated into Turkish as Ateşle Oynamak: Hindistan'da Yedi Yaşam Üzerinden Feminist Düşünce ve Eylem (Ayizi Kitap, 2011) and into Marathi as Ageeshee Khelataana: Saat Stree Karyakartancha Sahpravaas (Manovikas Prakashan, 2015).

In Muddying the Waters: Coauthoring Feminisms Across Scholarship and Activism (2014), which received Gloria Anzaldua Book Prize's Honorable Mention,[19] Richa Nagar examines coauthorship as a mode of sharing authority and addresses translation as ethical responsibility. The book "emerges out of the difficulties and (im)possibilities encountered in the creation of politically meaningful scholarship that inevitably crosses multiple borders. Those between academia and social movements, academic and nonacademic writing, or geographical and linguistic borders...Nagar's work is a call for politically engaged and ethical research that takes matters of epistemic violence seriously. For the author, such research cannot shy away from the tensions, risks and challenges involved in the building of solidarities and alliances between researchers and the researched 'on the ground.' These 'situated solidarities' are achievable when activists and scholars speak with each other to become 'radically vulnerable' through trust, affect and critical reflexivity without losing sight of their institutional, material and geopolitical positions.".[20] Here, Nagar also introduces the concept of 'radical vulnerability' as a critical mode of collectivity in politically-engaged alliance-work—an idea that she and her critics have continued to explore further.[21][22][23]

Books in English
  • 2019. Nagar, Richa, in journeys with Sangtin Kisan Mazdoor Sangathan and Parakh Theatre.Hungry Translations: Relearning the world through Radical Vulnerability. Urbana, Chicago, and Springfield:University of Illinois Press. 2019. ISBN 978-0-252-08440-9 (pbk), 978-0-252-04257-7(cloth).
  • 2014. Nagar, Richa. Muddying the Waters: Co-authoring Feminisms Across Scholarship and Activism. Champaign: University of Illinois Press. 2014. ISBN 978-0252-080357 (pbk), 978-0252096754 (e-book) also available as Open Access version.
  • 2010. Amanda Lock Swarr and Richa Nagar, editors. Critical Transnational Feminist Praxis. Albany: SUNY Press. 2010. ISBN 978-1438429380 (pbk)
  • 2009. Eric S. Sheppard, Philip W. Porter, David Faust, and Richa Nagar. A World of Difference: Encountering and contesting development. Second fully revised and expanded edition. New York: Guilford Press. 2009. ISBN 978-1606232620 (pbk)
  • 2006. Sangtin Writers and Richa Nagar. Playing with Fire: Feminist Thought and Activism Through Seven Lives in India. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press. 2006. ISBN 978-0816647705 (pbk)

Books in Hindi

Articles on Collaboration, Friendships, and Radical Vulnerability in Research and Alliance Work
  • 2016. Nagar, Richa with Özlem Aslan, Nadia Z. Hasan, Omme-Salma Rahemtullah, Nishant Upadhyay, and Begüm Uzun. Feminisms, Collaborations, Friendships: A Conversation. Feminist Studies 42:2: 502-519.
  • 2016. Book Review Forum: Muddying the Waters: Coauthoring Feminisms across Scholarship and Activism. Respondents: Elora Halim Chowdhury, Laura Pulido, Nik Heynen, Lainie Rini, Joel Wainwright, Naeem Inayatullah, and Richa Nagar. Gender, Place and Culture https://dx.doi.org/10.1080/0966369X.2016.1221880.
  • 2016. Editor's Interview with Richa Nagar, Interview Forum: On Feminist and Postcolonial Thought. Journal of Narrative Politics 2:2: 73-81. http://journalofnarrativepolitics.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/03/JNP-Vol-22-Nagar.pdf.
  • 2013. Interview with Class War University: Desiring Alliance and Complex Translations in Activist Research (Conducted 11 July 2012, Posted July). http://classwaru.org/2013/07/25/desiring-alliance/
  • 2012. Interview with Selda Tuncer: Richa Nagar'la Feminizmin Zor Sorulari Uzerine. AMARGI (Turkish feminist Journal) 25: June: 13-20. English Translation at: https://www.academia.edu/2541413/An_Interview_with_Richa_Nagar_An_Honest_Dialogue_on_Difficult_Questions_of_Feminism.
  • 2008. Sangtin Writers (Richa Nagar, Richa Singh, Surbala). Safar Jaari Hai/The Journey Continues [A response in English and Hindi to Geraldine Pratt, Sharad Chari, Mathew Spark, Rupal Oza, and Gillian Hart]. Authors meet Critics: A set of reviews and response. Social and Cultural Geography 9:1: 226-236.
  • 2007. Nagar, Richa and Susan Geiger. Reflexivity, Positionality and Identity in Feminist Fieldwork Revisited. In eds. Adam Tickell, Eric Sheppard, Jamie Peck and Trevor Barnes. Politics and Practice in Economic Geography. London: Sage, pp. 267–278.
  • 2006. Benson, Koni and Richa Nagar. Collaboration as Resistance? Reconsidering Processes, Products, and Possibilities of Feminist Oral History and Ethnography. Gender, Place and Culture 13:5: 581-592.

