Shailaja Paik

Shailaja Paik is the Charles Phelphs Taft Distinguished Professor of History in the Department of History at the University of Cincinatti. Her first book, Dalit Women’s Education in Modern India: Double Discrimination (London and New York: Routledge, 2014), examines the nexus between caste, class, gender, and state pedagogical practices among Dalit (“Untouchable”) women in urban India. Her second book, The Vulgarity of Caste: Dalits, Sexuality, and Humanity in Modern India (Stanford University Press, 2022), analyzes the politics of caste, class, gender, sexuality, and popular culture in modern Maharashtra. The book won the American Historical Association's 2023 John F. Richards Prize for "the most distinguished work of scholarship on South Asia" and the Association of Asian Studies 2024 Ananda Kentish Coomaraswamy Prize. Paik has published several articles on a variety of themes, including the politics of naming, Dalit and African American women, women’s education, and womanhood in colonial India in prestigious international journals. Her research has been funded by the American Council of Learned Societies, Stanford Humanities Center, National Endowment for the Humanities, American Institute of Indian Studies, Yale University, Emory University, the Ford Foundation, and the Charles Phelps Taft Research Center, among others. Her scholarship and research interests are concerned with contributing to and furthering the dialogue in anti-colonial struggles, transnational women’s history, women-of-color feminisms, and particularly on gendering caste, and subaltern history.

On the Dr. Malathy Singh Visiting Fellowship at Yale University:

The Malathy Singh Fellowship provided me an engaging intellectual space and time off of teaching a full course-load and enabled me to finish the writing of my first book. I gained the fellowship at an opportune time. During my year at Yale, I taught two classes and interacted with students and faculty. I presented chapters of my book and discussed them with graduate students and faculty. Some colleagues read and commented on drafts of some chapters. I am grateful to them. I also worked with colleagues and organized the Modern South Asia Conference. This was a wonderful opportunity that allowed me to provide insights on the shaping of the field and to interact with graduate students and colleagues from different universities.