akmishra.hss | Indian Institute of Technology (BHU)

Dr. Ajit Kumar Mishra

Associate Professor

Department of Humanistic Studies, IIT (BHU)

Phone No(s): (91) 542 7165071

Email: akmishra.hss@iitbhu.ac.in

Area of Interest: Medical & Health Humanities, Life Writing, Narrative Studies, Visual Culture

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About Me

My academic journey has been shaped by an enduring interest in the ways narratives form our understanding of ourselves and the world around us. As an academic engaged in teaching, research, and outreach, I locate myself at the intersection of literature and health, constantly exploring how narratives inform and transform human experience.

My current research interests lie in the interdisciplinary fields of medical and health humanities, film and cultural studies, and life writing. This has led me to explore narrative practices around illness, health, and recovery, the disruptive power of contemporary Indian cinema, and the ethics of storytelling in contexts of suffering, care, and healing.

I offer a range of courses spanning communication, life skills, mental health, leadership with an aim to create an inclusive and dialogic space where learners can connect academic learning with lived experience. Beyond the classroom, I have been actively involved in outreach and curriculum development, regularly conducting short-term courses and delivering talks on leadership, life skills, research writing, and communication for diverse learner groups.

I am committed to bridging academic research and public engagement, and welcome opportunities to collaborate with individuals and institutions working in the areas of medical and health humanities. I am especially keen on mentoring prospective PhD scholars with a background in Humanities or allied disciplines, who would be interested in joining my research groups.

Current Research Focus:

Medical & Health Humanities | Film & Cultural Studies

1. Education:

M A in English (Specialization: American Literature)
Berhampur University, Berhampur, Odisha

PhD in English (Research Area: African American Fiction)
Banaras Hindu University, Varanasi, Uttar Pradesh

PGDTE (Specialization: Linguistics & Phonetics, Stylistics, Postcolonial Literature)
English & Foreign Languages University, Hyderabad, Telangana

2. Employment:

Associate Professor, Department of Humanistic Studies
Indian Institute of Technology (BHU) Varanasi
2018- Present

Associate Professor
Department of English Studies & Research
D.A-V PG College, CSJM University, Kanpur, Uttar Pradesh
2015-2018

Assistant Professor (Senior Scale)
Department of English Studies & Research
D.A-V PG College, CSJM University, Kanpur, Uttar Pradesh
2012-2015

Assistant Professor
Department of English Studies & Research
D.A-V PG College, CSJM University, Kanpur, Uttar Pradesh
2007-2012

Lecturer
Department of English Studies & Research
D.A-V PG College, CSJM University, Kanpur, Uttar Pradesh
2003-2007

3. Administrative Experience

External

1. Member, Governing Body, Shyam Lal College, University of Delhi (Since June 2024)
2. Member, Board of studies for Agricultural Journalism, Institute of Agriculture, Banaras Hindu University (2022-2024)
3. Member, Board of Studies, Department of English, RSR Engineering College, JNTU (Since 2023)

Institutional:

1. Coordinator, ASEAN-DIA (Since December 2021)
2. Coordinator, Alumni Visiting Faculty Program (Since June 2019)
3. Faculty Incharge, International Student Affairs (Since September 2020)
4. Co-Coordinator, Centre for Faculty Development & Educational Technology (CFDET, formerly TLC)
5. Member, International Relations Committee (Since September 2024)
6. Member, Institute Furniture Purchase Committee (FY 2024-25)
7. Member, PG Ordinance Review Committee (April 2023)
8. Member, Committee for Modification of Ordinances & Syllabus for Preparatory Course
9. Member, Committee for Review of PG Course Curriculum Structure (2025)
10. Member, Committee for Induction Program (For Odd Semester 2025-26)
11.Member, Non-Faculty Grievance Committee (2022-23)
12.Member, Committee fro Promotion of Group-A Staff (2022)
13.member, Institute Library Committee (2019-21)
14.Member, Organizing Committee for Convocation & Sub-Committee for Director's Address & Institute Brochure
15.Faculty Editor, IIT BHU Connect (2019)
16.Member, Institute Newsletter Purchase Committee (2019)

