Jublee Handique (co-advised by Mat Coleman and Madhu Dutta) will be getting $10,000 from Mershon for her dissertation fieldwork. Jublee’s project, titled Open Air Markets and Boundary-Making in Northeast India, explores the complex role of cross-border rural markets—or haats—in shaping statecraft along the India-Bangladesh and India-Myanmar borders. Set against the backdrop of India's evolving security and development paradigms in the Northeast, the project investigates how these seemingly ordinary marketplaces function as critical sites for state surveillance, regulation, and spatial control.

Dr. Madhu Dutta will be receiving a New Associate Faculty Grant from Mershon to the tune of $50,000. This is for her project titled Promises of “Skilled,” “High Tech” Labor: The CHIPS Act, State Intervention, and Realities On-the-Ground. Madhu’s work will investigate how the CHIPS Act’s promises of high-tech job creation in Ohio intersect with the lived experiences of local workers, questioning whether workforce development truly benefits communities or primarily serves national security goals.