Personal Statement:
I study and teach the social and cultural history of South Asia with a focus on commodities, capital, and agrarian history. My current work explores the role of British colonialism in reshaping the agrarian frontier of eastern Bengal and the political economy of intoxicant commodities in the nineteenth and twentieth century. I am broadly interested in labor history, peasant politics, popular culture, social movements, and gender and empire.
In 2018-19, I will teach courses on commodity history, South Asian cultural history, and Indian Ocean history. In 2019-20, I will also teach survey courses in South Asian history and historical methods.
Research and Teaching Interests:
- South Asia (1500 – Present)
- British Empire (1688 – Present)
- Indian Ocean World
- Commodity and Agrarian History
- Gender and Labor
- Internationalism and Marxist thought
- Historical Methods
Selected Publications:
Utathya Chattopadhyaya, “Labor: Identities and Time under Empire” in Kirsten McKenzie ed. A Cultural History of Western Empires in the Age of Empire 1780-1920 (London: Bloomsbury, 2018) 119-146.
Utathya Chattopadhyaya, “Time to move on?” Kritik, June 26, 2014.
Courses Taught:
Winter 2019
HIST 9: Commodities and Labor in Colonial South Asia [Historical Investigations: Methods and Skills] Research papers may cover places outside South Asia.
Spring 2019
HIST 189M: South Asian Public Culture
HIST 201C [Advanced Historical Literature]: South Asia and the Indian Ocean
Upcoming – Fall 2019
HIST 88
HIST 9
Winter 2020
HIST 189M
HIST 202
Honors and Professional Activities:
2016 Thomas and Barbara Metcalf Junior Research Fellowship in Indian History, American Institute of Indian Studies.
2015 Illinois Program for Research in the Humanities (IPRH) Prize for Research in the Humanities, University of Illinois.