Shivani Kaul
Shivani Kaul is an anthropologist, film artist, and action-researcher from Kashmir and the US. At Bremen, Shivani works as a postdoctoral researcher at the crossroads of environmental humanities and public anthropology at the Institute of Anthropology and Cultural Research (IfEK). As a dozent at IfEK, she teaches ethnographic writing with an ear for unsettling storytelling and multimodality. She is also developing research on planetary health infrastructures, a monograph, and an episodic film.
Moved by her family history in the most militarized region on the planet, Shivani’s research follows the frictions and alternatives that emerge as new technologies and knowledge practices travel – with an interest in how the state, science, and subjectivity might be done differently in noncolonial Himalayan settings. She has conducted long-term anthropological research in Bhutan, with additional research, teaching, and public scholarship in Kashmir, India, the Netherlands, and Spain. Drawing from her training crossing disciplines and continents, she generates ethnographic theory from the Himalayas in conversation with medical anthropology, feminist science studies, psychoanalytic object relations, material and visual culture studies, economic anthropology, and the anthropology of development.
Over the last 15 years, Shivani has interwoven praxis, theory, and poiesis in her work. Her multiversal methods span film, photography, breathwork, drag, person-centered interviewing, and questionnaires. She practices public anthropology through TV programs, policy reports, podcasts, public talks, and curatorial work. Through her teaching and supervision across anthropology, media studies, political ecology, and degrowth, she experiments with community-based slow learning, pluriversal pedagogies, and multimodal methods.
Before joining IfEK, Shivani was a lecturer at Utrecht University and the University of Amsterdam. She has taught for the first Degrowth MA program at the Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona, and was previously a lecturer in the first anthropology degree program in the Royal University of Bhutan as well as in the media studies department of Sherubtse College.
Shivani completed her PhD in Anthropology at the University of Amsterdam within the ERC project “Global Future Health.” Through co-laboring with colleagues and friends in Bhutan, her dissertation examined how mothers, health workers, and feeding practitioners partially refused and redesigned bioeconomic metrics, micronutrients, and models of child growth that travelled with the First 1000 Days policy agenda. For its experimental approach to ethnographic theorization and collaboration, this work has received multiple awards. Shivani also holds an MRes in Anthropology from University College London; a postgraduate certificate in mental health and wellbeing from the Tavistock and Portman NHS Foundation Trust; an MA in Arts and Aesthetics from Jawaharlal Nehru University; and a BA in Political Science and South Asia Studies from Wellesley College.
Personal website: https://uu.academia.edu/ShivaniKaul
Shivani’s current postdoctoral project examines planetary health infrastructures through comparative ethnographic research on maslin seeds in Himalayan and European contexts. The project follows alternative health indicators and ecological uncertainties to ask how nourishment is organized across scales: from soils, crops, and kitchens to global health metrics and planetary boundaries. Through this work, Shivani studies how communities challenge standardized models of nutrition, productivity, and sustainability, while enacting more situated forms of metabolism and wellbeing.
A second plotline of research builds on her doctoral research at UvA examining pluriversal alternatives to global health interventions. Shivani and her co-researchers in Bhutan followed frictions and alternatives that emerged as universalizing interventions – such as growth charts, micronutrient powders, and causal models – traveled across the Himalayas in the shadow of climate emergency. Their work showed how caregivers and practitioners did not simply implement these materials, techniques, and discourses, but sometimes redesigned and partially refused them. This research contributes to medical anthropology, science and technology studies, and environmental humanities by asking what interventions become possible when health is understood through ecosocial relation rather than bioeconomic optimization.
A third plotline of research builds on Shivani’s earlier work in psychological anthropology, economic anthropology, and visual culture on how social media and wage labor shape body norms and wellbeing among young people. Her MRes research at UCL studied the socialization, aesthetics, and ethics of body image among undergraduates in Bhutan, one of the last countries in the world to introduce broadcast television. This work continues to inform her interest in how digital and material environments shape alternative beauty ideals, gendered subjectivities, and the value of caring labor – especially in places that do not fit dominant colonial narratives of modernity.
