Publish and Flourish is an annual event that recognizes the accomplishments of our faculty and staff who have published a book within the past year. In connection with the Office of Research, the UW Tacoma Library celebrates the achievements of our campus community. The UW Tacoma Library purchases all faculty and staff publications to make them available to the UW community. This week we are highlighting:
Legends in Gandhian Social Activism: Mira Behn and Sarala Behn: Addressing Environmental Issues by Dissolving Gender and Colonial Barriers
Author: Bidisha Mallik
Department: Division of Politics, Philosophy and Public Affairs in the School of Interdisciplinary Arts & Sciences
“This book is about Madeleine Slade (1892-1982) and Catherine Mary Heilemann (1901-1982), two English associates of Mohandas K. (Mahatma) Gandhi (1869-1948), known in India as Mira Behn and Sarala Behn. The odysseys of these women present a counternarrative to the forces of imperialism, colonialism, capitalism, and globalized development. The book examines their extraordinary journey to India to work with Gandhi and their roles in India’s independence movement, their spiritual strivings, their independent work in the Himalayas, and most importantly, their contribution to the evolution of Gandhian philosophy of socio-economic reconstruction and environmental conservation in the present Indian state of Uttarakhand. The author shows that these women developed ideas and practices that drew from an extensive intellectual terrain that cannot be limited to Gandhi’s work. She delineates directions in which Gandhian thought and experiments in rural development work and visions of a new society evolved through the lives, activism, and written contributions of these two women. Their thought and practice generated a new cultural consciousness on sustainability that had a key influence in environmental debates in India and beyond and were responsible for two of the most important environmental movements of India and the world: the Chipko Movement or the movement against commercial green felling of trees by hugging them, and the protest against the Tehri high dam on the Bhagirathi River. To this day, their teachings and philosophies constitute a useful and significant contribution to the search for and implementation of global ideas of ecological conservation and human development..” — Springer
“A book that breaks paradigms…invit[ing] us to strengthen intercultural, interdisciplinary and interhemispheric collaborations that are essential to solve today’s complex socio-environmental problems. Bidisha Mallik’s book documents the richness of multiple facets of feminine, masculine, and multiple gender perspectives, religious, scientific, and community traditions…based on the story of Gandhi with a biocultural approach supported by the CHIC Center from the south of Chile.” — Ricardo Rozzi, Director of the Cape Horn International Center (CHIC) in Chile, La Prensa Austral
While we’re working to add this to our collection in the UW Libraries, you can still check out Legends in Gandhian Social Activism: Mira Behn and Sarala Behn through one of our worldwide partners. Need help? Ask us how!
Find out more about the author here.
The UW Tacoma Library is very proud of your accomplishments, Bidisha. Congratulations!