Manipal Centre for DWEEPA

Meera has over twenty years of teaching experience and over fifteen years of research experience. She has been deeply involved in humanities and social science education in India and is passionate about the environment and philosophy. Her teaching and research interests are interdisciplinary and transdisciplinary. She is interested in Indian Philosophy and environmental humanities, such as the conceptualization of nature in Indian thought, ecological and environmental ethics, religion and environment, and sustainability issues.  More broadly, her research currently is around lived concepts of Indian philosophy, including place, aesthetics, decoloniality, ecofeminism, and gender issues.  She is also a published fiction author, and artist.

Deepta is a design researcher, educator, architect and planner, working in sensitive wetscapes. Her transdisciplinary research is focused on creating new pathways in practice, education and policy. The approach she works through gathers diverse ontologies, situated practices, movement, and the politics of the colonial eye, seeking new ways of engaging in and reading shifting terrains. She is entangled in art and design, environmental humanities and philosophy, to build new futures. She approaches design in ways that are responsive, inclusive and participative of more-than-human beings, material processes, practices, and phenomena, through immersive primary research. She is also a dancer, photographer and equestrian.

Mohan was born in India, and has lived and worked in Africa, the Caribbean, Australia, the United States, and the south Pacific islands. He was awarded a doctorate from Clark University’s Graduate School of Geography in 2007 for research that examined the effects of environmental and social geographical factors on human development. Mohan has received fellowship/grants or award support from sources including the George Perkins Marsh Institute, US National Science Foundation and the University of Colorado PERISHIP dissertation fellowship, US National Academy of Science fellowship, and a postdoctoral research fellowship from the Global Institute of Sustainability at Arizona State University.

Malvika Tewari is a designer and illustrator who uses visual narrative as a medium and form to tell stories of and through the environment. She is an alumnus of Srishti Institute of Art, Design and Technology, Bangalore. Her design process is inspired by her collaborations with scientists, educators, lawyers, government bodies, and local communities working in wildlife and environment conservation. Her projects are based in fragile landscapes such as Agumbe, North-East India, and Lakshadweep. A sensitive artist at heart, Malvika has also explored theatre and shadow puppetry as a way of storytelling.