Departmental:

1. Head of the Department (June 2021-June 2024)
2. Chair, PhD Admission Committee (5 terms)
3. Chair, DFAC (July 2021- June 2024)
4. Member, DFAC (2020-21, 2024-)
5. Convener, Department Alumni Relations Cell
6. Convener, Department Space Committee
7. Member, DPGC
8. Member, Finance/Budget Committee

1. Courses Designed & Offered:

PG Level

1. Research Communication
2. Narratives & Worldmaking
3. Film Theory & Criticism

UG Level

1. Understanding Visual Culture
2. Literature & Coping Skills
3. Communication for Engineers
4. Leadership through Literature
5. Basic English (Only offered)
6. Preparatory English

2. Courses Coordinated:

UG Level

1. Data & Digital Economy
2. Media Environment
3. Quality management & Business Strategies
4. Finance & Economics for Engineers

3. Extension Activities:

1. Subject Expert (English Language): Syllabus Committee for AICTE Induction Program 2020
(Designed and developed English Language module)
2. Expert Reviewer: New Course Structure in Humanities & Management, Centre of Management & Humanities, Punjab
Engineering College (Deemed to be University)
3. Expert Reviewer: Course on Speculative Fiction, School of Humanities, Social Sciences and Management, IIT
Bhubaneswar
4. Peer Reviewer: Springer, Wiley, Taylor & Francis

1. Research Groups:

Medical & Health Humanities Research Group

The research group in Medical and Health Humanities is exploring the intersections of medicine, health, and the human
  experience through interdisciplinary approaches, bringing together insights from Literature, Film, and Cultural Studies. We
  are examining how narratives, representations, and social contexts shape understandings of health, illness, and care to
  foster a meaningful engagement of the arts and sciences to enrich medical education, healthcare practices, and public
  understanding of health.

Scholars:

Mahua Bhattacharyya*
Manvi Pandey
Ryno Settrisman
Ankita Nandi
Pallavi Priya
Nimisha Tiwari
Anindita Paul

*PhD Awarded

Film and Cultural Studies Research Group

The research group in Film & Cultural Studies is exploring how cinema as a powerful medium of cultural, aesthetic, and
  political discourse, reflects, constructs, and challenges social realities across diverse historical and geographical
  contexts.. We engage with a wide range of film traditions and cultural practices, with particular attention to questions of
  representation, reception, and transformation.

Scholars:

Veeru Rajbhar*
Pratyusha Pramanik*
Sooraj SS* **
Nikita Mittal
Samridhi Thakur

*PhD Awarded
** Co-Supervision

2. PhD Thesis Supervision:

Completed:

Sooraj SS* | Tensions in Heteropatriarchal Consensus: Men and Masculinities in Contemporary Kerala | 2024

Mahua Bhattacharyya | Shedding the Burden, Moving Forward: A Comparative Study of Select Contemporary Indian and
American Breast Cancer Narratives | 2024

Pratyusha Pramanik | From Maternal Paradox to Empowered Mothering: Reconfiguration of Motherhood in Contemporary
Hindi Cinema | 2023

Veeru Rajbhar | Kabir Seen through the Eyes of the People: Reception, Adaptation and Transcreation | 2022

Christina Charan | The Problematic of Subjectivity: Looking Beyond Michael Foucault | 2022

*(Co-Supervisor)

Ongoing:

Nikita Mittal | Towards Disruptive Inclusion: New Men & Masculinities in Contemporary Bollywood

Manvi Pandey | Constructing Autobiographical Selves: A Study of Female Performers in India

Ryno Settrisman | Area: Mental Illness Recovery Narratives

Samridhi Thakur | Area: Desiring Subjects & Female Sexual Desire

Ankita Nandi | Area: Organ Transplant Experiences

Pallavi Priya | Area: Mental Illness & Stigma

Nimisha Tiwari | Area; Patient Consent & Autonomy

Anindita Paul | Area: Abortion Narratives

3. Internship Supervision:

NPTEL Internship:

Kashish Gera (November 15, 2024 - December 12, 2024)
Area: literature & mental Health

