Author: nandini_pandya

At the end of August, I wrote a post about the topics that I expected to cover in Chapter 12. At the time I estimated that it would take me

It is safe to say that the most unlikely personality in Anandi’s story is Queen Victoria, Empress of India. A few weeks after the commencement, the dean of the College sent a letter

“Ice should be given internally. ” I was startled when I read this prescription in Anandi’s thesis, in the section describing treatments for a fragile pregnancy. Ice? in India?  During the 1870s?

The New York Times Magazine has a superb article titled “Could Ancient Remedies Hold the Answer to the Looming Antibiotics Crisis?” Through the story of a researcher at Emory University,

How can there be two firsts in the same category? Read on! I came across a book called A Warrior of the People: How Susan La Flesche Overcame Racial and

Anandi’s thesis was on the topic of obstetrics among Hindus. It is a fifty-page document written in her beautiful cursive script.  It is as good a primary source as it is possible

My process of writing a chapter has evolved considerably since I first started this project over five years ago. The first few chapters were challenging as I was struggling (in

I completed the first draft of Chapter 11 a few days ago. Here are the highlights: Gopal in San Francisco and Salt Lake City. Contradictory views about women’s freedoms, inflammatory speeches about

Yesterday’s New York Times has an op-ed by Roger Cohen titled Olympians in Hijab and Bikini. It features the below photograph of  Egyptian Doaa Elghobashy and German Kira Walkenhorst: As I read the op-ed

A slight change of focus. I felt inspired by the story of Khizr Khan (and his wife Ghazala) and the speech he gave at the Democratic National Convention. And, was