Finally, Shivani engages with educators, journalists, and curators working towards socioecological transformation. Across her work in Kashmir, Bhutan, the Netherlands, and transnational degrowth networks, she attends to how people mobilize aesthetic and embodied practices in response to militarism and ecological crisis. This line of work connects public anthropology with questions about the role of material, semiotic, and symbolic dynamics in conflict transformation and postgrowth futures.
Monographs
Kaul, S. Outgrowing Anthropos: Feeding Tendrel Futures During the Golden 1000 Days in Bhutan. In preparation.
Dissertations
Kaul, S. (2025). A Tendrel Logic: Growing Humans Otherwise During the Golden 1000 Days in Bhutan. PhD dissertation, University of Amsterdam.
Kaul, S. (2018). From “Full Moon” Faces to “Fit”: The Socialization, Aesthetics, and Ethics of Body Image in Bhutan. MRes dissertation, University College London.
Edited Special Issues
Kaul, S., Akbulut, B., DeMaria, F., & Gerber, J.-F. (2022). “Alternatives to Sustainable Development: What Can We Learn from the Pluriverse in Practice?” Special feature in Sustainability Science, 17.
Journal Articles
Kaul, S., Yangchen, P., & Wangmo, S. C. (2026). “Multiversal Feeding? On Tendrel Technologies and Planetary Health in Bhutan.” In “Imagining Planetary Health, Well-Being, and Habitability: Perspectives from the Environmental Humanities,” edited by Lijuan Klassen and Christof Mauch. Global Environment.
Kaul, S., et al. (2022). “Alternatives to Sustainable Development: What Can We Learn from the Pluriverse in Practice?” Sustainability Science, 17, 1149–1158.
Kaul, S. (2016). “Probing the Role of the Media in Gender and Body Image Formation among Bhutanese Youth.” Sherub Doenme: The Research Journal of Sherubtse College, 12(1–2), 5–14.
Book Chapters
Kaul, S., Tobgay, Y. W., Pelden, S., & Yangzom, D. (2026). “Lenchak and the Postgrowth Possibilities of a Tendrel Logic of Intervention in Bhutan.” In A. Linkenbach & V. Verma (Eds.), Radical Imaginaries of Life Beyond “Growth”. Abingdon: Routledge.
Kaul, S., & Yates-Doerr, E. (2024). “Interdependence: Reworking Ontogeny through Tendrel Fishbones and Dirty Chickens.” In M. Pentecost, J. Keaney, T. Moll, & M. Penkler (Eds.), The Handbook of DOHaD and Society: Past, Present, and Future Directions of Biosocial Collaboration. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Kaul, S., & Gerber, J.-F. (2024). “Degrowth and Psychoanalysis: From Transition to Transformation.” In K. Heron & L. Eastwood (Eds.), The Handbook of Degrowth: Propositions and Prospects. London/Berlin: De Gruyter.
Films and Television
Kaul, S. (in preparation). Co-director. A Tendrel Logic. Episodic feature documentary film. Amsterdam/Thimphu.
Kaul, S. (2024). Director. A Telegram for You. Short documentary film. Den Haag/Bumthang.
Ju-Nor Studios. (2020). Co-producer. “Anthropology of Science.” Television episode. Bhutan Broadcasting Service 2. Thimphu.
Kaul, S., Chandna, A., Kaushik, D., Punj, D., Sharma, P., & Wadhwa, U. (2013). Co-director. Roadside Blues. Short fiction film. Delhi.
Exhibition Catalogues
Kaul, S. (2014). “Blank Noise/Jasmeen Patheja.” In S. Hapgood & S. Talengala (Eds.), Mapping Gender: Bodies and Sexualities in Contemporary Art across the Global South, 55–58. New Delhi: School of Arts and Aesthetics, Jawaharlal Nehru University.
Kaul, S. (2014). “Maya Krishna Rao.” In S. Hapgood & S. Talengala (Eds.), Mapping Gender: Bodies and Sexualities in Contemporary Art across the Global South, 59–64. New Delhi: School of Arts and Aesthetics, Jawaharlal Nehru University.
