Ayushi Dhawan
Areas of Interest & Expertise
- International Trade in Hazardous Waste
- History of Greenpeace’s Environmental Activism in India
- Scrap Recycling
- History of Medicine in Pre-Modern India
- Global History
- Modern South Asia
Biography
Ayushi Dhawan is an Environmental Historian with particular interests in the movement of hazardous waste trade from the Global North to the Global South, scrap recycling, and environmental activism in India.
She has completed her BA (Hons) and MA in History from the University of Delhi, followed by a Research Masters from the University of Leiden, the Netherlands and PhD in Environmental Humanities from Ludwig Maximilian University, Munich, Germany.
Before joining Azim Premji University, she was pursuing her PhD and was part of a research group Hazardous Travels. Ghost Acres and the Global Waste Economy funded by the German Research Foundation. Her doctoral research is an innovative re-telling of the Alang shipbreaking yards in Gujarat, India and by adopting a perspective of the Global South it provides a more nuanced and complex account of the transnational project of shipbreaking that goes beyond reducing workers at the yards to passive victims of environmental injustice.
She works at the intersection of Environmental History and Environmental Humanities and is currently working on her first monograph. She is also currently a part of an interdisciplinary German research network called Waste in Motion. This network funded by the German Research Foundation investigates the movements and mobility of waste in global settings.
As an Environmental History Scholar committed to addressing present-day issues, she believes in disseminating her research through public scholarship to generate a broader societal impact beyond the confines of academic circles.
She has contributed academic blogs and articles to various online platforms, including Seeing the Woods, Environmental History Now, Pipe Wrench Magazine, Vigia Magazine, and the Aerocene.
For her interdisciplinary research, she has received research funding from the German Research Foundation, LExS, Crayenborgh, and Encompass scholarship. Apart from research and teaching, she enjoys baking, volunteering at animal shelters, and playing board games.
Publications
Chapters in Edited Books
- Dhawan, A. (2023). Greenpeace, Alang, and the Binary Labels that Defined the Existence of the Indian Shipbreaking Industry. In G. K. Bhambra, L. Mayblin, K. Medien, M. Viveros-Vigoya (Eds.), The SAGE Handbook of Global Sociology (pp. 557 – 569). SAGE. https://us.sagepub.com/en-us/nam/the-sage-handbook-of-global-sociology/book277822
- Dhawan, A. (2021). The Persistence of SS France: Her Unmaking at the Alang Shipbreaking Yard in India. In S. Krebs & H. Weber (Eds.), The Persistence of Technology: History of Repair, Reuse and Disposal (pp. 263 – 285). Transcript Verlag. https://doi.org/10.1515/9783839447413 – 013
- Dhawan, A. (2020). Obituary: A Farewell to the Oriental Nicety (1986 – 2012). Long Gone but not Forgotten! In T. Saraceno, A. Lamperti & R. Mackie (Eds.), Movements for the Air Munich Landing (pp. 125– 128). Ruksaldruck. https://aerocene.org/aerocene-festival-2019-report-book-munich/
Journal Articles
- Dhawan, A. and Simone M. Müller. (Forthcoming). Hazardous Hope: Re-positioning troubled research(ers) in times of a troubled planet. Journal of Environmental Humanities.
- Dhawan, A. (2023). The classic case of “waste dumping” or a latent opportunity: Alang – Sosiya and the making of the world’s largest shipbreaking yards. Sudasien – Chronik/South Asia Chronicle (13): 163 – 194. A Classic Case of “Waste Dumping” or a Latent Opportunity: Alang-Sosiya and the Making of the World’s Largest Shipbreaking Yards (hu-berlin.de)
Virtual Exhibition
- Feichtner, M., Stuck, J., Dhawan, A., Lennartz, C., & Müller, S.M. (2021). Toxic relationships: Uncovering the worlds of hazardous waste. Environment & Society Portal, Virtual Exhibitions, no. 1, Rachel Carson Center for Environment and Society. doi.org/10.5282/rcc/9273
Magazine Articles
- Dhawan, A. (2021, August/September). The Ghost Acres of Gujarat. Pipe Wrench Magazine. https://pipewrenchmag.com/shipbreaking/.
- Dhawan, A. (2022). Obsolete Schiffe, funktionierende Geräte: Die Abwrackwerfte und Second-Hand-Märkte für elektronische Geräte in Alang. Vigia Magazine for Technology and Society. (Translated from English to German by Jonas Wenger). https://vigia.tech/obsolete-schiffe-funktionierende-geraete/
Blog Posts
- Feichtner, M., Stuck, J., & Dhawan, A. (2019, September 3). Green talks: Looking behind the scenes of environmental journalism. Seeing the Woods. A Blog by the Rachel Carson Center. https://seeingthewoods.org/2019/09/03/green-talks-looking-behind-the-scenes-of-environmental-journalism/
- Dhawan, A. (2018, November 9). Hope in the murky waters of the international shipping industry. Seeing the Woods. A Blog by the Rachel Carson Center. https://www.hazardoustravels.carsoncenter.uni-muenchen.de/blog-_trash-talks_/hazardous_hope/murky_waters/index.html
- Müller, S. M., Dhawan, A., Feichtner, M., & Stuck, J. (2018, October 9). Hazardous hope – the debate. Seeing the Woods. A Blog by the Rachel Carson Center. https://www.hazardoustravels.carsoncenter.uni-muenchen.de/blog-_trash-talks_/hazardous_hope/the_debate/index.html
- Dhawan, A. (2017, November 24). Mumbai deluge 2017: Nowadays rain gods have a new tool– plastic bags! Seeing the Woods. A Blog by the Rachel Carson Center. https://www.hazardoustravels.carsoncenter.uni-muenchen.de/blog-_trash-talks_/everyday_encounters/mumbai/index.html#:~:text=Content‑,Mumbai%20Deluge%202017%3A%20Nowadays%20Rain%20Gods,a%20New%20Tool%E2%80%94Plastic%20Bags!&text=We%20often%20do%20not%20think,practices%20be%20to%20our%20environment%3F
For more information, please visit her academia.edu page at https://lmu-munich.academia.edu/AyushiDhawan