Race in academia: an interview with Dr Mahvish Shami and Shingira Masanzu

In season 4’s debut episode Can You Hear Us?, sits down with Dr. Lama Tawakkol, Lecturer in International Relations in the Department of Politics  at the University of Manchester to talk about everything from her research on the Humanitarian Development Nexus in Jordan and Lebanon to her appreciation for definitions and Cairo’s urban revitalization! Tune in to listen to her discuss how power dynamics operate within a capitalist and global economy, including within the politics of development policy and aid. As well as expand on her conceptual framework on how international development and humanitarian aid projects have extended and reproduced Western imperialism. 

Quotes from the interview:

Prompted by our youngest team member’s desire for shorter podcasts on her regular commute

to and from LSE, Can You Hear Us?  is proud to present So We Heard, a series of bite-sized,

informal chats dedicated to exploring academic theories, case studies, and current affairs within

international development through the lens of black, indigenous, and women of color (BIWOC).

With episodes lasting 30 minutes or less, Can You Hear Us team members join assistant

producer, Ragini Puri, on a quick deep-dive into what topic within development is peaking their

interest and why it matters. 

In the first episode of 2024, Monica, a CYHU co-founder, joins Ragini to discuss mentorship. As a young professional, she brings personal insights to the conversation. 

How has the nature of mentorship evolved in the twenty-first century?

What, if any, is the ideal mentor-mentee relationship?

How can cultural nuances affect mentorship?

We discuss this and a lot more in the fifth episode of So We Heard. Tune in to listen!

Resources:

Defining mentoring: https://nyaspubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1111/nyas.14176 

Prompted by our youngest team member’s desire for shorter podcasts on her regular commute

to and from LSE, Can You Hear Us?  is proud to present So We Heard, a series of bite-sized,

informal chats dedicated to exploring academic theories, case studies, and current affairs within

international development through the lens of black, indigenous, and women of color (BIWOC).

With episodes lasting 30 minutes or less, Can You Hear Us team members join assistant

producer, Ragini Puri, on a quick deep-dive into what topic within development is peaking their

interest and why it matters. 

Since we are in the middle of the 16 Days of Activism against Gender-Based Violence Campaign, Madiera, one of CYHU’s founders, joins Ragini to discuss GBV. 

Can focussing on women’s vulnerability lead to their essentialisation?

How do we further include men and boys in discussions of gender-based violence?

What happens when GBV permeates a whole new space, like the virtual world?

We discuss this and a lot more in the fourth episode of So We Heard. Tune in to listen!

Resources:

• UNFPA’s virtual is real website: https://www.unfpa.org/thevirtualisreal 

In the second part of our two-part discussion on children’s welfare and child-centric development, host Ragin Puri (CYHU Assistant Producer) and Sanjana Sunder (CYHU Assistant Producer) explore the intersections between child-centric development and gender. They dive into how poverty can be passed from generation to generation, leading to intergenerational child poverty. Finally, the discussion reflects on the space accorded to child poverty in International Development. 

On this week’s episode of Can You Hear Us?, Monica and Ragini are joined by development economist and author Shrayana Bhattacharya. After completing her training from Delhi University and the Harvard Kennedy School, Shrayana worked on research projects with the Institute of Social Studies Trust, SEWA and Centre for Policy Research. At present, she is a Senior Economist at the World Bank. Her first book of non-fiction Desperately Seeking Shah Rukh: India's Lonely Young Women and the Search for Intimacy and Independence was published by HarperCollins India in November 2021 and by Liberty Books in Pakistan in August 2022. Shrayana recently won the Atta Galatta BLF Book Prize for Best Non Fiction for 2022. She has also won the Times of India JK Paper AutHer Prize for Best Non-Fiction Author for 2022 and the SKOCH Economic Forum Prize for Literature.

Quotes from the interview: 
 

Prompted by our youngest team member’s desire for shorter podcasts on her regular commute to and from LSE, Can You Hear Us? is proud to present So We Heard, a series of bite-sized, informal chats dedicated to exploring academic theories, case studies, and current affairs within international development through the lens of black, indigenous, and women of color (BIWOC). With episodes lasting 30 minutes or less, Can You Hear Us team members join assistant producer, Ragini Puri, on a quick deep-dive into what within development is peaking their interest and why it matters. 

This week, Sanjana, CYHU’s social media head, joins Ragini to discuss children’s welfare and the importance of adopting a child-centric lens in International Development.

The Can You Hear Us Team is excited to Introduce So We Heard — an informal coffee chat series that, like Can You Hear Us, creates a space for black, indigenous women and femmes of color to discuss and understand anything related to international development without the pressure of having to sound intelligent while doing it. 