Kaul, S., & Xaviers, J. (2014). “Who Are We?” In S. Hapgood & S. Talengala (Eds.), Mapping Gender: Bodies and Sexualities in Contemporary Art across the Global South, 5–22. New Delhi: School of Arts and Aesthetics, Jawaharlal Nehru University.
Academic Blogs and Public Essays
Kaul, S., Yangchen, P., Wangmo, S. C., Wangmo, Y., Chetri, A., & Nangsel, T. (2026). “Partially Refusing the Measure and Taste of Growthism in Bhutan.” Anthropology News.
Embodegrowth Lab. (2021). “Embodying Degrowth by Turning the Movement Inside Out.” DevISSues. International Institute of Social Studies.
Embodegrowth Lab. (2022). “Embodying Degrowth by Turning the Movement Inside Out.” Degrowth.info.
Gottke, F., Ibañez Martin, R., Kaul, S., Sakoun, R., Sigmund, K., Thompson, A., & Yates-Doerr, E. (2019). “The Ethnographic Fact: A Discussion of Ethics in Anthropological Fieldwork.” Somatosphere.
Kaul, S. (2014). “An Invitation to Remember: The Lightning Testimonies Comes to India.” Countercurrents.
Reports and Policy Briefs
Kaul, S., Yangchen, P., Wangmo, S. C., Wangmo, Y., Chhetri, A., Yoezer, K., & Chophel, T. (in preparation). “Nutrition in Translation: A Tendrel Study of Maternal and Child Eating Practices in Bhutan.” Research report for the Research Ethics Board of Health, Royal Government of Bhutan.
Kaul, S. (2015). “Finding Our Way Through Together: Learning from the Hum Kadam Education for Peace Initiative.” Research report assessing the impact of a three-year British High Commission-funded peace education program in Kashmir.
Kaul, S. (2011). “Disposal of Sputum in Home Settings.” Global Health Delivery.
Kaul, S. (2011). “Triage Strategies to Minimize TB Infection in Resource-Limited Settings.” Global Health Delivery.
Kaul, S. (2008). “Early Childhood Education Policy Recommendations for Oklahoma.” Policy paper for discussion among community stakeholders in local government.
Podcasts, Webcasts, and Broadcasts
“Anthropological Perspectives on Growth and Degrowth.” Webinar guest. Antroplogen Beroepsvereniging, Dutch Association of Anthropologists. March 30, 2023.
“1000 Days of Life in Bhutan.” Podcast guest. Anthropologic, Leiden University. November 24, 2022.
“Embodying Degrowth.” Podcast guest. 8th International Degrowth Conference. 2021.
“Anthropology of Science.” Public broadcasting guest. Bhutan Broadcasting Service 2. July 24, 2020.
“Covid-19 and Medical Anthropology.” Webinar guest. Anthropologic. July 1, 2020.
In Bremen
Summer Term 2026
Making Ethnography Public: Writing and Storytelling in Social Science Research
BA Course, Institute of Anthropology and Cultural Research, University of Bremen
Previously
Lecturer, University College Utrecht, Utrecht University
Anthropology of (De)coloniality: Epistemology, Theory, Practice
BA Anthropology Course, Spring Semester 2026
Lecturer, University of Amsterdam
Encountering the Pluriverse: Anthropological Approaches to Degrowth, Health, and Wellbeing
BA Sociology Thesis Course, Spring Semester 2025
Lecturer, Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona
Post-development, Feminisms, and Degrowth
Spring Semester 2022 and 2023
MA Degrowth course with Agustina Solera and Wendy Harcourt
Lecturer, Royal Thimphu College, Royal University of Bhutan
Medical Anthropology
BA Anthropology Course, Spring Semester 2020
Writing Ethnography
BA Anthropology Course, Spring Semester 2020
Anthropology of the Himalayas
BA Anthropology Course, Fall Semester 2019
Biological Anthropology
BA Anthropology Course, Fall Semester 2019
Lecturer, Sherubtse College, Royal University of Bhutan
Social Science Research Methods
BA Media Studies Course, Spring Semester 2016
Introduction to Political Science
BA Media Studies Course, Spring Semester 2016
Photojournalism
BA Media Studies Course, Fall Semester 2015
Television I
BA Media Studies Course, Fall Semester 2015