Anurag Juyal (June 1, 2023 - July 15, 2023)
Area: Mental Health: Recognising & Knowing

Harsh Mishra (June 1, 2023 - July 15, 2023)
Area: Mental Health: Self-Awareness

Aman Bhushan (Dec 20, 2021 - Jan 31, 2022)
Area: Poetry Therapy

Damini Charate (Dec 14, 2021 - Jan 10, 2022)
Area: Fiction and Healing

Nikita Mittal, Ajit K Mishra. Changing/Unchanging Realities: Mapping Experiences of Same‐Sex Love vis‐à‐vis Section 377 Indian Penal Code Through Hostel Room 131 (2010) and Badhaai Do (2022). Sexuality, Gender & Policy (Wiley), 2025. SCOPUS

Pratyusha Pramanik, Ajit K Mishra. The ‘ART’ of (Re)Production: Understanding Motherhood Beyond Biological Destiny. Journal of International Women's Studies (U of Bridgewater), 2025. SCOPUS

Mahua Bhattacharyya, Ajit K Mishra. Mommy with a Different Body': Rethinking Motherhood through American Breast Cancer Memoirs. Journal of International Women's Studies (U of Bridgewater), 2025. SCOPUS

Mahua Bhattacharyya, Ajit K Mishra. Narratives of Reconstruction: Looking Beyond Biographical Disruption through Three Indian Breast Cancer Memoirs. Health: An Interdisciplinary Journal for the Social Study of Health, Illness and Medicine (Sage), 2025. WoS & SCOPUS

Mahua Bhattacharyya, Ajit K Mishra. Rethinking Gender and Epistemic Injustice: A Comparative Study of Male and Female Breast Cancer Memoirs. Humanities (MDPI), 2025. WoS & SCOPUS

Ryno Settrisman, Ajit K Mishra. Journeys to functionality: A dimensional analysis of personal narratives of recovery from depression. Journal of Evaluation in Clinical Practice (Wiley). 2024. WoS & SCOPUS

Pratyusha Pramanik, Ajit K Mishra. From the womb to the world: a study of pregnancy narratives by celebrity moms in India. Medical Humanities (BMJ) 2024. WoS & SCOPUS

Nikita Mittal, Ajit K Mishra. Masking Sexuality: Studying Gay Men’s Closeting Strategies through Contemporary Bollywood. Quarterly Review of Film and Video (T&F), 2024. SCOPUS

Pratyusha Pramanik, Ajit K Mishra. Changing Stories, Changing Lives: Reconfiguration of Mothering Practices in Contemporary Bollywood. Quarterly Review of Film and Video (T&F), 2023. SCOPUS

Sooraj SS, Kavya Krishna KR, Ajit K Mishra. The Male Householder and the Hypermasculine Deity: Malayalam-Language Films Based on the Sabarimala Temple in Kerala. Visual Anthropology (T&F), 2023. WoS & SCOPUS

Pratyusha Pramanik, Ajit K Mishra. Trajectories of Care: Representations of Empowered Mothering in Contemporary Bollywood. SARE: Southeast Asian Review of English (U of Malaya), 2023. WoS & SCOPUS

Mahua Bhattacharyya, Ajit K Mishra. To Weep or to Laugh: Studying Humour and Breast Talk through Indian Breast Cancer Narratives. Literary Voice, 2023. WoS

Pratyusha Pramanik, Ajit K Mishra. Bad Mothers, Bad Daughters: A Study of Maternal Ambivalence in Avni Doshi's Girl in White Cotton and Renuka Shahane's Tribhanga. Literary Voice, 2023. WoS

Pratyusha Pramanik, Ajit K Mishra. Matricentric Leadership: Vidya Balan and the Emergence of Alternative Leadership Style in Popular Hindi Cinema. Media Watch (Sage), 2023.

