Summer programme to educate young girls on women’s issues
LUCKNOW: Providing a platform to high school girls to develop an “interdisciplinary outlook” on issues concerning women, Panthalassa, a non-profit organisation, will organise a summer programme ‘Women Empower Humanities’ (WEH-2018) from July 1 to 15 in Lucknow.
The two-week seminar will delve deep into humanities. Scholars from across the globe will be invited to educate participants on how gender and sex play out in classical studies, art, philosophy, music, language, literature and politics. Ethics of gender identity and equality will also be among the subjects covered.
The expense of the programme, being organised in collaboration with Denison University, USA, will include class material, brunch and invitations to orientation and final day celebrations, said Mrinalini Mitra, founder and CEO, Panthalassa .
“The venue is GD Goenka Public School. All students with good participation grades will receive certificates acknowledging their commitment to the programme,” she said.
Students will also be expected to maintain a journal and create a final capstone project. “The project will be an essay based on the lectures presented at the seminar. Students should be able to demonstrate critical reading, writing and research skills,” said Mitra.
She said that to help the students create these capstone projects, the seminar will include writing workshops, where participants will be taught research methods used in global undergraduate programmes. “The performance of students in capstone projects will determine their competitiveness for scholarships to pursue SAT, ACT, IELTS, and TOEFL exams,” she said.
Students of all academic backgrounds can apply for the summer programme. “Preference will be given to students completing Classes 11 and 12. However, students from Class 9 onwards are eligible to apply,” said Mitra. All candidates will be required to write an application essay. They will also have to download and submit the parental approval form available on the website reachpanthalassa.com , she added.
WEH will also award scholarships, in partnership with the Manya Group - The Princeton Review, to students who demonstrate the “grit and ambition” to pursue globally renowned research-driven undergraduate programmes. The subject for this course will be ‘gender, work and education in a globalising world’, said Mitra.
Among the experts who will educate the participants are Mariana Saavedra-Espinosa, assistant professor of global commerce at Denison University, and Hosna Sheikholeslami, assistant professor in the department of anthropology and sociology, Denison University.
Saavedra-Espinosa holds a bachelor’s degree in philosophy from Macalester College at St Paul, Minnesota, and a master’s and PhD in anthropology from Cornell University.
Prof Sheikholeslami has completed her bachelor’s in comparative literature from UC Berkeley and PhD from Yale University.
Her research interests include political anthropology, anthropology of intellectuals and translation.
Mitra said, “During the programme, we will explore the shifting place of women in the contemporary world. We will also explore how economic transformation has not only changed the way we work, but also how we live our lives. To look at the impact of increasing global interconnections, we will study examples from industrialised countries, developing countries and global cities such as New York and Dubai.”