Artha Global hosted a brown bag with Thomas Blom Hansen, Reliance-Dhirubhai Ambani Professor of Anthropology, and Chair of the Department of Anthropology at Stanford University on Monday, February 27, 2023, from 3:30 PM-4.30 PM IST. This was an in person, on-the-record event hosted at the Artha Global office in Khar West, Mumbai.
About the event:
There are multiple ways to approach policy research. Professor Hansen discussed ways to use Anthropological Research Methods for conducting research in policy and social sciences. Drawing on his experiences in India and South Africa, Prof. Hansen provided novel approaches to bolster the team’s research, especially how to strike a balance between qualitative and quantitative methods. He also explained how these methods help contextualise large datasets.
About the speaker:
Thomas Blom Hansen is the Reliance-Dhirubhai Ambani Professor of Anthropology, and Chair of the Department of Anthropology at Stanford University. He has written on Hindu nationalism, Hindu-Muslim conflicts, and urban politics in India, as well as memory and cultural politics in post-apartheid South Africa. He is the author of The Saffron Wave. Democracy and Hindu nationalism in modern India (Princeton University Press 1999); Wages of Violence. Naming and identity in postcolonial Bombay (Princeton University Press 2001); Melancholia of Freedom. Social Life in an Indian Township in South Africa (Princeton University Press 2012); The Law of Force. The Violent Heart of Indian Politics (Aleph Books 2021)