Assistant Professor
Stephen Leacock Building, Room 839
855 Sherbrooke Street West
Montreal, Quebec, H3A 2T7
Tel.: 514-389-6837
Fax: 514-398-7476
E-mail: poulami.roychowdhury [at] mcgill.ca
Research Areas
Political Sociology; Gender; Political Economy of Development; Qualitative Methods
Biography
Assistant Professor at McGill since 2014
Ph.D., New York University, Department of Sociology, 2014
My research examines the relationship between politics, law, and social inequality. My book, Capable Women, Incapable States was released with Oxford University Press in 2021. The book follows women who negotiate rights against gendered violence in India. It shows how Indian law enforcement personnel govern violence not by protecting women from harm, but by forcing them to become "capable": to take the law into their own hands and complete the hard work that incapable and unwilling state officials refuse to complete.
My previous research examined masculinity and labor organizing, and media coverage of sexual violence. I am currently working on two new projects. The first examines the politics of sexual harassment in the United States and India. The second is an inter-disciplinary, collaborative initiative that traces the inequality of Covid 19 in India.
My research has been supported by the National Science Foundation, the Fulbright Foundation, the Social Science and Humanities Research Council of Canada, the Fonds de Recherche du Québec, and the American Institute for Indian Studies.
I am an Associate Editor at Social Politics and serve on the editorial board of Gender & Society.
Publications
BOOKS
2021. Poulami Roychowdhury. Capable Women, Incapable States: Negotiating Violence and Rights in India. New York: Oxford University Press
Poulami Roychowdhury. “A call to knowledge: Let’s gather more data before rushing to action.” Gender & Society (https://gendersociety.wordpress.com/2016/02/23/a-call-to-knowledge-lets-gather-more-data-before-rushing-to-action/).
2014 Poulami Roychowdhury. “Gender-based violence: an index of ‘tradition’ or social change?” Gender & Society. (https://gendersociety.wordpress.com/2014/01/21/gender-based-violence-an-index-of-tradition-or-social-change/)
2013 Poulami Roychowdhury. “Focus on rape in India ignores global problem.” Salon.com (https://www.salon.com/test/2013/01/09/stop_demonizing_indian_culture/)
2012 Managing Editor (with NYU Colleagues). The Sociology Project: An Introduction to the Sociological Imagination. New York: Pearson.
Courses Taught
Graduate Seminars
SOCI 550 Developing Societies
SOCI 489 Gender, Crime, Deviance
Undergraduate Courses
SOCI 255 Gender and the State
SOCI 370 Gender and Development