ÐÓ°ÉÂÛ̳

Events

Nine Paths: what it means to be a minority woman in a majoritarian state

Hosted by the Department of Anthropology and the International Inequalities Institute

Online public event

Speakers

Sonia Faleiro

Sonia Faleiro

Professor Patricia Jeffery

Professor Patricia Jeffery

Dr Lexi Stadlen

Dr Lexi Stadlen

Chair

Professor Alpa Shah

Professor Alpa Shah

Against the backdrop of a rising Hindu majoritarianism and marked social and economic inequality, what does it mean to be a Muslim woman in India today?

This event marks the launch of Lexi Stadlen’s newly published Nine Paths which explores the intimate lives of nine women and their families on an island in the Sunderban, at the eastern edge of India, over the course of a year. There are weddings to celebrate and deaths to mourn, families to care for, difficult marriages to navigate and tragedies to overcome, as we observe the everyday drudgery, unexpected turmoil and the dreams of something better. A conversation chaired by Alpa Shah with Lexi Stadlen, sociologist Patricia Jeffrey who has conducted four decades of research in a Muslim village in Uttar Pradesh and journalist Sonia Faleiro who most recently wrote the The Good Girls, the ordinary killing of two low caste girls in a village in Uttar Pradesh.

Meet our speakers and chair

Sonia Faleiro () is an award winning journalist and writer. She is the author, most recently, of Good Girls: An Ordinary Killing, praised by the GuardianObserverSunday TimesNew York Times and Financial Times.

Patricia Jeffery, the author of many books and articles on India, is Emeritus Professor of Sociology at University of Edinburgh and is finalising a manuscript on the transitions of ordinary life in a Muslim village in Uttar Pradesh over more than forty years.

Lexi Stadlen has a PhD in Social Anthropology from the London School of Economics and Political Science and won the 2019 Bayly Prize, awarded by the Royal Asiatic Society for an outstanding thesis on an Asian topic completed at a British University. 

Alpa Shah () is the author of Nightmarch: Among India’s Revolutionary Guerrillas, a finalist for the 2019 Orwell Prize for Political Writing, the New India Book Foundation Prize and winner of the 2020 Association for Political and Legal Anthropology Book Prize. She is Professor of Anthropology and Convenor of the ‘Global Economies of Care’ research theme at the International Inequalities Institute, ÐÓ°ÉÂÛ̳.

More about this event

ÐÓ°ÉÂÛ̳ Anthropology () is world famous and world leading. Our work is based on ethnographic research: detailed studies of societies and communities in which we have immersed ourselves via long term fieldwork. Placing the everyday lives and meanings of ordinary people - whoever and wherever they are - at the heart of the discipline, we take nothing for granted.

The  () at ÐÓ°ÉÂÛ̳ brings together experts from many of the School's departments and centres to lead cutting-edge research focused on understanding why inequalities are escalating in numerous arenas across the world, and to develop critical tools to address these challenges.

You can order the book  (UK delivery only) from our official ÐÓ°ÉÂÛ̳ Events independent book shop, .

Twitter Hashtag for this event: #ÐÓ°ÉÂÛ̳NinePaths

Live captions

Automated live captions will be available at this webinar. Once you join the Zoom webinar, you will be able to show or hide the subtitles by clicking on the “Live Transcript - CC” button, from where you can also change the font size and choose to view the full transcript. Please note that this feature uses Automatic Speech Recognition (ASR) technology, or machine generated transcription, and is not 100% accurate.

Podcasts

We aim to make all ÐÓ°ÉÂÛ̳ events available as a podcast subject to receiving permission from the speaker/s to do this, and subject to no technical problems with the recording of the event. Podcasts are normally available 1-2 working days after the event. Podcasts and videos of past events can be found online.

Social Media

Follow ÐÓ°ÉÂÛ̳ public events on for notification on the availability of an event podcast, the posting of transcripts and videos, the announcement of new events and other important event updates. Event updates and other information about what’s happening at ÐÓ°ÉÂÛ̳ can be found on the ÐÓ°ÉÂÛ̳'s page and for live photos from events and around campus, follow us on . For live webcasts and archive video of lectures, follow us on . 

is a selection of images taken by the school photographer.

From time to time there are changes to event details so we strongly recommend that if you plan to attend this event you check back on this listing on the day of the event.