Professor Kamal K. Misra, Dean, School of Social Sciences and faculty in the department of Anthropology at the University of Hyderabad has been appointed as Vice-Chancellor of Utkal University of Culture for a period of three years. Founded in 1999 the Utkal University of Culture is a public University in Bhubaneswar, Odisha dedicated for research, teaching and education in the field of culture.
Prof. K K Misra was educated at Utkal University, Bhubaneswar; Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi; and University of Kent at Canterbury, UK. He has been teaching anthropology in various Universities in India and abroad since 1978. He was the recipient of the prestigious Fulbright Scholar-in-Residence Award (2003-04) and the Commonwealth Academic Staff Fellowship (1996- 97) in the UK. He was invited by the University of Bergen, Norway, as a Guest Researcher in 2007.
He has a strong research interest in the areas of Culture, Environment and Development; Culture, Language and Cognition; Anthropological Theory; Cultural Symbols; Anthropology and Museums; and Anthropology of Gender. His regional interests include South Asia and South East Asia. Dr. Misra was the Director of National Museum of Mankind (2010-13), Bhopal, and concurrently the Director of the Anthropological Survey of India, Kolkata, the premier research organization in anthropology, under the Ministry of Culture, Govt. of India. In 2013 he was appointed member of the High Level Committee constituted by the Prime Minister of India to prepare a status report on the Scheduled Tribes of India.
Dr. Kamal K. Misra was the Editor of Humankind, Journal of Anthropological Survey of India, and Associate Editor of South-East Asian Perspectives, Manav, etc. He is on the Editorial Advisory Board of Indian Anthropologist, The Anthropologist, Journal of Ethnomedicine, The Oriental Anthropologist and The Scientific Journal International. He has completed a large number of Research Projects and was a consultant for the UNDP for the project on SelfGovernance in Tribal Areas of India. He has authored/edited/co-edited 21 books and published scores of research papers in journals of repute. His latest publications include Gendering Material Culture: Representations and Practice (Rawat, 2013), Dissent, Discrimination and Dispossession: Tribal Movements in India (Manohar, 2013), Amazing Arunachal Pradesh: Land, People, Culture (Aryan, 2013), Cultural Pluralism: The Indian Scenario (Gyan, 2012), Displacement and Rehabilitation: Solutions for the Future (Gyan, 2012), Anthropological Impact Assessment of Development Initiatives (INCAA, 2012), Tribal Movements in India: Visions of K.S.Singh (Manohar, 2012), Plural Nature of Anthropology (INCAA, 2012),etc. His books, Recent Studies on Indian Women (Rawat, 2007 and 2010 reprint), Text Book of Anthropological Linguistics (Concept, 2000), etc. have been popular as text books in many universities in India and abroad.
Dr. Misra was Visiting Fellow at various Universities and was the UGC nominee in the Research Advisory Committees of different University departments of Anthropology, receiving research support from the UGC.
Dr. Misra’s can be reached on e-mail: kkmssin@gmail.com