Articles on Globalization, Development, and Questions of Empowerment
  • 2004. Nagar, Richa & Amanda L. Swarr. Organizing from the Margins: Grappling with "Empowerment" in India & South Africa. In eds. Lise Nelson and Joni Seagar. A Companion to Feminist Geography. London: Blackwell, pp. 291–304.
  • 2004. Swarr, Amanda L. and Richa Nagar. Dismantling Assumptions: Interrogating "Lesbian" Struggles for Identity and Survival in India and South Africa. Signs: Journal of Women in Culture and Society 29:2:491-516.
  • 2003. Nagar, Richa and Saraswati Raju. Women, NGOs and the Contradictions of Empowerment and Disempowerment. Antipode: A Radical Journal of Geography 35:1:1-13.
  • 2002. Nagar, Richa, Victoria Lawson, Linda McDowell and Susan Hanson. Locating Globalization: Feminist (Re)readings of the Subjects and Spaces of Globalization. Economic Geography 78:3:257-284.
  • 2001. Faust, David and Richa Nagar. English Medium Education, Social Fracturing, and the Politics of Development in Postcolonial India. Economic and Political Weekly July 28-August 3: 2878-2883.

Articles on Politics of Identity, Place, and Community among 'Asians' in Tanzania
  • 2014. Dar es Salaam, Making peace with an abandoned field. In R. Nagar, Muddying the Waters, Champaign: University of Illinois Press.
  • 2001. Nagar, Richa. Saboteurs? Or Saviors? South Asian Magazine for Action & Reflection: Special Issue on South Asia and Africa. Winter/Spring:14-19.
  • 2000. Nagar, Richa. "I'd Rather be Rude than Ruled": Gender, Place, and Communal Politics among South Asian Communities in Dar es Salaam. Women's Studies International Forum 23:5: 571-585.
  • 2000. Nagar, Richa. Religion, Race and the Debate over Mut'a in Dar es Salaam. Feminist Studies 26:3: 661-690.
  • 1998. Nagar, Richa and Helga Leitner. Contesting Social Relations in Communal Places: Identity Politics Among Asians in Dar es Salaam. In eds. Ruth Fincher and Jane Jacobs. Cities of Difference. New York: Guilford, pp. 226–251.
  • 1998. Nagar, Richa. Communal Discourses, Marriage, and the Politics of Gendered Social Boundaries among South Asian Immigrants in Tanzania. Gender, Place and Culture 5:2: 117-139.
  • 1997. Nagar, Richa. Communal Places and the Politics of Multiple Identities: The case of Tanzanian Asians. Ecumene: A Journal of Cultural Geographies 4:1: 3-26.
  • 1997. Nagar, Richa. The Making of Hindu Communal Organizations, Places and Identities in Postcolonial Dar es Salaam. Environment and Planning D: Society and Space 15: 707-730.
  • 1996. Nagar, Richa. The South Asian Diaspora in Tanzania: A History Retold. Comparative Studies of South Asia, Africa and the Middle East: A Journal of Politics, Culture and Economy 16:2: 62-80.
  • 1993. Nagar, Richa. Indigenisation Debate and Tanzanian Asians. Africa World Review 5:24-25.
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References
  1. "Prof Richa Nagar: College of Liberal Arts". University of Minnesota. Retrieved 24 May 2016.
  2. Poets, Desirée "Book Review: Nagar, Richa (2014).Muddying the Waters: CoauthoringFeminisms across Scholarship and Activism." Journal of Narrative Politics. Vol. 2 (2) 2016. (Retrieved 2016-05-24)
