University of Heidelberg

"The Vedic Sacrifice (yajña) in the New Public Spheres" The Vedic Sacrifice (yajña) in New Public Spheres investigates in the transformation of an ancient ritual practice to the contemporary world and its adaptation to new global requirements, based on shifting asymmetries between Asia and Europe, in order to cope with the search of one's own culture and identity in times of globalization. Read more.
This project is connected to B14 "Religion on Stage".

This research project explores the complex interplay of global electric telegraphy, news reporting and press in nineteenth-century India.

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This project is connected to B9 "Information Flows".

"Indian Contemporary Art in a Transnational Context: An Ethnography on Art with Focus on the Travelling Exhibition Indian Highway" Read more.
This project is connected to B4 "Transcultural Visuality"

"Sex [at] Work in Nepal: Discourses around Sexuality, Self-Perception and Society" Sex work taken “as an optic for investigation not as a reified social fact.” In dealing with the relationship between sex and consumer culture, the analysis will trace the connections between sex work and the whole scope of social, cultural, economic and political practices bringing forth the complex texture of societies. What conditions in defined as “local niches” allow for the development or integration of what are assumed as being “global” trends? Read more.

This research project intends to examine the feasibility of the formulation of the category of nineteenth century convert literature (Hindu converts to Christianity) in Bengal. The body of literature that will be studied used the prominent tropes of the literary current of its contemporary western counterpart (i.e. decadent romantic poetry), yet playing in consonance with the revivalist trend, and, interestingly enough, invested its creative energies in re-inventing Hindu myths and legends. Read more

"Global Flows of News and Media in the 19th Century: How the Telegraph influenced News and Reporting in Great Britain" This research project is interlinked with B9 “Information Flows”. It investigates the interplay of electric telegraphy and the resulting global flows of information and newspaper reporting in 19th century British newspapers. Focusing on the media coverage of India, the project examines the role of the new medium telegraphy as a vehicle for transcultural flows and will discuss as to what extent it contributes to a new way of experiencing and interacting with the subcontinent.
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“Transcultural Practices of Classic Music – A Case of East Asian Students of Music in Germany” This project is a contribution to the research on transcultural agency in multiple public spheres, using East Asian students of music at German institutions of higher education as a case-in-point. As a “multi-sited” ethnography, the project attempts to “track” and document asymmetrical considerations in individual strategies of migration. Read more.

My research is an ethnographic field study of a trend called Metrosexuals in Indian popular media. It investigates the key visual themes and representational codes associated with this trend in various Indian magazines, films and ad commercials and how the Indian readers/audience /consumers are engaging with and negotiating the trend in their everyday practices. In Indian Media the trend is represented through projection of aesthetically appealing male bodies, fair skin and forms of sexuality that seems to be at variance with the heterosexual normative Indian masculinity. This project is connected to B12 Rethinking Trands.

"The Internet and the Public Sphere in the Era of Convergence: An Ethnographic Case Study of Chinese Diasporic Media in Germany" This project investigates the development of the Chinese diasporic media (especially the German-Chinese internet) in relation to Chinese migration to Germany. Read More.

"Chinglish – Communicating with the World?" This thesis on Chinglish identifies the various uses of English in the Chinese public sphere and identifies the, at times, asymmetrical attitudes that exist towards the transcultural phenomenon. With a corpus of 5000 Chinglish examples the thesis attempts to provide a valid typology and argues for a selective inclusion of Chinglish into the ongoing discussion on “China English”. Read more.

"A New Cosmopolitan Elite? An Ethnographic Study of Priviledged Western Youth in Shanghai" This ethnography investigates the everyday cultural practices of ‘Western’ youths in Shanghai with regards to questions of identity and global mobility. These teenagers’ practices are situated in and contributing to different overlapping public spheres working on local, national, transnational and transcultural levels, e.g. mediascapes, the city of Shanghai or the expatriate communities. Read More.

"Mobilities and Social Networks: Mapping Mobile Phone Usage in Urban India"
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"Reading Asymmetries and Flows: Satirical Pictures in Chinese Illustrated Newspapers and Periodicals" Chinese satirical pictures, in this project, serve as important evidence of cultural interact at the turn of the 20th century. They offer a visual sphere which clearly exhibits cultural asymmetries that trigger a cultural exchange of ideas and knowledge. Therefore, with a background of imperialism and colonialism, these images and comics can also be perceived as an association with the rest of the world. Read more.
This project is connected to B1 "Satire".