Biography

Dr. Debotri Dhar's interdisciplinary work engages the intersections of international relations (IR), development, and humanitarian education. Her research and teaching interests span women in IR, peace and conflict studies, with attention to gender violence in war and humanitarian law, gender and development, gender and education, and policy. She also has an enduring interest in women in literature and is a published novelist. She teaches two electives at the Jindal School of International Affairs, on Gender Violence in War, Policies for Peace and Transitional Justice (Spring) and Feminist Foreign Policy (Fall). She will also teach a course on the Global Indian Diaspora for the M.A. India Studies Program.

Dr. Dhar earned a B.A. in Economics (Honors) from Shri Ram College, Delhi University, and a Masters in Women's Studies, with distinction, from Oxford University, UK, where she specialized in gender and development. She won the Ambassador Dr. Wafiq Z Kamil (Secretary-General, Asian African Consultative Committee, UN General Assembly) gold medal in human rights from IIHR, New Delhi. She earned a Ph.D. in Women's and Gender Studies from Rutgers University, USA, where she was awarded an Excellence Doctoral Fellowship, a graduate fellowship on 'Rights of Culture/Culture of Rights,' South Asian Studies research award, and award for teaching excellence. During 2013-14, she was a visiting researcher at Boston University. From 2015-2023, she lectured on policies to address sexual violence in war/peace, feminist theory, and women in literature at the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor,  USA, where she was affiliated with the Institute for Research on Women and Gender, Center for Education of Women, and Ford School of Public Policy's Center for Finance, Law and Policy, and served as faculty adviser for public diplomacy research on gender violence.

Dr. Dhar has authored and edited seven books including Love is Not a Word: The Culture and Politics of Desire (Speaking Tiger, New Delhi), Education and Gender, and co-edited Education in South Asia and Indian Ocean Islands, both by Bloomsbury Academic (London, New York, New Delhi, Sydney), published book chapters such as on women in media, literature and law, articles in Postcolonial Text, Transformations, Feminist Formations, Dialog, German Journal of World History and Istor (special issues on India), and her next book on paradigms and policies to address rape victims' suicides is forthcoming. Dr. Dhar has given papers, talks, and invited presentations at Harvard, Yale, Oxford, Ashoka Young India Fellowship, Princeton, Boston, U-Pennsylvania and Delhi universities, as well as India International Centre, India Habitat Centre, British Council-Kolkata, and venues accessible to a wider audience. Her work has been widely reviewed, and she has served as a reviewer for the National Endowment for the Humanities (USA), Indian Institute for Advanced Study fellowship and National Women's Studies conference papers, a judge for the Barbara Deming Fund for women writers (New York), Best Asian writing series (Singapore), and several renowned publishers. 

A public scholar, she has written numerous newspaper columns and blog series, such as on women's issues ('She Thinks,' Times of India), India's international relations and classical culture ('Animal Instincts,' The Asian Age), friendship, feminist foreign policy, diplomacy and popular culture (Outlook Magazine), diaspora ('An Indian Abroad,' Sunday Guardian, New Delhi), feminism, faith and comparative politics (Hindustan Times). She was shortlisted for the Muse India Young Writers' Award for her novel The Courtesans of Karim Street, and her shorter literary works such as 'A Flute Called Radha' (Penguin Random House) have appeared in literary magazines and anthologies worldwide, including New Zealand, Canada, UK, USA, and India. Dr. Dhar has also consulted with organizations in the public, private and non-profit sectors, such as Manavi that addresses violence against South Asian women in the United States. Dr. Dhar is the founder of the Hummingbird Global Writers Circle and Leaders Forum.