Meghana Joshi

PhD

Meghana Joshi.

Meghana Joshi

PhD

Meghana Joshi

PhD

Research Topics

Health Inequalities; Culture and Reproduction; Gender/Masculinities; Childlessness/Infertility; Medical Anthropology; Loneliness and Belonging; Germany/Europe; India

About

Born and raised in different regions in India, I finished my PhD in cultural anthropology at Rutgers in 2017. I have worked, done research, and taught on ethnography, reproduction, masculinities, and medical anthropology in India, Germany, and the United States. I am committed to the comparative method in understanding intersections between macro policies, social and spatial embeddedness, and health disparities, experiences and outcomes. 

My 2024 book Children are Everywhere: Conspicuous Reproduction and Childlessness in reunified Germany is based on the last few years of research on childlessness, parenting cultures and demographic anxieties in Berlin. Going forward, I am exploring new research on loneliness, belonging and care.

Besides these interests, odd and awkward encounters that reveal contextual and interpersonal differences in how we exist in the world fascinate me! I also love listening to and learning new languages. 

Education

  • PhD, Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey
  • MA, Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey
  • MA & MPhil, Tata Institute of Social Sciences
  • BA, Pune University

Courses Offered

Undergraduate Courses

  • APY 106 | Introduction to Cultural Anthropology
  • APY 275 | Culture, Health and Illness
  • APY 312 | Culture and Reproduction
  • APY 321 | Topics: Anthropology and Demography
  • APY 401 | Theory in Anthropology
  • APY 410 | Topic - Men and Masculinities

Graduate Courses

  • APY 508 | Qualitative Research Methods
  • APY 554 | Topics: Anthropology of the Body
  • APY 578 | Ethnomedicine
  • APY 594 | Topics: Anthropology of Loneliness 
  • APY 623 | Memory and Commemoration
  • APY 655 | Graduate Survey of Social Anthropology

Selected Publications

  • Joshi, M (2024) Children are Everywhere: Conspicuous Reproduction and Childlessness in reunified Germany Berghahn: New York, Oxford
  • 2021. “I do not want to be a weekend Papa”: The demographic ‘crisis,’ active fatherhood, and  emergent caring masculinities in Berlin, Journal of Family Issues Vol 42(5): 883-907
  • 2020 Becoming fathers in a ‘child-friendlier’ Germany: male infertility, reproductive visibility, and the labor of paternity, NORMA: International Journal of Masculinity Studies, DOI: 10.1080/18902138.2020.1713582 
  • 2017 Berlin’s Hypervisible Children: “German Child-Unfriendliness” amidst Demographic Anxieties, in Reimagining the Child: Proceedings of the 2016 Rutgers-Camden Graduate Student Conference in Childhood Studies. Edited by J Burton and K Fredricks
  • 2008 “‘Correcting’ the Reproductive ‘Impairment’: Infertility Treatment Seeking Experiences of Low Income Group Women in Mumbai Slums,” Sociological Bulletin, 57 (2), May-August 2008, pp. 155-172