Rashmi Banerjee

Contact

Field & Specialties

Modern South Asia
Britain and its Empire
Global Legal History
Women, Gender and Sexuality

Education

M.Phil. Modern Indian History, Jawaharlal Nehru University, 2021

Thesis: "Tales from a Colonial Bench": Debates on the Judicial Profession in Bengal, c. 1861-1919

M.A. Modern Indian History, Jawaharlal Nehru University, 2018

B.A. History, Jadavpur University, 2016

Biography

I am a Ph.D. candidate at the Department of History, specializing in modern South Asia. My doctoral project examines governmental attitudes towards infanticide and abortion in late nineteenth and early twentieth-century India. It explores social, medical and legal debates on women who were accused of infanticide and abortion to understand how their criminality was shaped in the colonial context. 

I joined the Department of History at UVa in 2021 and received my Master's degree in 2023. My Master's thesis focused on medico-legal discourses on abortion and its criminalization in colonial India. I have also received a graduate certificate in Women, Gender and Sexuality Studies at UVa. I am currently conducting archival research in India and the U.K. for my doctoral dissertation. 

Awards & Honors

 

  • Graduate Global Research Grant, Center for Global Inquiry & Innovation, University of Virginia, Spring 2023
  • WGS Graduate Research Grant, Women, Gender & Sexuality Department, University of Virginia, 2023
  • DGS Fall Conference Travel Award, Department of History, University of Virginia, Spring 2023
  • Summer Research Grant, Department of History, University of Virginia, 2023
  • Dumas Malone Graduate Research Fellowship, Office of the Vice-President for Research, University of Virginia, Fall 2024- Spring 2025

 

Courses Taught

Graduate Teaching Assistant for the following courses:

HIEA 2031: Modern China (Fall 2022)

HIEU 3021: Greek and Roman Warfare (Spring 2023)

HIEU 2004: Nationalism in Europe (Fall 2023)