Sooraj SS, Kavya Krishna KR, Ajit K Mishra. Undoing the Masculine Hero: Fahadh Faasil's Stardom in Contemporary Malayalam Cinema. Intersections: Gender and Sexuality in Asia and the Pacific (Australian National U), 2023. WoS & SCOPUS

Mahua Bhattacharyya, Ajit K Mishra. Tabooing 'Ageing in Women': Paradoxes of Feminist Perspectives. Literary Voice, 2022. WoS

Ajit K Mishra. Rethinking the India-Bharat Divide vis-à-vis COVID-19: Implications for a Sociolinguistics of Health Communication. Rupkatha Journal on Interdisciplinary Studies in Humanities, 2020. WoS

Ajit K Mishra. Navigating Precarity:(Re)mediation, Agency, and Human Security in Airlift. Literary Endeavour, 2019.

Ajit K Mishra. The Insurmountable Malaise: Richard Wright's The Long Dream and the "Will to Being." Language in India, 2019.

Ajit K Mishra. Negotiating Politics of Alterity: Narendra Jadhav's Outcaste: A Memoir and (Re) visionist Discourse. Labyrinth, 2013.

Ajit K Mishra. Beyond Silence: Shashi Deshpande's That Long Silence and Alternative Intercourse. IUP Journal of English Studies, 2013. SCOPUS

Ajit K Mishra. Fetishizing Marginality: Contemporary Indian Academia and the Rise of Subaltern. Labyrinth, 2012.

Ajit K Mishra. Resisting ‘Alterity’: Ambedkar and the Ethics of Recognition. Journal of Exclusion Studies, 2011.

Sponsored Research Projects:

Sustainable Living through Traditional Knowledge: Recontextualizing Subhāṣitas for a Universal Life Design Perspective |
ICSSR | 5,00,000 | PI | Ongoing

Hindu Worldview vis-a-vis UNDP-SDGs in the context of Fourth Industrial Revolution: a study of VUCA-coping cultural mechanisms of Hindus in Varanasi and the Netherlands | SPARC | 74,04,000 | Co-PI (India) | Ongoing

MOOC Projects (Sponsored):

CoL MOOC Project on "Essential Life Skills" | CEMCA, Commonwealth of Learning, Canada | 6,14,000 | Project Coordinator | Completed

NPTEL MOOC Project on "Literature & Coping Skills" | NPTEL, IIT Madras (A GoI initiative) | 7,00,000 | Project Coordinator | Completed

Consultancy Projects:

A. Digital Content Development:

MOOCs

20 hrs (8 week) MOOC on "Literature & Coping Skills"
NPTEL-SWAYAM (MoE, Govt. of India)
Being offered every year since 2021
Course Instructor: Ajit K Mishra

15 hrs (6 week) MOOC on " Essential Life Skills"
Jointly developed by IIT (BHU) Varanasi and CEMCA- Commonwealth of Learning (Canada)
Offered in all Commonwealth countries in 2022-23
Course Instructor: Ajit K Mishra

20 hrs MOOC on " Essential English Language Skills"
Swayamprabha (Govt. of India)
Course Instructor: Ajit K Mishra

B. Collaborations:

Collaboration with the Commonwealth Educational Media Centre for Asia (CEMCA), Commonwealth of Learning (CoL),
Canada to develop a 15-hour MOOC on Essential Life Skills and offer the course to participants for all Commonwealth
nations.

C. Programs Organized (Select):

D. Invited Talks (Select):

2024
- Do we need another experience machine: Doing literature in the era of disruption | 2024-02-28 | SMVDU, Katra, J&K
- Understanding mental health through literature: A survival-value perspective | 2024-02-21 | MMV, Banaras Hindu
University
- Methodology, Pedagogy and Core Competencies in Literary Studies | 2024-02-20 |IUCTE, Banaras Hindu University
- Skill-Based Education in India | 2024-02-28 | IIT Patna
- English for research paper writing | 2024-02-02 | NIT Hamirpur

2023
- Effective Communication for Public Health | 2023-03-01 | AIIMS, New Delhi

2022
- Importance of language in academic writing | 2022-09-12 | Faculty of Ayurveda, BHU
- Building Blocks of Writing | 2022-10-13 | MMV, Banaras Hindu University
- Mechanics of Writing | 2022-12-16 | Department of German Studies, Banaras Hindu University
- Life Skills for Academics | 2022-10-15 | NIT Allahabad
- Listening for Workplace Success | 2022-04-23 | Pondicherry University