Teach-In Series | Madihah Akhter | The Begum of Bhopal
CSA's Quarterly Teach-In Series focusing on modern day issues facing South Asia
Madihah's doctoral dissertation explores modern sovereignty through the political mechanics in princely Bhopal under the direction of its ruler, Sultan Jahan Begum (r. 1901-1926). Bhopal, a state in central India, was ruled by a series of four female rulers in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. She is interested in exploring the representative, administrative, territorial and legal aspects of sovereignty in Bhopal using gender as her main method of historical and conceptual analysis. In this project, she interrogate how gender, Islam and South Asian history contribute to the making of global sovereignty in the twentieth century.
Bio: Madihah is a fourth year PhD candidate focusing on modern South Asian history. She received a Master’s in history from Tufts University and a Bachelor’s in history from UCLA. At Stanford, she is also completing a PhD minor in the Feminist, Gender and Sexuality Studies program. Her research interests include Islam in South Asia, gender, intellectual history, queer history and global history.