Dr. Pronoy Rai was appointed as a Visiting Faculty in Social Sciences at GSG College for a five-year term beginning in September 2019. SESA served as liaison in order to make the appointment possible.
Dr. Rai is an assistant professor of International and Global Studies at Portland State University in Oregon, focusing on labor migration and social change in rural western India. He has traveled extensively throughout India and has visited GSG five times since 2012 to conduct research in the surrounding villages.
Dr. Rai reflected, "I look back at early spring 2012 nostalgically, when, as a first-year Masters in International Development student at Ohio University, I had the opportunity to learn about Umarkhed and GSG from Meeta Gawande and Sushila Gawande at their beautiful home in Athens. We explored the possibility of my travel in the ensuing summer to Umarkhed to meet with and understand the needs of GSG students, staff, and faculty and for me to conduct research for my thesis on the politics of access to food in the region. I am fortunate to have been able to maintain my professional and personal ties with GSG since my first visit and to see the partnership between GSG and various US-based specialists, organizations, and donors.
Most recently, Dr. Rai published research in the August issue of the journal Gender, Place and Culture based on fieldwork conducted while staying at GSG College through summer 2014 and summer and fall of 2015. Through interviews with residents of five villages in rural Maharashtra, he studied how gender affects the division of labor among labor migrant communities both in their home villages and the various destinations where they migrate for work. Additional articles based on Dr. Rai’s fieldwork in villages near GSG College can be found at https://works.bepress.com/pronoy-rai/. His next project will examine how climate change affects migrant laborer and smallholder farming communities.
Said Dr. Rai, "I look forward to serving GSG for the next five years and beyond by continuing my own research projects in the region that would continue to involve the extended GSG community and acting as a facilitator for researchers in the US and elsewhere interested in learning about the region."
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