Samita Sen

Samita Sen is the Vere Harmsworth Professor of Imperial and Naval History at the University of Cambridge, affiliated with Trinity College and the Faculty of History. She specializes in South Asian colonial and post-colonial studies, with a focus on gender, labor, migration, and legal history. Her career includes previous positions at Calcutta University and Jadavpur University, where she served as Dean of Interdisciplinary Studies and Vice-Chancellor of Diamond Harbour Women’s University.

Her research explores four interconnected themes: the gendered formation of formal labor sectors, feminization of informal work, migration dynamics (especially in Assam's tea industry), and marriage systems in colonial law. She actively contributes to gender justice initiatives and trade union movements, particularly for domestic workers in Kolkata.

Sen's publications analyze historical and contemporary intersections of labor, gender, and power structures. Her 1999 monograph, Women and Labour in Late Colonial India, won the Trevor Reese Prize. Recent work (2021-2024) examines child marriage, reproductive labor, agrarian women workers, and gendered migration patterns.

Awards:

• Trevor Reese Prize in Commonwealth History (1999)

She supervises graduate students researching South Asian social history, gender, and labor movements. No specific grant or lab details are provided in sources.