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SS&IS organises a special talk by Sankrant Sanu

SS&IS organises a special talk by Sankrant Sanu

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SS&IS organises a special talk by Sankrant Sanu
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School of Sanskrit and Indic Studies
 
is organizing a special talk
 
 
 
अंग्रेज़ी माध्यम का भ्रमजाल 
(the myth of English medium)

 

Sankrant Sanu

(author, technologist and entrepreneur)

 

Chair: Prof Madhav Govind, Director HRDC, JNU

 

Friday, 18th January 2019, 4pm,

Conference Room, School of Sanskrit and Indic Studies

 

About the author :  Sankrant Sanu is an author, technologist and entrepreneur. He was a senior development manager at Microsoft where he co-founded Microsoft Sharepoint. He has been a serial entrepreneur since then, involved in startups in Seattle, Bay Area, Ottawa and Gurgaon. Some of his essays were published by Rupa in the book “Invading the Sacred.”  He has written for Rediff, Entrepreneur Magazine, the Hindustan Times, Amar Ujala, and Manushi among others. He is the CEO and founder of Garuda Prakashan, a publication venture.

Sankrant is a Computer Science graduate of IIT Kanpur and the University of Texas. He teaches the Art of Living course. He holds six technology patents and blogs at sankrant.org.

 

Abstract:-  There is an assumption in India today that the spread of English-medium education is necessary for India's growth. Technologist and entrepreneur Sankrant Sanu questions this with a detailed study based on his visits to over 30 countries to study language policy. He finds that, even though English is being increasingly used as a link language, the most prosperous countries are using their own languages as the medium for higher education, science, medicine, engineering and law. Of the top 20 richest countries all of them uses the common languages of the people, of which only 4 are English-medium. Of the 20 poorest countries however, more use English-medium, and exclude the vast majority of their people from development.

 

The advantages of science and development will happen the fastest when brought to it in the languages of the common people. Based on this Sankrant has created a comprehensive policy proposal for Indian languages that is based on the EU model. This proposal allows every child in India to be educated to the highest level in their own language and restores the primacy of the economic linkages of Indian languages which is necessary to Indian to develop both economically and culturally.

A warm welcome to the modified and updated website of the Centre for East Asian Studies. The East Asian region has been at the forefront of several path-breaking changes since 1970s beginning with the redefining the development architecture with its State-led development model besides emerging as a major region in the global politics and a key hub of the sophisticated technologies. The Centre is one of the thirteen Centres of the School of International Studies, Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi that provides a holistic understanding of the region.

Initially, established as a Centre for Chinese and Japanese Studies, it subsequently grew to include Korean Studies as well. At present there are eight faculty members in the Centre. Several distinguished faculty who have now retired include the late Prof. Gargi Dutt, Prof. P.A.N. Murthy, Prof. G.P. Deshpande, Dr. Nranarayan Das, Prof. R.R. Krishnan and Prof. K.V. Kesavan. Besides, Dr. Madhu Bhalla served at the Centre in Chinese Studies Programme during 1994-2006. In addition, Ms. Kamlesh Jain and Dr. M. M. Kunju served the Centre as the Documentation Officers in Chinese and Japanese Studies respectively.

The academic curriculum covers both modern and contemporary facets of East Asia as each scholar specializes in an area of his/her interest in the region. The integrated course involves two semesters of classes at the M. Phil programme and a dissertation for the M. Phil and a thesis for Ph. D programme respectively. The central objective is to impart an interdisciplinary knowledge and understanding of history, foreign policy, government and politics, society and culture and political economy of the respective areas. Students can explore new and emerging themes such as East Asian regionalism, the evolving East Asian Community, the rise of China, resurgence of Japan and the prospects for reunification of the Korean peninsula. Additionally, the Centre lays great emphasis on the building of language skills. The background of scholars includes mostly from the social science disciplines; History, Political Science, Economics, Sociology, International Relations and language.

Several students of the centre have been recipients of prestigious research fellowships awarded by Japan Foundation, Mombusho (Ministry of Education, Government of Japan), Saburo Okita Memorial Fellowship, Nippon Foundation, Korea Foundation, Nehru Memorial Fellowship, and Fellowship from the Chinese and Taiwanese Governments. Besides, students from Japan receive fellowship from the Indian Council of Cultural Relations.