Dr Rohit K  Dasgupta

Dr Rohit K Dasgupta

Associate Professor of Gender and Sexuality, Deputy Head of Department (Research)

Department of Gender Studies

Room No
PAN11.01.G
Office Hours
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Languages
Bengali, English, Hindi
Key Expertise
queer politics, diaspora, media & cultural production, cultural labour

About me

Prior to my current role I was Senior Lecturer at the University of Glasgow where I am currently Honorary Senior Research Fellow. I have previously held teaching and research posts at Loughborough University, University of Southampton, University of Sussex, University of West London and University of the Arts London. I have also held visiting fellowships at the University of Pennsylvania and Fordham University in New York. I have experience in policy making and political strategy for a number of years as elected councillor in the London Borough of Newham in the areas of Equalities, Social Justice and Culture.

Using ethnographic and creative methodologies I have explored the relationship between sexuality, class and belonging in contemporary India which led to my first monograph Digital Queer Cultures in India: Politics, Intimacies & Belonging (Routledge, 2017) and the subsequent books Queering Digital India: Activisms, Identities, Subjectivities (Edinburgh University Press, 2018); Social Media, Sexuality & Sexual Health Advocacy in Kolkata, India (Bloomsbury, 2018) and Friendship as Social Justice Activism (Seagull/University of Chicago Press, 2018), which received an Honourable Mention by Pen America. 

I currently edit two book series- Ethnographic Innovations, South Asian Perspectives (with Niharika Banerjea & Paul Boyce) for Routledge and South Asian Screens (with Sangita Gopal) for Bloomsbury.

Expertise Details

queer politics; diaspora; media & cultural production; cultural labour

Publications

Authored Books

Churnjeet Mahn, Rohit K Dasgupta and DJ Ritu (forthcoming) Desi Queers LGBTQ+ South Asians and Cultural Belonging in Britain. London: Hurst & Co. ISBN: 9781911723646. 280 pp

Rohit K Dasgupta, Amrita Ghosh and Bhakti Shringarpure (forthcoming) India’s Imperial Formations: Cultural perspectives. Madison, NJ: Fairleigh Dickinson University Press. ISBN: 9781683932994. 148 pp.

Kaustav Bakshi and Rohit K Dasgupta (2019). Queer Studies: Texts, Contexts, Praxis. New Delhi: Orient Blackswan. ISBN: 9789352875849. 200 pp.

Rohit K Dasgupta and Sangeeta Datta (2019). 100 Essential Indian Films. Lanham, MD/London: Rowman and Littlefield. ISBN: 9781442277984. 282 pp

Rohit K Dasgupta and Pawan Dhall (2017) Social Media, Sexuality, and Sexual Health Advocacy in Kolkata, India. New Delhi/London: Bloomsbury Publications. ISBN: 9789386432650. 130pp.

Rohit K Dasgupta (2017) Digital Queer Cultures in India: Politics, Intimacies and Belonging. London/New Delhi: Routledge. ISBN: 9781138220348. 208 pp.

Edited Volumes

Rohit K Dasgupta and Clelia Clini (Eds.). (2024). The Cultural Industries of India. London/New York/New Delhi: Routledge. ISBN: 9781032445090. 116 pp.

Somak Biswas, Rohit K Dasgupta and Churnjeet Mahn (Eds). Queer Politics in Times of New Authoritarianisms: Popular Culture in South Asia. London/New York/New Delhi: Routledge. ISBN: 9781032610337. 118 pp.

Niharika Banerjea, Paul Boyce and Rohit K Dasgupta (Eds.) (Routledge, 2022) COVID- 19 Assemblages: Queer and Feminist Ethnographies from South Asia. London/New York/New Delhi: Routledge. ISBN: 9781032201108. 220pp.

Clelia Clini, Rohit K Dasgupta and Yangling Yang (Eds.) (2021) South and East Asian Cinemas Across Borders: Critical Trends in Transnational Cinema. London/New York/New Delhi: Routledge. ISBN: 9780367693732. 102 pp.

Lipi Begum, Rohit K Dasgupta and Reina Lewis (Eds.) (2018). Styling South Asian Youth Cultures: Fashion, Media and Society. London: Bloomsbury. ISBN: 9781784539177. 272 pp.

