Sangeeta Banerji

Postdoctoral Fellow in International and Public Affairs, 2022-2024
Areas of Interest Urban studies, bureaucracy, state space, development, brokerage

Biography

My research investigates 'fixers' who have been for years, instrumental in 'fixing' the city of Mumbai by mobilizing varying politics at different positions with one of the largest bureaucratic state apparatuses—the Municipal Corporation of Greater Mumbai. Rejecting normative black and white accounts of state action in India, I claim that it is the 'fixers' operating in the space of the local state who are key makers of the Indian city. My ethnographic research is motivated the by two broad questions of: How do these key fixers mold state space to settle and unsettle the city of Mumbai? How does the changing space of the state in Mumbai in which these local fixers reside influence ways in which the city of Mumbai is produced? To conduct a multiscalar and multisited ethnography of informal brokerage in Mumbai, I follow the translation of the spatial plan called the 'development plan' as it moves through the levels of bureaucracy and interacts with these key 'fixers' that I have identified during my research.

Publications

Banerji, Sangeeta. (June, 2011) “Role of Megaprojects in Making of a World Class City: The Case of Sabarmati Riverfront Development Project in Ahmedabad.” Tata Institute of Social Sciences. DSpace.

Banerji, Sangeeta. (Forthcoming, May 2021) “Shazia: Proof maker” in Bombay Brokers: Ethnography in the Global Interregnum. Edited by Lisa Björkman. Duke University Press.

Banerji, Sangeeta. (Under review). “Field of Fixing: Following the follow-up boys in the Urban Bureaucracy of Mumbai.” Political Geography. (April 2020)

Banerji, Sangeeta. (Under review). “Māṇḍavlī: Negotiating with Digital Governance in Mumbai.” Urban Geography. (August 2020)

Banerji, Sangeeta. (In preparation). “At the Tracers’ station: Ethnographically studying the Bureaucratic State Apparatus.” Geoforum. (September 2020)

Banerji, Sangeeta (In preparation). “Struggling in Bhim Nagar: Fixing Infrastructure-Induced Displacement and Enclosure of Non-privatized land.” Environment and Planning D: Society and Space. (October 2020)

Teaching

Rutgers University (New Brunswick, NJ)

  • Teaching Assistant, Department of Geography (Spring 2017), "Space, Place, Location" (Introduction to Human Geography)
  • Course Instructor, Department of Geography (Summer 2016), "Cities" (Urban Geography)
  • Teaching Assistant, Department of Geography (Fall 2016), "Cities" (Urban Geography)
  • Teaching Assistant, Department of Geography (2015–2016), "Cities" (Urban Geography)

Tata Institute of Social Sciences (Mumbai, MH)

  • Small Group Lecturer, Regulatory Governance Group, School of Habitat Studies (2017–2018), "Qualitative Research Methods"

Awards

  • Wenner-Gren Foundation Dissertation Fieldwork Grant (October 2017)
  • Excellence Fellowship, Graduate School–New Brunswick, Rutgers University (2014–2015, 2017–2018, 2018–2019)
  • Traveling Scholar of the Big Ten Alliance, University of Minnesota, Twin Cities (Fall 2018)