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Prof. (Dr.) Jayani Jeanne Bonnerjee

Prof. (Dr.) Jayani Jeanne Bonnerjee

Professor and Associate Dean, Academic Affairs

B.Sc (Geography) Loreto College, Calcutta University;

M.Sc (Geography) Queen Mary, University of London;

PhD (Geography) Queen Mary, University of London

: jjbonnerjee@jgu.edu.in

Prof. (Dr.) Jayani Jeanne Bonnerjee is an Professor and Associate Dean, Academic Affairs, JSLH. Jayani Bonnerjee is a cultural geographer with research and teaching interests in postcolonial urbanism and critical geographies of diaspora. She completed her PhD (Geography) from Queen Mary, University of London, focusing on issues of identity and belonging for Calcutta’s Chinese and Anglo-Indian communities. Building on this research, Jayani is currently working on a book on the Calcutta Chinese community and the idea of the cosmopolitan city. Her work has been published in the Journal of Intercultural Studies, South Asian Diaspora and Global Networks.

With degrees from University of Calcutta (Loreto College) and University of London (Queen Mary, University of London), Jayani has taught both in India and the UK. She has also held postdoctoral positions in Delhi (Centre de Sciences Humaines), London (Queen Mary, University of London) and Singapore (Nalanda-Sriwijaya Centre, ISEAS).

Postcolonial urbanisms; Critical geographies of migration and diaspora; Urban sociality; Home, belonging and identity; Practices of urban heritage; Representing and imagining cities; Mixed or creole identities.
  • 2019: ‘Diaspora and Home’. Co-authored with Alison Blunt in Katharyne Mitchell, Reece Jones and Jennifer Fluri (ed), Handbook on Critical Geographies of Migration, Edward Elgar Press.
  • 2018: Review essay ‘Chinatown Days’ (by Rita Chowdhury), China Report 54 (4).
  • 2017: ‘Anglo-Indian Diaspora’ in the Routledge Handbook of Indian Diaspora, edited by Ajaya Sahoo and Radhika Hegde, Routledge.
  • 2015: ‘Beyond boundaries? Hindu spaces in Chinatowns of Calcutta and Singapore’. In J. Bhattacharya and C. Kripalani ed. Indian and Chinese Immigrant Communities: Comparative Perspectives, Anthem Press.
  • 2013: ‘Invisible belonging: Anglo-Indian identity in multicultural Toronto’, Journal of Intercultural Studies, 34 (4) August 2013: 431-442.
  • ‘Home, city and diaspora: Anglo-Indian and Chinese attachments to Calcutta’ (with Alison Blunt), Global Networks, 13(2) April 2013: 220-240.
  • 2012: ‘Dias-para’: neighbourhood, memory and the city’, South Asian Diaspora, 4, 1(March 2012): 5-23.
  • ‘Diasporic returns to the city: Anglo-Indian and Jewish visits to Calcutta’ (with Alison Blunt and Noah Hysler-Rubin), South Asian Diaspora, 4, 1 (March 2012): 25-43.
  • Blunt, A., J. Bonnerjee, C. Lipman, J. Long and F. Paynter 2007 ‘My Home: text, space and performance’ Cultural Geographies 14:1-10.
  • Society, Space, Culture
  • Globalization and Migration
  • Thinking about the Field
  • Interdisciplinary Seminar 3 (service-learning course, working with local schools and anganwadis)
  • Thesis Seminar