معرفی
Meena Dhanda is Professor of Philosophy and Cultural Politics at the University of Wolverhampton, Faculty of Arts, Business and Social Sciences. She has been a leading academic at the institution since 1992, progressing from Lecturer to Professor, and is internationally recognized for her work in diaspora Dalit studies and casteism as racism. Her research is empirically informed and transdisciplinary, connecting philosophy with social justice, gender, race, and caste.
- DPhil, Philosophy, University of Oxford
- MA, Philosophy, Panjab University, Chandigarh
- BA (Hons), Economics and Mathematics, Panjab University, Chandigarh
Her research interests center on social and political philosophy, ethics, cultural politics, feminist philosophy, and anti-racist/anti-caste theory. She explores identity through the lenses of caste, class, gender, and race, drawing on thinkers like Ambedkar, Beauvoir, Fanon, and Sartre. Her work bridges academic philosophy with real-world justice issues.
The most recent publications reflect a strong trend in examining caste discrimination in Britain, the philosophical foundations of anti-casteism, and the intersection of caste with gender and migration. Her articles frequently appear in journals such as Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society, Economic and Political Weekly, and Radical Philosophy, demonstrating a consistent engagement with both theoretical and empirical dimensions of oppression and resistance.
Scientific awards and recognitions include:
- Commonwealth Scholarship
- Rhodes Junior Research Fellowship
- Leverhulme Research Fellow
- ERAS Fellowship
- Senior Fellow of the Higher Education Academy
She has supervised numerous PhD students across diverse topics including African feminism, disability studies, animated autobiography, and philosophical analyses of Rousseau and Kant. Her grant leadership includes projects funded by the Equality and Human Rights Commission, The Leverhulme Trust, and the European Commission, such as 'Caste in Britain' and 'Freedom from Caste: the political thought of Periyar'. She is also co-editing the Routledge Handbook of Punjab Studies and writing Caste: A Very Short Introduction for Oxford University Press.
Meena Dhanda is engaged in public philosophy through media appearances (BBC, Lotus TV, Philosophy Now Radio) and advisory roles with organizations like Amnesty International and King Edward's School on decolonizing curricula. She is a member of the British Philosophical Association’s Diversity and Inclusion Working Group and serves on editorial boards including Religions and Racism By Context.