Rohit K Dasgupta and Debanuj Dasgupta (2018) (Eds). Queering Digital India: Activisms, Identities, Subjectivities. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press. ISBN: 9781474421171. 216pp.

Niharika Banerjea, Debanuj Dasgupta, Rohit K Dasgupta and Jaime Grant (2018) (Eds.). Friendship as Social Justice Activism: Critical Solidarities in a Global Perspective. Kolkata/London: Seagull Books and Chicago: University of Chicago Press. ISBN: 9780857424433. 288pp.

  •  This book received an Honourable Mention by PEN America on their Freedom, Power and Rage List

 Sangeeta Datta, Kaustav Bakshi and Rohit K Dasgupta (Eds.) (2015). Rituparno Ghosh: Cinema, Gender and Art. Abingdon/New Delhi: Routledge. ISBN: 9781138953901. 303 pp.

Rohit K Dasgupta and K Moti Gokulsing. (Eds). (2014). Masculinity and its Challenges in India: Essays on Changing Perceptions. Jefferson, NC: McFarland. ISBN: 9780786472246. 252 pp.

Journal Articles

Rohit K Dasgupta and Clelia Clini (2023) ‘The Cultural Industries of India: An Introduction’. Cultural Trends. 32 (4): 341-347. ISSN: 0954-8963

Rohit K Dasgupta and Kaustav Bakshi (2023) ‘Queer Film Festivals in India: Precarious Cultural work, Community making and Social change’. Cultural Trends. 32 (4): 348-365. ISSN: 0954-8963

Jennie Jordan, Rohit K Dasgupta and Graham Hitchen (2023) ‘Mapping innovation in India’s creative industries: An ecosystem framework’. Cultural Trends. 32 (4): 416-428. ISSN: 0954-8963

Somak Biswas, Rohit K Dasgupta and Churnjeet Mahn (2023) ‘Queer Politics in Times of New Authoritarianisms.’ South Asian Popular Culture. 21 (2): 147-153. ISSN: 1474-6697

Rohit K Dasgupta and Churnjeet Mahn (2023) ‘Between visibility and elsewhere: South Asian queer creative cultures and resistance.’ South Asian Diaspora. 15 (1): 1-16. ISSN: 1943-8192

Rohit K Dasgupta (2023) ‘Mourning a Queer Aunty: Creative Resistance, activism and performing family’ South Asia: Journal of South Asian Studies. 46(1): 234-251. ISSN: 0085-6401

Rohit K Dasgupta (2022) ‘Viral Assemblages and witnessing extraordinary times: Queer patchworks of intimacy, precarity and affect in an Indian city’ Journal of Intercultural Studies. 43 (6): 880-896. ISSN: 0725-6868

Zhao, Yang., Zhang, Tao., Rohit K Dasgupta.  and Xia, Renpin. (2022) ‘Narrowing the age-based digital divide: Developing digital capability through social activities.’ Information Systems Journal. 33 (2): 268-298. ISSN: 1365-2575

Rohit K Dasgupta (2022) ‘‘Grindr is basically interactive porn’: ethnographic observations from Kolkata on queer intimacies and ‘pic exchange’ on Grindr and Planet Romeo’. Porn Studies. 9(3): 339-345. ISSN: 2326-8743

Paul Boyce and Rohit K Dasgupta (2021). Debanuj and Joyraj: Queering the City. Contemporary South Asia. 28 (4): 511-523. ISSN: 0958-4935

Yanling Yang, Clelia Clini and Rohit K Dasgupta (2020) ‘Critical Trends in Transnational Cinema: Inter-Asian productions and exchanges’ Transnational Screens. 11 (3): 177-186. ISSN: 2578-5273

Rohit K Dasgupta (2018). Ambalavaner Sivanandan and Black Politics in Britain. Theory, Culture and Society. 35 (7-8): 331-336. ISSN: 0263-2764

Rohit K Dasgupta and Kaustav Bakshi (2018). Opening Closets and Dividing Audiences: Rituparno Ghosh, the Queer Star of Bengali cinema. South Asian Popular Culture. 16 (1): 101-113. ISSN: 1474-6689

