A.Suneetha is a Senior Fellow at and Coordinator of Anveshi Research Centre for Women’s Studies. She is a political theorist who is invested in the questions of gender and minority. Her research interests include gender and violence, secularism and the Muslim woman’s question and Muslim politics in the Telugu region, more specifically of Hyderabad. She is part of the editorial team of bilingual Anveshi Broadsheet on Contemporary Politics. Along with M.A.Moid, she is working towards a book on Muslim politics.
Completed Research Projects
City and Sexuality: A Study of Youth Living and Working in Hyderabad, AJWS, 2016-2018
Post 1990 Muslims Politics in Hyderabad: Cross currents and Tensions, ICSSR, 2010-2013
Feminist Politics, Rights Discourse, the Family and Sexuality: Rethinking Women’s Suffering and Agency, Ford Foundation, 2007-2010
Institutional Responses to Domestic Violence, AEI Luxemburg, 2000- 2003
Member
Southern Regional Committee, Indian Association of Women’s Studies (2018-)
Twelvth Plan Steering Committee on Minorities (2012)
Education
Ph.D (Political Science), University of Hyderabad on “Family, Gender and Power: A Study of Women and Violence in Families in Andhra Pradesh” (2000)
M.Phil (Political Science), University of Hyderabad on “Portrayal of Rape in Telugu Cinema” (1994)
M.A (Political Science) University of Hyderabad (1990-1992)
Miscellaneous
Suneetha was a recipient of doctoral fellowships awarded by the Indian Council for Social Science Research, New Delhi, 1995, and by Jawaharlal Nehru Memorial Fund, New Delhi, 1996-1998. She was one of the coordinators of the first South Indian Young Feminists Conference, ‘Listening Together, Talking Differences,’ organised by Anveshi and Hyderabad Women’s Collective in September 2001.
Publications
Edited Volumes
Guest Editor Special Issue of Women’s Link, Gender, Religion and Democracy, Vol.25, April-June 2018
Cco-editor of Towards a World of Equals, a Bilingual Textbook on Gender Sensitization (2015) Telugu Academy, Hyderabad (with Susie Tharu)
Co-editor of Vegetarians Only, Stories of Telugu Muslims (2015) Orient Blackswan, Hyderabad (with Uma Bhrugubanda)
Guest Editor Special Issue on Violence, Law and Feminist Politics, Indian Journal of Gender Studies, Vol.17, No.3, Oct 2010 https://journals.sagepub.
Forthcoming
A World of Equals, Orient Blackswan, New Delhi (Coedited with Susie Tharu and Uma Bhrugubanda)
Research Articles
- Mediating Muslim Citizenship? AIMIM and its Letters (Coauthored with M.A.Moid), Contemporary South Asia, Jan 2019. It can be accessed at https://www.tandfonline.
com/doi/full/10.1080/09584935. 2019.1573213
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Telugu nationalism and Police Action against Hyderabad: Notes on History, Historiography and Memory, unpublished paper presented at the Berkshire Conference of Women Historians, University of Toronto, 22-25 May, 2014.
- Muslim Women and Marriage Laws: Debating the Model Nikahnama, Economic & Political Weekly,Vol. XLVII, No.43, Oct. 27, 2012.
- Between Haquq and Taaleem: Muslim Women’s Activism in Contemporary Hyderabad, Economic & Political Weekly, Vol. XLVII, No.34, Aug 25, 2012.
- Towards Understanding Muslim Social Reform: Jamiat-ul-Mominath and Its Fatwas for Women in Flavia Agnes and Shobha Venkatesh Ghosh ed. Negotiating Spaces, Oxford University Press, 2012.
- Indian Secularism and Muslim Personal Law: The Story of Model Nikahnama, Social Difference Online, Ed. by Lila Abu Lughod and Anupama Rao, Vol.1, Dec.2011.
- Ilm Haasil Karna: Muslims, madrassas and education in post 1990 India, unpublished paper presented in the workshop Politics of Religious Freedom Workshop: Contested Norms and Local Practices
Chiang Mai, Thailand, 14-15 December, 2011.
- Dealing with Domestic Violence: Towards Complicating the Rights Discourse (Coauthored with Vasudha Nagaraj), Indian Journal of Gender Studies, Vol. 17 (3), 2010.
- ‘Conjugality and Violence: Notes from the Past and the Present.’ Indian Journal of Human Rights,Vol.3, Nos.1&2, 1999.
- ‘State of Human Rights in the First World: Emerging Trends.’ (Coauthored with G.Haragopal) Quarterly Journal of the Institute for the Study of Developing Areas, Vol.8, No.1, Jan-March 1998. Co-author.
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‘Civil Liberties in the Making: A Case of Andhra Pradesh Civil Liberties Committee.’ Indian Journal of Human Rights, Vol.1, No.2, Jul-Dec 1997. Co-author.
Select blog publications
In Tollywood, the bottom of the pyramid is leading the #metoo movement (with Vasudha Nagaraj, Tejaswini Madabushi and K.Sajaya) https://thewire.in/
The List and the task of rearranging academic relationships (with Uma Bhrugubanda, Vasudha Nagaraj and Lakshmikutty) https://www.epw.
The real debate on triple talaq is happening within the Muslim Communities
Secular Telugus and communal Muslims: The politics of razakar memory
Read Suneetha’s Blog for her newspaper articles and blog entries in Telugu.
Her 2018 Balagopal Memorial Lecture can be accessed at https://www.youtube.com/