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Sri Lanka Discussion With President Wickremesinghe Takes Place at Crucial Moment

Sri Lanka Discussion With President Wickremesinghe Takes Place at Crucial Moment

On Friday, March 24, President Ranil Wickremesinghe joined the Harvard community live from Sri Lanka for a discussion moderated by professors Tarun Khanna, Harvard Business School, and Asim Khwaja, Harvard Kennedy School. The event, co-sponsored by the Center for International Development at Harvard and the Mittal Institute, covered a wide range of topics, from the recently announced IMF deal to social, economic, and political reforms to human rights issues and the way forward for the country.

Prof. Martha Selby on the Beauty and Value of Indian Poetry

Prof. Martha Selby on the Beauty and Value of Indian Poetry

This past fall, Harvard University welcomed Prof. Martha Selby as the Sangam Professor of South Asian Studies. She joined us from the University of Texas at Austin, where she taught since 1999. A scholar of South Asian literature, she shared more about her work and previewed her upcoming April 6 talk on “Sangam Tamil Lecture – Loss in Love and War: On Grief and Longing in Old Tamil Poetry.”

Shikha Kukreti, Lancet Citizens’ Commission Researcher, Explores COVID’s Impact on Healthcare Workers

Shikha Kukreti, Lancet Citizens’ Commission Researcher, Explores COVID’s Impact on Healthcare Workers

As we enter the fourth year of the COVID-19 pandemic, Dr. Shikha Kukreti, MPH, BDS, is focused on exploring the attitude of healthcare workers to vaccines, and their psychological wellbeing during the pandemic. A researcher with the Lancet Citizens Commission and a Ph.D. candidate at National Cheng Kung University in Taiwan, Shikha is spending the spring at the Mittal Institute. We spoke with her about her project.

Previewing LMSAI’s Inaugural Climate Change Workshop in New Delhi

The Mittal Institute has embarked on a major climate change initiative focused on South Asia, hosted at our Harvard Global Research Support Center India, an affiliate of Harvard University. This focus comes as Harvard awarded the Mittal Institute two multi-year grants to catalyze climate change research in South Asia. To build on the initiative, the Mittal Institute will host an inaugural climate change workshop on March 30-31 in New Delhi. The sessions will convene an interdisciplinary group of experts, policymakers and academics to set collective research and strategic priorities. LMSAI Director Tarun Khanna, Jorge Paulo Lemann Professor at Harvard Business School, spoke with us about LMSAI’s climate focus, and previewed the upcoming workshop.

Siblings Write the Book They Needed

Siblings Write the Book They Needed

For Nicole Jain, Ed.M.’11, the children’s book she recently published is the kind of book that would have been helpful when she was a girl. Our Mom, Our Superhero, co-authored with her brother Ravi is about the experience of two young siblings trying to help their mother deal with mental illness. It’s based on the experience the pair had with their own mom. Jain spoke about the book.

From New York City to Nepal: How Francis X. Clooney, SJ, Became a Leading Scholar of Hindu-Christian Studies

From New York City to Nepal: How Francis X. Clooney, SJ, Became a Leading Scholar of Hindu-Christian Studies

Francis X. Clooney, a born and bred New Yorker, was following a fairly traditional path toward Jesuit priesthood when he took an unexpected detour that would change his religious and world view forever. Clooney, now Parkman Professor of Divinity at Harvard, is a leading scholar in the Sanskrit and Tamil traditions of Hindu India and the developing field of comparative theology. He has written numerous books, including Hindu God, Christian God (2001) and the more recent Reading the Hindu and Christian Classics (2019). How he found himself at the forefront of Hindu-Christian studies began in 1973 with a trip to Kathmandu, where different religious traditions were not just in books but all around him.

Calling All Harvard Photographers! Submit Pictures to the LMSAI Photo Contest

Calling All Harvard Photographers! Submit Pictures to the LMSAI Photo Contest
Calling all Harvard photographers! The Mittal Institute seeks images of South Asia for our inaugural PHOTO CONTEST. Deadline Extended to 5pm EST on Friday, March 10 in the following categories: CATEGORIES: 1. Nature + Landscapes 2. People 3. Urban Landscapes and...

South Asia, “Ground Zero” of Climate Change, Subject of New Multi-Year Harvard Award

South Asia, “Ground Zero” of Climate Change, Subject of New Multi-Year Harvard Award

An interdisciplinary team, comprised of Mittal Institute faculty, has banded together to design specific climate mitigation strategies through the project, “Climate Adaptation and Climate-Driven Migration in South Asia: Building an International Research Network for Long-Term impact.” And Harvard University has just awarded the team one of the inaugural “Climate Clusters” grants from Harvard’s Salata Institute for Climate and Sustainability.