Himani Bannerji (born 1942) is a

Canadian Canadians (french: Canadiens) are people identified with the country of Canada. This connection may be residential, legal, historical or cultural. For most Canadians, many (or all) of these connections exist and are collectively the source of ...

writer A writer is a person who uses written words in different writing styles and techniques to communicate ideas. Writers produce different forms of literary art and creative writing such as novels, short stories, books, poetry, travelogues, p ...

, sociologist, scholar, and philosopher from

Kolkata Kolkata (, or , ; also known as Calcutta , the official name until 2001) is the capital of the Indian state of West Bengal, on the eastern bank of the Hooghly River west of the border with Bangladesh. It is the primary business, comme ...

West Bengal West Bengal (, Bengali: ''Poshchim Bongo'', , abbr. WB) is a state in the eastern portion of India. It is situated along the Bay of Bengal, along with a population of over 91 million inhabitants within an area of . West Bengal is the fou ...

India India, officially the Republic of India (Hindi: ), is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by area, the second-most populous country, and the most populous democracy in the world. Bounded by the Indian Ocean on the so ...

. She teaches in the Department of Sociology, the Graduate Programme in Social and Political Thought, and the Graduate Programme in Women's Studies at

York University York University (french: Université York), also known as YorkU or simply YU, is a public university, public research university in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. It is Canada's fourth-largest university, and it has approximately 55,700 students, 7,0 ...

in Canada. She is also known for her activist work and poetry. She received her B.A. and M.A. in English from

Visva-Bharati University Visva-Bharati () is a public central university and an Institution of National Importance located in Shantiniketan, West Bengal, India. It was founded by Rabindranath Tagore who called it ''Visva-Bharati'', which means the communion of the ...

and

Jadavpur University Jadavpur University is a public state university located in Jadavpur, Kolkata, West Bengal, India. It was established in 1905 as ''Bengal Technical Institute'' and was converted into Jadavpur University in 1955. In 2022, it was ranked fourth am ...

respectively, and her M.A. and Ph.D. from the

University of Toronto The University of Toronto (UToronto or U of T) is a public university, public research university in Toronto, Ontario, Canada, located on the grounds that surround Queen's Park (Toronto), Queen's Park. It was founded by royal charter in 1827 ...

. Bannerji works in the areas of Marxist, feminist and

anti-racist Anti-racism encompasses a range of ideas and political actions which are meant to counter racial prejudice, systemic racism, and the oppression of specific racial groups. Anti-racism is usually structured around conscious efforts and deliberate ...

theory. She is especially focused on reading

colonial Colonial or The Colonial may refer to: * Colonial, of, relating to, or characteristic of a colony or colony (biology) Architecture * American colonial architecture * French Colonial * Spanish Colonial architecture Automobiles * Colonial (1920 au ...

discourse through

Karl Marx Karl Heinrich Marx (; 5 May 1818 – 14 March 1883) was a German philosopher, economist, historian, sociologist, political theorist, journalist, critic of political economy, and socialist revolutionary. His best-known titles are the 1848 ...

's concept of ideology, and putting together a reflexive analysis of gender, race and class. Bannerji also does much lecturing about the

Gaze In critical theory, sociology, and psychoanalysis, the gaze (French ''le regard''), in the philosophical and figurative sense, is an individual's (or a group's) awareness and perception of other individuals, other groups, or oneself. The concept ...

and

othering In phenomenology, the terms the Other and the Constitutive Other identify the other human being, in their differences from the Self, as being a cumulative, constituting factor in the self-image of a person; as acknowledgement of being real; h ...

and silencing of women who are marginalized. Her novella, Coloured Pictures, teaches children about confronting racism. In addition to her work in the academy, Bannerji has also published in a variety of venues to reach different audiences. Two of her articles have been published in Rungh Magazine.

Early life

Bannerji was born in

Bengal Presidency The Bengal Presidency, officially the Presidency of Fort William and later Bengal Province, was a subdivision of the British Empire in India. At the height of its territorial jurisdiction, it covered large parts of what is now South Asia and ...

of British India. She studied in Calcutta and earned a B.A. and M.A.. Her thesis was completed in 1988 with the title: ''The Politics of Representation: A Study of Class and Class Struggle in the Political Theatre of West Bengal''.

Bibliography

*
The Ideological Condition: Selected Essays on History, Race and Gender.
' (Brill) *''Demography and Democracy: Essays on Nationalism, Gender and Ideology.'' (Canadian Scholars' Press and Orient Blackswan) *''Inventing Subjects: Studies in Hegemony, Patriarchy and Colonialism. '' (Tulika) *''Dark Side of the Nation: Essays on Multiculturalism, Nationalism and Racism'' (Canadian Scholars Press) *''The Writing on the Wall: Essays on Culture and Politics'' (TSAR Press); *''Thinking Through: Essays in Marxism, Feminism and Anti-Racism'' (

The Women's Press The Women's Press was a feminist publishing company established in London in 1977. Throughout the late 1970s and the 1980s, the Women's Press was a highly visible presence, publishing feminist literature. Founding In 1977, Stephanie Dowrick cof ...

) *''The Mirror of Class: Essays on Bengali theatre'' (Papyrus)

Fiction

* ''Coloured Pictures'' (A novel) (Toronto: Sister Vision, 1991) * ''Her Mother's Ashes'', in: Nurjehan Aziz, ed. ''Her Mother's Ashes. Stories by South Asian Women in Canada and the United States.''

TSAR Publications TSAR Publications is a Toronto-based nonprofit book publisher focusing on multicultural literature, particularly Canadian authors and subject matter. TSAR Publications began as the literary journal ''The Toronto Review of Contemporary Writing Abro ...

, Toronto 1994

Poetry

*''Doing Time: Poems'' (Toronto: Sister Vision, 1986.) *''A Separate Sky'' (Toronto: Domestic Bliss, 1982.) - Which includes her translation of Bengali poems by Subhas Mukhapadhyay, Manbendra Bandyopadhyay and

Shamshur Rahman ''Shabkhoon'' was an Urdu literary magazine started in June 1966 in Allahabad, India. The magazine was founded and edited by poet and author Shamsur Rahman Faruqi who used to work on it along with his job at the Indian Postal Service. The jour ...

Co-authored and edited

*''Of Property and Propriety: The Role of Gender and Class in Imperialism and Nationalism'' (University of Toronto Press); *''Unsettling Relations: The University as a Site for Feminist Struggle'' (The Women's Press); *''Returning the Gaze: : Essays on Gender, Race and Class by Non-White Women'' (SisterVision Press)

References

External links

'On the Dark Side of the Nation' article

Yorku profile
1942 births Bengali Hindus 20th-century Bengalis 21st-century Bengalis Bengali writers Writers from Kolkata Women writers from West Bengal Canadian feminist writers Canadian non-fiction writers Canadian people of Bengali descent Canadian women non-fiction writers Canadian writers of Asian descent Canadian Hindus Jadavpur University alumni Living people University of Toronto alumni Visva-Bharati University alumni Academic staff of York University Canadian Marxist writers Indian emigrants to Canada Bengali philosophers Canadian women philosophers Marxist feminists Canadian sociologists Canadian women sociologists {{India-writer-stub