Dr. Subhashim Goswami, is a sociologist and a practicing theatre artist. As a sociologist, he is interested in questions of research methodology, ethnography, the visual world and manifestations of the world in writing and the intersection and interface between art and research. As a theatre artist, he has a distinct passion of working with children and works on creating plays for toddlers, i.e. plays for children below three years to watch.
His doctoral research focused on the question of method in the field of anthropology and sociology and looked at what it means for practitioners of a discipline to construct their objects of inquiry. Currently he is developing a manuscript tentatively titled: “Ethnography – an object in emergence” which underlines the possibility of framing ethnography itself as an object. This work invites practitioners of the discipline to closely interrogate and ask what it means for them to be engaged in the practice that they do.
Subhashim decided to pursue his Ph.D. eight years after his M.Phil as he felt he finally had a question that he needed to ask of the discipline. In the interim eight year period Subhashim had co-founded a research and media collective in collaboration with a film-maker and a researcher which allowed him to explore various kinds of research questions and engage with diverse field sites and locations in terms of people’s world views, practices and ways of life and living. Working and collaborating with other kinds of practitioners allowed him to explore the use of varied research techniques and media forms from ethnography, documentary films to public art and community media.
Subhashim is an alumnus of the Department of Sociology, Delhi School of Economics. His publications have been in the field of method in the social sciences, visuality, masculinity and on practices which lie at the interstices of research and art. His current research interests are: research/art interface, Visual Practices/New Media and Material Culture, Theatre for toddlers, Ethnographic Film-Making.
Teaching Interests
- Ethnographic Practice and Methods, Research Methodology, Sociological Theories – Classical thinkers, Structuralism and Post- Structuralism, Visual and New Media Studies, Sociology of Religion and its relevance in the contemporary world. Writing Pedagogies.
Research Interests
- Research/Art Intervention, Visual Practices and New Media, Visual and Material Culture, Art and Design intervention of the contemporary, Theatre for toddlers, Ethnographic Film-Making. Writing Studies.
- Co-Convener of the Panel Dematerialization and Immateriality: the impact of intangibility in pedagogy and ethnography at at the Association of Social Anthropologists of the UK and Commonwealth Annual Conference, ASA 2021: Responsibility, Online 29 March – 1 April 2021, University of St. Andrews, UK.
- Co-convener of the panel (Re)distributing Anthropological Knowledge at Distribute 2020: A Biennial Conference of the Society for Cultural Anthropology (SCA) and Society for Visual Anthropology (SVA). May 7-8-9. 2020.
- Anthropology as Interlocution: An Ethnography of the Seen and the Heard at the European Association of Social Anthropology 16th Biennial Conference, Online. 20-24 July 2020. Lisbon, Portugal
- Inside and Outside the Bus: Politics of Perception through Wheels on Streets at the Association of Social Anthropologists of the UK and Commonwealth Annual Conference, 3 -6 September 2019, University of East Anglia., Norwich, UK.
- Epistemic movement of Ethnography to Method at the IUAES Inter-Congress 27th – 31st August 2019, Adam Mickiewicz University, Poznan, Poland.
- The Making of an Ethnographic Object – Improvisation in Discontinuity at the Association of Social Anthropologist of Aotearoa/New Zealand Annual Conference 2018. Massey University, Wellington, New Zealand.
- Capturing the Emergent Object: A play of the Formulaic at the Deleuze and Guattari International Conference, Chennai. 16th-17th February 2018.
- Conducted a workshop titled “Ethnography as Emergence” at the IUAES Inter-Congress 27th – 31st August, Adam Mickiewicz University, Poznan, Poland.
- Conducted a lab on Research Methodology through body and movement at the Association of the Social Anthropologists of the UK and Commonwealth Annual Conference - ASA 2019, 3rd -6th September, University of East Anglia, Norwich, UK
- Joint Recipient of the Wenner-Gren Workshop Grant 2019. Conducted a workshop titled “Cosmopolitics in the Contemporary” 22-23 July 2019 at Shiv Nadar University, India.
- Wenner-Gren grant to attend the ASA 2019 Conference at University of East Anglia, UK.
- Recipient of the IEG-ICSSR Doctoral fellowship 2012-14