Paul Boyce, Sarah Brown, Sue Cavill, Sonalee Chaukekar, Beatrice Chisenga, Mamata Dash, Rohit K Dasgupta, Noemie De La Brosse, Pawan Dhall, Julie Fisher, Marli Gutierrez-Patterson, Oinam Hemabati, Andrés Hueso, Salma Khan, Santa Khurai, Archana Patkar, Priya Nath, Marielle Snel, and Kopila Thapa (2018). Transgender-Inclusive Sanitation: Insights from South Asia. Waterlines: An International Journal of Water, Sanitation and Waste. 37 (2): 102-117. ISSN: 0262-8104

  • [Cited in World Health organization Report on Sanitation and Health in South Asia as the only research paper on Trans inclusivity]

Debanuj Dasgupta and Rohit K Dasgupta (2018) Being Out of Place: Non Belonging and Queer Racialization in U.K. Emotion, Space and Society. 27 (May): 31-38 ISSN: 1755-4586

Rohit K Dasgupta and Debanuj Dasgupta (2018) Intimate Subjects and Virtual Spaces: Rethinking Sexuality as a Category for Intimate Ethnographies. Sexualities. 21 (5-6): 932-950. ISSN: 1363-4607

Kaustav Bakshi and Rohit K Dasgupta (2017) From Teen Kanya to Arshinagar: Feminist Politics, Bengali High Culture and the Stardom of Aparna Sen. South Asian History and Culture. 8(2): 186-204. ISSN: 1947-2498

Sharif Mowlabocus, Craig Haslop and Rohit K Dasgupta (2016). From Scene to Screen: The Challenges and Opportunities of Commercial Digital Platforms for HIV Community Outreach. Social Media and Society. 2(4): 1-8 ISSN: 2056-3051

Rohit K Dasgupta (2016). Remembering Benedict Anderson and his Influence on South Asian Studies. Theory, Culture and Society. 33 (7-8): 334-338. ISSN: 0263-2764

Rohit K Dasgupta and Tanmayee Banerjee (2016). Exploitation, Victimhood and Gendered Performance in Rituparno Ghosh’s Bariwali. Film Quarterly (University of California Press). 69 (4): 35- 46. ISSN: 0015-1386

Rohit K Dasgupta (2016). Labour Wins London: Sadiq Khan and the Future of British Politics. Economic and Political Weekly. 51 (21): 21-23. ISSN: 2349-8846

Rohit K Dasgupta (2016). ‘The University Shall be the Battleground for Freedom’: Solidarity and Diaspora Organising in London. South Asian History and Culture. 7 (3): 308-311 ISSN: 1947-2498

Rittika Dasgupta and Rohit K Dasgupta (2016) ‘Intersecting Sexuality and Nationalism: Reading Queerness in Funny Boy’. Sahitya: The Journal of the Comparative Literature Association of India. Vol 6-7: 22-34. ISSN: 2249-6416

Sharif Mowlabocus, Justin Harbottle, Ben Tooke, Craig Haslop and Rohit K Dasgupta

(2015) "Because even the placement of a comma might be important": Expertise, Embodiment and Social Capital in Online Sexual Health Promotion. Convergence: The International Journal of Research into New Media Technologies. 21 (3): 375-387. ISSN: 1354-8565

Lipi Begum and Rohit K Dasgupta (2015). South Asian Youth Cultures and the Fashion Landscape. International Journal of Fashion Studies. 2 (1): 133-145. ISSN: 2051-7106

Sangeeta Datta, Kaustav Bakshi and Rohit K Dasgupta (2015). ‘The World of Rituparno Ghosh: Texts, Contexts and Transgressions’. South Asian History and Culture. 6 (2): 223-237. ISSN: 1947-2498

Rohit K Dasgupta (2015). Dissident citizenship: Articulating belonging, dissidence and queerness on cyberspace. South Asian Review. 35 (3): 203-223. ISSN: 0038-2841

Rohit K Dasgupta (2015). The Visual Representation of Queer Bollywood: Mistaken Identities and Misreadings in Dostana. JAWS: Journal of Arts Writing. 1 (1): 91-101. ISSN: 2055-2823. [To be reprinted in Subhashish Bhattacharjee (Ed.). Queering Visual Cultures: Representing Sexual Politics on Stage and Screen. Montreal: Universitas Press, ISBN 9780995029132]