  3. "Desiring Alliance and Complex Translations in Activist Research: An Interview with Richa Nagar". Class War University.
  4. "Editor's Interview with Richa Nagar." Journal of Narrative Politics. Vol. 2 (2) 2016. (Retrieved 2016-05-24)
  5. "Past Fellows, Research Affiliates, and Visiting Scholars - Center for Advanced Study in the Behavioral Sciences". casbs.stanford.edu.
  6. "Welcome to Jawaharlal Nehru University". www.jnu.ac.in.
  7. Mary Jo Maynes, Jennifer L. Pierce, Barbara Laslett, 2008, Telling Stories: The Use of Personal Narratives in the Social Sciences and History, Ithaca: Cornell University Press, p. 102
  8. Dodomusings (1 February 2016). "Asians in Tanzania".
  9. Patterns of Urban Life and Urban Segregation in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania by Sarah L. Smiley, Ph.D. Dissertation, University of Kansas, 2007, p. 213.
  10. Laura Fair, 2001, Pastimes and Politics: Culture, Community, and Identity in Postabolition Urban Zanzibar, 1890-1945, Athens: Ohio University Press. p. 306.
  11. Ronald Aminzade, 2013, Race, Nation, and Citizenship in Postcolonial Africa, New York: Cambridge University Press, p. 321.
  12. Maggi W. H. Leung, 2003, Notions of Home among Diaspora Chinese in Germany, in eds, Laurence J. C. Ma and Carolyn L. Cartier, The Chinese Diaspora: Space, Place, Mobility, and Identity, Lanham: Rowman & Littlefield, p. 241.
  13. Anupamlata; Ramsheela; Reshma, Ansari; Vibha, Bajpayee; Shashibala; Shashi, Vaish; Surbala; Richa, Singh; Richa, Nagar (22 June 2017). "Sangtin Yatra: Saat Zindgiyon Mein Lipta Nari Vimarsh". Cite journal requires |journal= (help)
  14. Salma Ismail, 2009, Review, Feminist Africa, Vol 13, p. 133-136 http://agi.ac.za/sites/agi.ac.za/files/fa13_review_ismail.pdf
  15. Salma Ismail, 2009, Review, Feminist Africa, Vol 13, p. 133-136. Authors meet Critics: A set of reviews and response. Geraldine Pratt; Rupal Oza, Gillian Hart, Matthew Sparke, Sharad Chari, Social & Cultural Geography, 2008, 9: 2: 213-226.
  16. Elisabeth Armstrong, NWSA Journal, 2008, p. 230 https://muse.jhu.edu/article/237382/pdf
  17. Rupal Oza, "Challenging the Victim-Recsuer Framework in Playing with Fire," Social and Cultural Geography, 2008, 9: 2: 214.
  18. See also https://www.academia.edu/3089357/Richa_Nagar_is_Playing_with_Fire_.
  19. "NWSA". www.nwsa.org.
  20. Desirée Poets, 2016, Book Review, Journal of Narrative Politics, 2:2:176.
  21. Richa Nagar with Özlem Aslan, Nadia Z. Hasan, Omme-Salma Rahemtullah, Nishant Upadhyay, and Begüm Uzun, 2016, Feminisms, Collaborations, Friendships: A Conversation. Feminist Studies 42:2: 502-519.
  22. Editor's Interview with Richa Nagar, Interview Forum: On Feminist and Postcolonial Thought. Journal of Narrative Politics, 2:2: 73-81. http://journalofnarrativepolitics.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/03/JNP-Vol-22-Nagar.pdf
  23. Book Forum: Muddying the Waters. Respondents: Elora Halim Chowdhury, Laura Pulido, Nik Heynen, Lainie Rini, Joel Wainwright, Naeem Inayatullah, and Richa Nagar. Gender, Place, and Culture. 23:12:1800-1812.
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