Jaya Wegner
About
South Asia Center FLAS Fellow: Summer 2019
FLAS gave me the opportunity to partake in a third year of Hindi in Delhi, allowing me to really solidify my speaking skills. Immersing myself in the language, really pushed me out of my comfort zone and helped me achieve a level of Hindi that would have been far more difficult studying in the United States. Thanks to FLAS and my Delhi program, I am able to communicate so much better with a lot of my Hindi speaking relatives. Being in India this summer also inspired my research for my senior thesis. I am comparing the MeToo movement in India to the Indian women’s rights movement, Gulabi Gang, to see how feminists campaigns function outside the country they were developed in and how local conditions effect the transition of these movements. My knowledge of Hindi as well as a wider understanding of the countries culture and politics that I received with my time in India has greatly helped me in my research. In the future, I hope to actually go back to India and conduct research while I am there. FLAS helped me achieve not only a skill I will use for the rest of my life, but an amazing experience I will never forget.