Prem Poddar

Professor Prem Poddar

Prem Poddar Honourable Dr
Founding Vice Chancellor of Darjeeling Hills University (Interim Charge)
Incumbent
Assumed office 23 March 2023
Personal details
Born	Kalimpong, West Bengal, India
Education	DPhil, University of Sussex
Alma mater	St. Augustine's School, Scottish Universities Mission Institution, University of North Bengal, Smith College, Massachusetts, University of Sussex, UK

Prem Poddar is an Indian academic who has served as Vice Chancellor of Darjeeling Hills University since March 2023. He has taught in India, Britain, and in two universities in Denmark. He was first an associate professor in Postcolonial Studies in Aarhus University and then Professor in Cultural Encounters in Copenhagen University.

Early life

Born and raised in Kalimpong, Prem Poddar attended a Swiss Jesuit school run by Father Hofstetter and Father Gressot. He pursued his undergraduate studies at Kalimpong College, obtaining a BA (Honours) in Philosophy, Politics and Literature, followed by a Masters in English Studies at the North Bengal University. His postgraduate studies at Smith College in Massachusetts, US, were in American and Interdisciplinary Studies.

Poddar's academic journey continued with a PhD exploring the appropriations of Mikhail Bakhtin's theories in the UK and US submitted in India. Subsequently, he obtained a second PhD on Postcolonial Theory and Nationalism from the University of Sussex, UK, under the supervision of Professor Homi Bhabha.

His career began at St Joseph's College and later at Jhargram Raj College and Darjeeling Government College. Fluent in Hindi, Nepali, Bengali and English, he has also acquired basic proficiency in German, Danish, and has elementary Mandarin (基础熟练程度).

Career

Professor Poddar is a Senior Research Associate in the Centre for World Environmental History at the University of Sussex, and is an Honorary Senior Fellow at the University of Manchester in U.K. Before that, he served as a Professor in Cultural Encounters at Rosklide University in Denmark for a decade. His extensive academic journey includes roles as an Alexander von Humboldt Senior Fellow in Berlin, AHRC Fellow at the University of Southampton and Carlsberg Senior Fellow at the University of Cambridge. He has also contributed globally through visiting professorhips at Fudan University in China, as a Confucius Senior Fellow in Shanghai, and a visiting professor at Heidelberg University.

He is the author of many articles and books. They include Violent Civilities (2002), Postkolonial Contra-modernitet: Immigration, Identitet, Historie (2004), and Invented Futures: Fin de Siècle Fantasies (2016) which have been revised and updated in Chinese and published as Cengjing de weilai 曾经的未来 (Imaged Futures) (2023). He has also edited Translating Nations (2000); A Historical Companion to Postcolonial Thought (Columbia University Press/Edinburgh University Press, 2005/2008), Empire and After: Englishness in Postcolonial Perspective (Berghahn Books, 2007/2010); A Historical Companion to Postcolonial Literatures — Continental Europe and its Empires (Edinburgh University Press, 2008/2011), and Gorkhas Imagined (2009). His forthcoming series of articles and a monograph (China in India: Himalayan Kalimpong) from Cambridge University Press investigate India-China relations through the optic of borders in the eastern Himalayas. His continuing interest in ‘state’ and ‘nation’ as conceptual contexts for analysing cultural representation forms the centre of his forthcoming work on the Politics of the Passport.

Select Publications

• Poddar, P., & Lindkvist Zhang, L. Through the China-India Border: Kalimpong in the Himalayas. Cambridge University Press, 2024, in press.
• Poddar, P., 'Force fields of the Modern: Symbolic Contestation of Power'. In N. Gontier, A. Lock & C. Sinha (eds.) The Oxford Handbook of Human Symbolic Evolution. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
• Poddar, P., Theorizing Water, Shifting Scales: Space of the Himalayan Anthropocene. In J. Suarez & J. Carlos (eds.) Transdisciplinary Thinking from the Global South. London and New York: Routledge.
• Poddar, P. Borders that cross us: The Case of Badrinarayan Pradhan’s Mauli. In Mauli. Introduced by Prem Poddar, Translated by Anmole Prasad. Gangtok: Rachna Books.
• Poddar, P., & Sinha, C. (Re)imagining Empire: Great(er) China and Global Britain. Seminar 743 (special on Editing History).
• Poddar, P., & Lindkvist Zhang, L. (2021) China as Third Pole: Between Theorising and Thought Work. In J. Farley & M. D. Johnson (eds.) Redefining propaganda in modern China. London: Routledge.
• Poddar, P., & Lindkvist Zhang, L. Kalimpong: 'The China Connection'. In M. Viehbeck (Ed.), Transcultural Encounters in the Himalayan Borderlands: Kalimpong as a "Contact Zone" (pp. 149-174). Heidelberg University Publishing, 2017.
• Watt A, Poddar P. Invented Futures: Fin de Siècle Fantasies. Eyecorner Press, 2016. 250 p.
• MacPhee, G. & P. Poddar, eds. Empire and After: Englishness in Postcolonial Perspective. 1st ed. Berghahn Books, 2010. http://www.jstor.org/stable/j.ctt9qdg3p.
• Poddar, P. & A. Prasad. Indra Bahadur Rai in translation. Mukti Prakashan. 2009
• Poddar, P. & D. Johnson, eds. A Historical Companion to Postcolonial Literatures in English. Edinburgh University Press, 2008. http://www.jstor.org/stable/10.3366/j.ctvxcrm6s.
• Poddar, Prem, Rajeev S. Patke, Lars Jensen, John Beverley, Charles Forsdick, Pierre-Philippe Fraiture, Ruth Ben-Ghiat, et al., eds. A Historical Companion to Postcolonial Literatures - Continental Europe and Its Empires. Edinburgh University Press, 2008. http://www.jstor.org/stable/10.3366/j.ctt1g0b6vw.
• Poddar, P. Postkolonial kontra-modernitet: immigration, identitet, historie. Modtryk.2004.
• Poddar P. Violent Civilities: English, India, Culture. Aarhus University Press, 2002. 214 p.

References

• "Prem Poddar to take charge as vice-chancellor of Darjeeling Hills University on Friday". www.telegraphindia.com. Retrieved 24 April 2023.
• Banerjee, Amitava (24 March 2023). "Prem Poddar takes charge as V-C of Darj Hill Univ". www.millenniumpost.in. Retrieved 24 April 2023.
• "Prof. Prem Poddar". ICAS:MP. Retrieved 24 April 2023.
• "West Bengal State Council of Higher Education (WBSCHE), Government of West Bengal". wbsche.wb.gov.in. Retrieved 24 April 2023.
• "Darjeeling Hills University". www.dhuniv.in. Retrieved 24 April 2023.
• "prem poddar | Roskilde University - Academia.edu". ruc-dk.academia.edu. Retrieved 24 April 2023.