Sohni Chakrabarti is a final-year PhD candidate in the School of English, University of St Andrews. Her thesis cross-culturally examines the construction of narrative spaces in contemporary American diasporic women’s writing. Her research analyses diasporic space and time through the intersections of gender, race, social class, and culture. She has an MA in Modern and Contemporary English Literature from the University of Bristol and a BA in Psychology from the University of Pune, India. She is the co-founder of Food for Thought an interdisciplinary food studies research group which hosted an international conference ‘Devouring Men: Food, Masculinity and Power’ in September 2020 at the University of St Andrews.
Recent Activities:
Conference Organisation:
Conference Co-organiser, ‘Devouring Men: Food, Masculinity and Power,’ Interdisciplinary Food Studies Conference, University of St Andrews (4th September 2020)
Panel Moderation/Chair:
Panel Chair, ‘Critical Theory and Marxism Symposium,’ Theoria Research Group, University of St Andrews, (11th May 2018)
Moderator, ‘Devouring Men: Food, Masculinity and Power,’ Interdisciplinary Food Studies Conference, University of St Andrews (4th September 2020)
Conference Presentation:
Panel Presentation, ‘Belonging elsewhere: A transcultural feminist nostalgia for the home,’ Moving Memories, CISI Postgraduate Symposium, University of St Andrews (6th September 2019)
Panel Presentation: ‘Remapping the Margins: Gloria Anzaldúa and Ana Castillo’s Spiritual Crossings,’ Memory and Identity in Latin America and the Caribbean, CIMS Postgraduate Symposium, University of St Andrews (9th December 2019)
Panel Presentation, ‘“The touch of a man:” Bengali diasporic masculinities and gendered food spaces in Jhumpa Lahiri’s writings,’ ‘Devouring Men: Food, Masculinity and Power,’ University of St Andrews (4th September 2020)
Panel Presentation, ‘Remythicizing violence as transformation: Nostalgia and the politics of belonging Bharati Mukherjee’s Jasmine and Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni’s Mistress of Spices,’ ‘Rethinking the Politics of Memory in South Asia,’ Swedish South Asian Studies Network Annual Conference (9th & 10th December, 2020)
Panel Presentation, ‘Imagining a Disabled Diaspora: Reading chronic illness through the lens of food in Porochista Khakpour’s Sick: A Memoir,’ Food Matters and Materialities: Critical Understandings of Food Cultures, Carleton University (22nd – 25th September 2021)
Seminar Presentation/ Invited Talk:
Graduate Seminar Presentation, ‘Discordant Movements: Imagination of transcultural spaces of belonging in contemporary American diasporic women’s writing,’ Migration and Movement Graduate Workshop, Edinburgh Centre for Global History, (19th November 2019)
Public Engagement:
Short Presentation on Dr Anindya Raychaudhuri’s Homemaking: Radical Nostalgia and the Construction of a South Asian Diaspora, Book Launch Event,Lighthouse Bookshop, Edinburgh, 15th October, 2019
Publications:
Book Chapter, Co-authored with Dr Radhika Gajjala, Digital Diasporas: Labor and Affect in Gendered Indian Digital Publics, Rowman & Littlefield, 2019 (Published)
Online article, ‘(In)visibilising race, voicing legitimacy: The Oprah Interview with Meghan Markle and Prince Harry,’ Cerebration, 2021 (Published)
Book Chapter, ‘The ‘Weird’ as a Metaphor of Chicana Feminist Resistance: Ana Castillo and Gloria Anzaldúa’s Re-mythicization of La Llorona or The Wailing Woman,’ The Weird: A Companion, forthcoming as a part of Genre Fictions and Film Companion Series, Peter Lang, 2022. (In Preparation)