Dr. Vidya Subramanian

Associate Professor and Associate Dean (Planning and Strategy)

Postdoctoral Fellowships (Harvard University and IIT Bombay);

Ph.D. Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU, New Delhi);

M.Phil – Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU, New Delhi)

Biography

Vidya Subramanian is an interdisciplinary scholar whose research interests lie at the intersection of technologies and societies. Her research is loosely framed by two large issues: the first is of the colonization of the everyday so-called real world by the digital; and the second is how power permeates and is implicated in such technologies. Her work has straddled several academic fields such as Science, Technology, and Society (STS), Sociology, Media Studies, and Sports Studies. Prior to joining Jindal Global Law School, she has held postdoctoral positions at Harvard University and IIT Bombay, after having completed her PhD from the Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU) New Delhi.

In her doctoral work, she attempted to explore the influence of ICTs and television on the sport of cricket, the identities of the spectator (who is transformed into a consumer by these very technologies), and the transformation of cricket into a platform. In thus exploring the layered mediations between the IPL and ICTs, her thesis explored how the digital colonized the everyday through technologies of leisure and play. Her first book, based on her doctoral work Speeding Up Sport: Technology and the Indian Premier League was published in 2022.

Publications

Book

2022. Speeding Up Sport: Technology and the Indian Premier League: Oxford University Press (ISBN: 978–0–19–286512–0)

Book Chapters and Journal Articles

2023, February. Speaking Out on the Internet: What does it mean to seek ‘justice’ on social media? Legal Pluralism and Critical Social Analysis. https://doi.org/10.1080/27706869.2023.2176010

2022, March. By The People: How ‘clicktivism’ helped shape net neutrality in India. Dialogue: Science, Scientists and Society (Special issue: Inquiring into Technoscience in India, edited by Dhruv Raina). https://doi.org/10.29195/DSSS.03.01.0046

2021 Who Watches Cricket? The New Spectator in the Sporting-Entertainment Complex. In Padma Prakash, Meena Gopal and Sujata Patel (ed.), Sports Studies in India: Expanding the Field. Oxford University Press.
2020, May 09. (with Kalindi Kokal). Locking Down on Rights: Surveillance and Administrative Ambiguity in the Pandemic. Economic and Political Weekly, Vol 55 (19): https://www.epw.in/engage/article/locking-down-rights-surveillance-and-ambiguity-covid-19
2020 (with Dhrubo Jyoti). Notes from a Newsroom: Interrogating the transformation of Hindustan Times in a “digital” space. In Maya Dodd, Nidhi Kalra (Ed.), Exploring the Digital Humanities in India: Pedagogies, Practices, and Institutional Possibilities: Routledge India
2020, May. (with Marianne Noel and Harmony Paquin). Tweet, Set, Match: Negotiating the Boundaries of Digital Technologies in Elite Tennis. Science, Technology and Society, Vol 25 (3), 404-425. https://doi.org/10.1177/0971721820912923
2016, November. ‘Television Was Left On, a Running Tap, From Morning till Night’: The Indian Premier League (IPL) as a Marketing Vehicle. Sporting Traditions, Vol. 33 (2), 1–17
2016 Of Shoes and Ships and Sealing Wax: what we talk about when we talk about the IPL. Jindal Journal of Public Policy, Vol 3 (1), 251-264
2016. Talking Between the Panels: Coffee and Lunch Breaks at 4S/EAAST, Barcelona 2016. EASST Review, Vol 35(4): https://easst.net/article/talking-between-the-panels-coffee-and-lunch-breaks-at-4seaast-barcelona-2016/
2015, April 11. Cricket-lite: IPL as a Sporting-Entertainment Complex. Economic and Political Weekly, Vol 50 (15): http://www.epw.in/journal/2015/15/web-exclusives/cricket-lite.html
2013. Not Just Cricket: The IPL as the Politics of Speed. The International Journal of Sport and Society, Vol 3, 69-79

2012, December. Cricket in the fast Lane: politics of speed. Economic and Political Weekly, Vol 47 (50), 21-24: https://www.epw.in/journal/2012/50/commentary/cricket-fast-lane.html

Selected Opinion Pieces and Other Articles

Grants and Scholarships

2021-22 Raghunathan Family Fellowship, South Asia Institute,
Harvard University
2020-22 Visiting Fellowship, Program on Science Technology and Society,
Harvard University

Research Interests

Digital Governance
Science Technology and Society
Sports Studies
Media Studies

Dr. Vidya Subramanian

Dr. Vidya Subramanian

Campus Location

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