Melton Center Welcomes President's Postdoctoral Fellow Manjari Mukherjee

The Melton Center for Jewish Studies is pleased to welcome Dr. Manjari Mukherjee as a President's Postdoctoral Fellow (2026–28). Jointly appointed in the Melton Center for Jewish Studies, the Department of Dance, and the Department of Near Eastern and South Asian Languages and Cultures (NESA), Dr. Mukherjee will contribute to the intellectual life of all three units during her two-year fellowship.

Dr. Mukherjee received her PhD in Theatre and Performance Studies from Tufts University. Her research and teaching center on performance history, Jewish and South Asian diasporic studies, feminist archival practice, and South Asian dance and performance traditions.

Her dissertation, Yahudi Ki Ladki (The Daughter of a Jew): Baghdadi Jews on the Indian Stage and Screen from the 1920s to the 1950s, examines the lives and artistic careers of Baghdadi (Iraqi) Jewish actresses in early Hindi cinema. Drawing on oral histories, family archives, studio photography, and film media from India, Israel, and the United States, the project explores how these performers navigated questions of race, religion, gender, and belonging within colonial and nationalist contexts.

Dr. Mukherjee's scholarship has been supported by the Tufts Center for the Humanities (CHAT), the Tufts Provost's Office, and the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences at Tufts University. Her work has also been recognized by the American Society for Theatre Research with the Po-Hsien Chu International Scholar Award, and she has participated in the Association for Jewish Studies Scholars of Color Fellowship. Her publications appear in Theatre Research International, the Jewish Women's Archive, and the Oxford Handbook of Judaism and Film.

In addition to her scholarly work, Dr. Mukherjee serves as co-convener of the "Performing in/from the Global South" working group at the American Society for Theatre Research, is an affiliate postdoctoral scholar at the Hadassah-Brandeis Institute, and is a trained Kathak dancer.

Members of the Melton Center community are encouraged to engage with Dr. Mukherjee's work during her time at Ohio State. She will teach one course in NESA and one course in Dance during her fellowship and will participate in lectures and programming across campus.

Learn more about Dr. Mukherjee and her research on her Melton Center profile:

https://meltoncenter.osu.edu/people/mukherjee.278