Category : Faculty
VAF Spotlight: Bunu Dhungana on Gender Norms in Art and Artistic Expression
Last week, the Harvard community had the opportunity to virtually meet the Mittal Institute’s two newest VAF artists – Bunu Dhungana and Pragati Jain – through their Art Exhibition: Women in South Asia: Expectations, Burdens and Obligations. Both artists shared their motivations, their craft, and their creations in moving, personal reflections (the full event video is above). As VAFs, these two mid-career artists from South Asia are spending the semester at Harvard, engaging with faculty and students, participating in art exhibitions, and completing research projects. The Mittal Institute checked in with Bunu Dhungana to learn more about her artistic motivations.
The Kinetic City: Professor Rahul Mehrotra Releases New Book
Rahul Mehrotra—practicing architect, urban designer, and educator—recently released a new book, entitled “The Kinetic City & Other Essays.” The book presents Rahul’s writings over the last thirty years and illustrates his long-term engagement with and analysis of urbanism in India.
Architecture of Practice: Research, Reflections and Reformulations
RMA Architects 1990-2020. Curated by Kaiwan Mehta. A project produced by Goethe-Institut / Max Mueller Bhavan and the Architecture Foundation. The exhibition will show at Gallery MMB, Goethe-Institut / Max Mueller Bhavan Mumbai from 27 October to 31 December, 2021. Monday to Saturday, 11:00 am to 7 pm.
Visiting Artist Fellow Pragati Jain Reflects on Being a Practicing Artist and Woman in India Today
Last week, the Harvard community had the opportunity to virtually meet the Mittal Institute’s two newest VAF artists – Bunu Dhungana and Pragati Jain – through their Art Exhibition: Women in South Asia: Expectations, Burdens and Obligations. Both artists shared their motivations, their craft, and their creations in moving, personal reflections (the full event video is above). As VAFs, these two mid-career artists from South Asia are spending the semester at Harvard, engaging with faculty and students, participating in art exhibitions, and completing research projects. The Mittal Institute checked in with Pragati, to learn how her experience at Harvard is transpiring and what projects she is working on. An interview with Bunu will be forthcoming in December.
Arvid Bell Previews Oct 15 Talk: Afghanistan’s Next Transition
On Friday, October 15, the Mittal Institute and the Negotiation Task Force present “Afghanistan’s Next Transition: How we got here, and what comes next,” a focus on the US withdrawal from Afghanistan. Discussants will explore the lead up to the collapse of the Afghan government, and what the new Taliban regime means for the future of the country and its people. Arvid Bell spoke with the Mittal Institute about his work, and what we can expect the panelists to cover at the October 15 event. Arvid is a scholar and entrepreneur who specializes in complex conflict analysis, negotiation strategy, and international security. He is lecturer on Government at Harvard University, Director of the Negotiation Task Force at the Davis Center for Russian and Eurasian Studies, and Partner at Negotiation Design & Strategy (NDS), a training, advisory, and research development group.
Video: An Epidemiological Perspective on Whether There Will Be a Third Wave of COVID-19 in India?
Rebooting Consent in the Digital Age: A Governance Framework for Health Data Exchange
In the below article, which appeared in BMJ Global Health, authors Nivedita Saksena (Harvard TH Chan School of Public Health, FXB Center for Health and Human Rights and the inaugural IDHN Fellow at the Mittal Institute), Rahul Matthan (Takshashila Institution, Bengaluru, India), Anant Bhan (Centre for Ethics, Yenepoya (Deemed to be University), Mangalore, Karnataka, India), and Satchit Balsari (Department of Emergency Medicine, Harvard Medical School / Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center and Mittal Institute Steering Committee member) explore India’s National Digital Health Mission’s goal of creating a system of electronic health records that capture data, with the patient’s consent.
Crossroads Emerging Leaders Program Becomes Aspire Institute
Since its inauguration in 2017, the Crossroads Emerging Leaders Program (CELP) has been devoted to engendering a transformation in the lives of first-in-family college students globally. By providing an array of educational resources, direct connections to Harvard faculty, mentorship opportunities, and affinity networks, CELP identifies and supports young people around the world in reimagining their academic and professional futures, fostering “success” through locally-grown, aspirational narratives, and in the process, building cohorts of next-generation leaders. This past month marked the conclusion of the fourth iteration—and second virtual iteration – of the program.
Op-Ed: Creating a Lasting Legacy of Collaboration Across South Asia
Contextualizing Evidence-based Recommendations for the Second Wave of the COVID-19 Pandemic in India
Satchit Balsari, Assistant Professor in Emergency Medicine at Harvard Medical School and Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center and Steering Committee member of the Mittal Institute, co-authored a comment in The Lancet on evidence-based, affordable interventions to manage COVID-19 in India. His co-authors include a range of other medical professionals: Zarir Udwadia, Department of Pulmonary Medicine, P.D. Hinduja Hospital and Medical Research Center, Mumbai, India (ZU); Department of Pulmonary Medicine, Breach Candy Hospitals & Research Centers, Mumbai, India; Ahmed Shaikh, Department of Emergency Medicine, New York Presbyterian Hospital, New York, NY, USA; Abdul Ghafur, Department of Infectious Diseases, Apollo Cancer Hospital, Chennai, India; and Sushila Kataria, Department of Internal Medicine, Medanta Hospital, Gurgaon, India.
Collaborative Effort Launched to Counter Misinformation with Science-based Guidelines for Covid-19 Treatment
The Swasth Alliance has announced the launch of a partnership of community-based organizations, frontline clinicians and leading scientists from India and the Indian diaspora to develop a community of practice committed to advancing evidence-based COVID-19 care, contextualized to rural India. The partnership, the Swasth Community Science Alliance (CSA), will provide a suite of timely clinical resources for use in rural and urban settings, all vetted for scientific accuracy.