In the first episode, host Ragini Puri (CYHU Assistant Producer) dives into a chapter from The Critique of Commodification: Contours of a Post-Capitalist Society by Christoph Hermann with CYHU lead researcher, Dana Abuzinadah. They re-examine the notion of commodification, its many critiques, and how it truly operates within our world, paying special attention to the commodification of women’s labour globally.

This week on Can You Hear Us, Monica and Madeira discuss dualities in International Development alongside Emonie Ayiwe; a Finnish-Nigerian Luxembourger with a master's degree in Intercultural Encounters! The theme for this week was inspired by Monica and Madeira’s personal experiences, and also the experiences of CYHU’s past guests. As a podcast dedicated to amplifying the voices of BIPOC women, we often ask our guests how their identities contribute to their approach to their work. Almost all of them respond with the same phrase, “This is not all I am.”

Duality can be defined as “the quality or state of having two different or opposite parts or elements.” Keeping this definition in mind, the episode begins with Emonie breaking down what it means to be a Finnish-Nigerian Luxembourger. She explains how the term essentially describes “who she is” and “where she comes from” and  highlights the importance of accepting her Finnish and Nigerian identities as a whole instead of considering herself a sum of “halves”. Monica and Madeira, who are both mixed, further add to the conversation by reflecting on their own experiences. The three of them discuss the pressures of being put in a box and how owning all aspects of their identity helped them feel more assertive.

The episode proceeds to focus on the role of duality in one’s professional life. Emonie has a keen interest in hip-hop studies and wrote her master's thesis on the expressions of identity in South Korean b-boys. Further, she has also interned in Benin. Currently, she is a research assistant for a Brussels-based NGO called the Democratic Society. She talks about code-switching and how the way she expresses herself varies depending on her surroundings. Monica brings up an interesting study that found that reminding any social group of a stereotype can negatively affect their outcomes and performance. This leads to an interesting discussion about dualities in International Development. An idea that often pushes back against looking at identities as dualities is intersectionality. Emonie discusses the importance of intersectionality but points out that instead of negating the idea of dualities, it works in conjunction with it. The discussion comes full circle as Monica, Madeira, and Emonie reflect on the World Economic Forum’s Global Gender Gap Index with Emonie pointing out how the numbers cannot be studied in isolation as gender is simply one aspect of an individual’s identity.

After a deep and reflective discussion, the episode ends on a light note as Emonie is subjected to the wheel of questions. Perfectly in line with Emonie’s interest in hip-hop, the question for this episode is “Who is your favourite artist?” To find out Emonie’s answer and for some great Nigerian artist recommendations, check out this week’s episode of Can You Hear Us!

Written by: Ragini Puri, assistant producer, CYHU Podcast

The Can You Hear Us podcast is back! There are several themes we are eager to explore with our brand-new team. In this Meet The Team episode Monica and Madiera are joined by Ragini, our assistant producer, Sanjana, our social media manager, and Doris, our lead researcher all responsible for the conversations that will take place in this third series of the podcast. Today,  the new team discuss: everything International Development (ID)! 

Doris, is a first-year sociology student at the LSE, who had not heard about ID before joining the podcast. However, after discussions with Monica and Madiera, she realised that she had in fact done work which could fall under development. To this end, she asks Ragini and Sanjana to elaborate on their understanding of international development and its definition. This leads to an insightful conversation about what the main goal of ID is, what constitutes the ID space, and why we need ID! 

Turning to Inclusivity, Sanjana provides insights about how ID tends to be gendered. She also touches upon the idea of those who provide aid versus those who receive aid. The team draws from their own experiences to understand what an inclusive ID space would look like and  while there are no concrete answers, the team builds on each other’s knowledge to come up with practical solutions.  

In the final segment, the team becomes introspective as they discuss where they stand in the ID space. As students and alumni of LSE, the team discusses the inherent elitism in the ID space. Sanjana had already touched upon the idea of an active actor and a passive receiver. The team expands on this topic to include personal anecdotes of instances where they first realised their own position in ID.   

After an excellent conversation about everything ID, Monica and Madiera bring out the wheel of questions! For this episode, the guests had to answer the prompt, “Horoscopes, yay or nay?” As an issue that has swept up the youth, there were many opinions to be shared. In an interesting discovery, the CYHU team realised there are three cusps on the team! To find out who votes yay and who votes nay, as well as who those cusps are, make sure you tune in to our brand new episode of Can You Hear Us! 

In today’s episode CYHU expands on the definition of activism as we embark on a season-long theme, by highlighting the sector of artisans and their work. Integral to many developing economies and to consumers in the global north, artisanal work has persevered as a gateway to culture preservation and an income opportunity for the majority of women that work within the sector. We are so excited to share this interview with Arushi Chowdhury Khanna, CEO and founder of the social enterprise LoomKatha. Join us as we chat about the origin of loom Katha, the history of India's handloom sector and the importance of highlighting artisans and “handicrafts” in international development.