Rohit K Dasgupta. (2013). Launda Dancers: The Dancing Boys of India. Asian Affairs: Journal of the Royal Society for Asian Affairs. 44 (3): 442-448. ISSN: 0306-8374

Rohit K Dasgupta (2012). Digital Media and the Internet for HIV Prevention, Capacity Building and Advocacy Among Gay, Other Men who have Sex with Men (MSM) and Transgenders: Perspectives from Kolkata, India. Digital Culture and Education. 4(1): 88-109. ISSN: 1836-8301

Rohit K Dasgupta (2011). Queer Sexuality: A Cultural Narrative of India’s Historical Archive. Rupkatha Journal of Interdisciplinary Studies in Humanities. 3(4): 651-670. ISSN: 0975-2935

Book Chapters

Rohit K Dasgupta (2022) ‘Queer Patchworks: Liveability, creative work and survival in the time of COVID.’ In N. Banerjea, P. Boyce and R.K. Dasgupta (Eds). COVID Assemblages: Queer and Feminist Ethnographies from South Asia. London/New York/New Delhi: Routledge

Rohit K Dasgupta (2020) ‘Keep it Classy': Grindr, Facebook and Enclaves of queer privilege in India. In E. Polson, L. Clark and R. Gajjala (Eds.). Routledge Companion to Media and Class. New York: Routledge. 90-98. ISBN 9781032084213

Paul Boyce and Rohit K Dasgupta (2019) Alternating Sexualities: Sociology and Queer Critiques in India. In S. Srivastava, Y. Arif and J. Nair (Eds.). Critical Themes in Indian Sociology. New Delhi: Sage. 330-345. ISBN: 9789352807956

Rohit K Dasgupta and Kaustav Bakshi (2018). Rituparno Ghosh, Sartorial Codes and the Queer Bengali Youth. In Lipi Begum, Rohit K Dasgupta and Reina Lewis (Eds.). Styling South Asian Youth Cultures: Fashion, Media and Society. London: I.B Tauris. ISBN: 9781784539177

Rohit K Dasgupta (2018) Online Romeos and Gay-dia: Exploring Queer Spaces in Digital India. Elizabeth Mcneil and James Wermers (Eds.) Mapping Queer Spaces of Praxis and Pedagogy. New York: Palgrave Macmillan. 183-200. ISBN: 9783319646220

Rohit K Dasgupta and Debanuj Dasgupta (2018). Introduction: Queering Digital India. In Rohit K Dasgupta and Debanuj Dasgupta (Eds.). Queering Digital India: Activisms, Identities and Subjectivities. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press. 1-26. ISBN: 9781474421195

Niharika Banerjea, Debanuj Dasgupta, Rohit K Dasgupta, Aniruddha Dutta, Radhika Gajjala, Amit S Rai and Jack Harrison-Quintana (2017) Queering Digital Cultures: A Roundtable Conversation. In Rohit K Dasgupta and Debanuj Dasgupta (Eds.). Queering Digital India: Activisms, Identities and Subjectivities. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press. 29-53. ISBN: 9781474421195

Rohit K Dasgupta (2018). Digital Outreach and Sexual Health Advocacy: SAATHII as a response. In Rohit K Dasgupta and Debanuj Dasgupta (Eds.). Queering Digital India: Activisms, Identities and Subjectivities. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press. 112-131. ISBN: 9781474421195

Niharika Banerjea, Debanuj Dasgupta, Rohit K Dasgupta and Jaime Grant (2018). Why Friendship as Social Activism. In Niharika Banerjea, Debanuj Dasgupta, Rohit K Dasgupta and Jaime Grant (Eds.). Friendship as Social Justice Activism. London/Kolkata/Chicago: Seagull Books/University of Chicago Press. 1-8 ISBN: 9780857424433

Rohit K Dasgupta (2018). Kinship, Friendship and Researching Queer Digital Media in India. In Niharika Banerjea, Debanuj Dasgupta, Rohit K Dasgupta and Jaime Grant (Eds.). Friendship as Social Justice Activism. London/Kolkata/Chicago: Seagull Books/University of Chicago Press. 53-64. ISBN: 9780857424433

