Podcast: Reimagining the classroom - Postcolonial Feminism, Masculinities and Security in University Settings

The project Postcolonial Hierarchies in Peace and Conflict has released the 3rd episode of their podcast series “Confronting Hierarchies – A Podcast on (De)Coloniality, Peace & Conflict” on the Virtual Encyclopedia. For this episode, hosts Viviana García Pinzón and Fabricio Rodríguez invited Swati Parashar and Amya Agarwal. Together they explore what it means to challenge postcolonial hierarchies in the classroom. They also talk about how feminist and postcolonial perspectives help us understand and confront violence, coloniality and colonial masculinity. They imagine the classroom as a space which can serve to promote critical thinking, a space that not only provides the possibility of reimagining the fundamentals of academic disciplines but that also allows for critical students and radical scholarship to emerge and thrive. 

Amya Agarwal is a lecturer of International Relations at the University of Sheffield, UK. Prior to moving to the UK, she was a senior researcher at the Arnold Bergstraesser Institute, Freiburg, Germany (2021–2023) and a postdoctoral fellow in Duisburg, Germany (2019–2021). She received her PhD from the Department of Political Science, University of Delhi, India in 2017. In the past, she has held teaching positions in the University of Delhi, South Asian University, University of Freiburg and University College Freiburg. Amya’s research lies at the intersection of gender, conflict and security. In particular, she studies and writes about masculinities, motherhood, art and aesthetics in times of violence and resistance.  

Swati Parashar is a Professor of Peace and Development at the School of Global Studies, Gothenburg University, Sweden. Her teaching and research have led to academic appointments and fellowships in India, Singapore, the UK, the US, Ireland, Australia, and Sweden. She has also taught at the University of Rwanda in Kigali and at the University of the West Indies in Kingston, Jamaica. Swati is a member of the Swedish Development Research Network and has served on the Scientific Advisory Board of SIDA. Her research interests include feminism, postcolonialism, research methodologies, gender-based violence, famines, and development in South Asia and East Africa. She has published numerous journal special issues, articles, policy papers, and popular media pieces. In 2025, she will be honored as the Distinguished Scholar of the Feminist Theory and Gender Studies Section at the ISA Convention in Chicago.
In November 2023, Swati Parashar held an ALMA-lecture on "Rethinking the coloniality & violence of famines in the Global South" in Freiburg that is available to watch online.

The episode was moderated by Abdul Karim Ibrahim from the institute of African Studies, University of Ghana.
It was prepared and recorded by Miriam Bartelmann and Harry Parfitt, Nora Wolf assisted.

The full episode can be listened to on the website of the Virtual Encyclopedia as well as on Spotify, Apple Podcast and Audible.