Deepa E
Areas of Interest & Expertise
- Gender and Work (Paid and Unpaid)/ Social Reproduction
- Women’s Work in the Informal Sector Work (Urban)
- Women and Work Choices (Caste, Gender, Spatial Context of Work Choices)
- Urban Informal Settlement and Work Networks/Migration
- Sexual Harassment at Workplace/Women, Work and Law
- Feminist Research Methods/Mixed Methods
Biography
She has worked at Loyola Institute of Social Science Training and Research (LISSTAR), Loyola College, Chennai as Research Fellow, and as a Researcher for the Social Science Research Council (SSRC) funded research project on ‘Precarity and Covid’. She completed her doctoral research in Women’s Studies from Madras Institute of Development Studies (MIDS), Chennai, Tamil Nadu.
She has a Master’s degree in Women’s Studies from Bharathidasan University, Tiruchirappalli, Tamil Nadu. She has an undergraduate degree (BSc in Computer Science) from Nirmala College for Women (Bharathiar University), Coimbatore. She pursued Diploma in Education (DEd) from Sacred Heart Teachers’ Training Institute, Bengaluru.
She anchors her research around Women and Work in the context of Gender and Development. Her doctoral thesis critically analyses the work choices of urban poor women working in the informal sector. Mapping various informal sector works among women in an informal settlement named ‘Kallukuttai’ in Chennai, her analysis reveals the influence of various dimensions including caste location, gender roles, lifecycle events, and spatial context in women’s work choices.
She critically examines the development framework through the lens of gender to understand the significance of women’s work (both paid and unpaid). By bringing in various crucial aspects of caste, class, gender, and spatial dimension in the specific context of India, her work tries to understand what ‘Development’ means at these intersections.
She engages with various social groups and movements, and actively conducts gender sensitisation workshops. She is also interested in watching films.
Courses
Women and Work
This course provides a nuanced understanding of the domain of women’s work, agency and empowerment in the context of India
Understanding Livelihoods: Perspectives, Concepts and Theories
How do people make a living?
Publications
Book Chapters
- Deepa, E. (Forthcoming). Gendering public policy: ‘Dually informalized’ work as women’s work ‘choice’.
- Deepa, E., & Aparajay. (2022). Gendered paid care work in advanced capitalist countries: Lessons from UK and Denmark. In S. Rabiyath (Ed.), Women, Work and Development (pp. 25 – 44). Mythri Books.
- Anandhi, S., & Deepa, E. (2022). Protecting livelihood, health, and decency of work- paid domestic workers in the time of Covid-19. In P.G. Babu (Ed.), Economic Policy in Covid-19 Times. Orient Black Swan. (Reprint). https://orientblackswan.com/details?id=9789354422904
- Anandhi, S., & Deepa, E. (2021). Protecting livelihood, health, and decency of work: Paid domestic workers in times of COVID-19. In A. Hans, K. Kannabiran, M. Mohanty, Pushpendra (Eds.) Migration, Workers, and Fundamental Freedoms (pp. 96 – 107). Routledge India. https://www.taylorfrancis.com/chapters/oa-edit/10.4324/9781003145509 – 8/protecting-livelihood-health-decency-work-anandhi-deepa?context=ubx&refId=bb60b7ed-a4d9-4f45-bbdf-768893f2e5af
Journal Articles
- Deepa, E. (Forthcoming). The social world of paid domestic workers: Frameworks to confront sexual harassment at workplace —Experiences from Chennai.
- Deepa, E. (2019). Women as invisible workers: Opportunities versus reality for unban underprivileged women in slums. Journal of the Madras School of Social Work, 13(1&2).
- Deepa, E., & Aparajay. (2019). Educational inequality among social groups in Chennai slum/informal settlement. Journal of Research and Reflection on Education, 17(4). https://www.sxcejournal.com/oct-dec-2019/paper5.pdf
Working Paper
- S. Anandhi and Deepa E. (2020). Protecting livelihood, health, and decency of work: Paid domestic workers in the time of Covid-19. Occasional Policy Paper 7 (Covid-19 Series), June 2020. Madras Institute of Development Studies.
Online Article
- Deepa, E. (2018, October 13). 96’-Another celebration of arranged marriage in the name of love! Newsclick. https://www.newsclick.in/96-another-celebration-arranged-marriage-name-love