Rohit K Dasgupta, Sunil Gupta and Rahul Rao (2018). Concluding Conversation. In Niharika Banerjea, Debanuj Dasgupta, Rohit K Dasgupta and Jaime Grant (Eds.). Friendship as Social Justice Activism. London/Kolkata/Chicago: Seagull Books/University of Chicago Press. 65-78 ISBN: 9780857424433

Niharika Banerjea, Debanuj Dasgupta, Rohit K Dasgupta and Jaime Grant (2018). Concluding Conversation. In Niharika Banerjea, Debanuj Dasgupta, Rohit K Dasgupta and Jaime Grant (Eds.). Friendship as Social Justice Activism. London/Kolkata/Chicago: Seagull Books/University of Chicago Press. 271-281 ISBN: 9780857424433

Paul Boyce and Rohit K Dasgupta (2017) Utopia or Elsewhere: Queer Modernities in Small Town West Bengal. In Tereza Kuldova and Mathew Varghese (Eds.). Urban Utopias: Excess and Expulsion in Neoliberal South Asia. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan. 209-225. ISBN: 9783319476223

Rohit K Dasgupta (2017) Game of Thrones in India: Of Piracy, Queer Intimacy and Viral Memes. In Kavita Mudan Finn (Ed.). Fan Phenomena: Game of Thrones. Bristol: Intellect/Chicago: University of Chicago Press. 152-162. ISBN: 9781783207848

Rohit K Dasgupta (2016). Queering Virtual Intimacies in Contemporary India. In B.Scherer (Ed.). Queering Paradigms VI: Interventions, Ethics and Glocalities. Oxford/New York: Peter Lang. 197-213. ISBN: 9781906165871

Rohit K Dasgupta (2015) Queer Kinship in New Queer India: From Wadia’s Bomgay to R.Raj Rao’s ‘Crocodile Tears’. In Nibedita Mukherjee (Ed). Gendering the Narrative: Indian English Fiction and Gender Discourse. Newcastle: Cambridge Scholars Publishing, 23-33. ISBN: 9781443877961

Rohit K Dasgupta (2014). Parties, Advocacy and Activism: Interrogating Community and Class in Digital Queer India. In Christopher Pullen (Ed.) Queer Youth and Media Cultures. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan. 265-277. ISBN: 9781137383549

Rohit K Dasgupta (2014). Gender and Nation: Postcolonial Conflicts in South Asia. In G.N Ray, Jaydip Sarkar and Anindya Bhattacharya (Eds.) Writing Difference: Nationalism, Literature and Identity. New Delhi: Atlantic Publishers, 63-79. ISBN: 9788126919383

Rohit K Dasgupta and K Moti Gokulsing (2014). Introduction: Perceptions of Masculinity and Challenges to the Indian Male. In Rohit K Dasgupta and K. Moti Gokulsing (Eds.). Masculinity and its Challenges in India: Essays on Changing Perceptions. Jefferson, NC: Mcfarland, 5-25. ISBN: 9780786472246

Rohit K Dasgupta (2011). An Exodus Scripted in Blood: A Gendered Reading of Partition. In Debra Castillo and Kavita Panjabi (Eds.) Cartographies of Affect: Across Borders in South Asia and Americas. New Delhi: Worldview Publications, 276- 285. ISBN: 9788192065106

Research

My current research interests are in cultural and queer politics in South Asia & the diaspora. I have recently completed a British Academy funded project on South Asian Queer diasporic organising & cultural production in Britain and a Carnegie Trust funded project on Queer film festivals and community making in India and about to start a three-year AHRC funded project 'Crafting Sustainability & Equitability' which will explore cultural labour in the Indian handicraft sector with an aim to address inequalities of gender, sexuality, religion, and caste from an intersectional perspective.  

 I am currently working on two co-authored monographs - Desi Queers: LGBTQ+ South Asians & Cultural Belonging in Britain (Hurst & Co) and India's Imperial Formations: Cultural Perspectives (Fairleigh Dickinson University Press).  

 I am also particularly interested in the role of digital culture and media for social change in relation to activism and intimate community making. 

I have received numerous grants & my research has been funded over the years by Wellcome Trust, Royal Society of Edinburgh, British Academy, Carnegie Trust, UKRI India and AHRC. 

 

Teaching