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Rajani Kannepalli Kanth

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Breaking with the Enlightenment, Against Eurocentrism: A Transc, Against economics, Paradigms in Economic, Capitalism and social theory

Rajani kannepalli kanth chimera pt 1


Rajani Kannepalli Kanth is a professor, economist, philosopher, and social thinker. Though born in India, he is a US citizen and has resided overseas for most of his life. His major research interests lie in the fields of Economics, Social Theory and Policy, and Women's Issues. His works have received positive endorsements from iconic intellectuals such as Ravi Batra, Roy Bhaskar, Noam Chomsky, Geoff Harcourt, Robert Heilbroner, John Hobson Jonathan Joseph, Tony Lawson, Ali Mazrui, John McMurtry, Roger Owen, Warren Samuels, Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak, Paul Sweezy, and Immanuel Wallerstein. He has, across plus-three decades, taught in the areas of Anthropology, Sociology, Political Science, History, Economics, and Philosophy. He currently serves as the Trustee of the World Peace Congress that he founded in Salt Lake City, Utah, in 2007. He has also served as an advisor to the United Nations in New York, aside from being on the faculty of major universities around the world.

Contents

Rajani kannepalli kanth chimera pt 2


Personal life

He has been married, and divorced, twice. He has four daughters, two from each marriage, all living in the USA.

Education

He has studied at various institutions in India and overseas, such as St George's College, Loyola College, the Delhi School of Economics, Columbia University, and the New School for Social Research. He holds a bachelor's degree in Economics/Statistics/Politics, a Master's in Sociology, a second Master's in Economics, and a Ph.D. in Economics.

Academic career

He commenced his academic career teaching Political Sociology at the newly inaugurated Jawaharlal Nehru University, after obtaining a master's degree in Social Anthropology from the Delhi School of Economics, in New Delhi in 1971. In 1974, he attended Columbia University from which he transferred to the New School for Social Research, New York in 1975. In 1979, he taught as Economics Faculty at the UN International School in New York, and at St. John’s University, as well as serving as a Teaching Fellow at the New School for Social Research. That same Year he earned his second Masters, in Economics, whilst also serving as a Research Associate at Columbia University, following it up with a Ph.D. in Economics in 1980. His Ph.D. thesis was published as a book titled Political Economy and Laissez-Faire in 1986. After a stint as Economic Advisor to the United Nations, at the UNFPA, and also the Centre for Transnational Corporations in New York, between 1979–1981, he returned to the academy, joining the State University of New York, at Purchase, where he taught from 1981–1985. From thereon, he went on to accept positions in a multitude of Institutions: Providence College, the University of Utah, Oxford University, UK, the University of Bielefeld, Germany, University of Bremen, Germany, the University of Aarhus (Denmark), the University of New South Wales (Australia), the University of Technology, Australia, Wagner College, New York, the National University of Singapore, Duke University, the University of Massachusetts Amherst, Tufts University, Loras College, Washington College, Bard College, and Harvard University (where he served as a Visiting Scholar in Economics in 1998, Fellow in the Center for Middle Eastern Studies 2007–2010, Associate of the Department of Anthropology 2010–2011, Fellow in the Department of Anthropology 2011–2014, Visiting Scholar in English 2014–2015) amongst others. In April–May 2012, he visited Jawaharlal Nehru University, India, as a Fellow of the Institute for Advanced Studies.

Major theories

Rajani Kanth's major philosophical theories include:

a) that Ricardian Economics was merely policy advocacy in theoretical guise,

b) that Economics is the crown jewel of the hegemonic ideology of Modernism,

c) that European Modernism, whose derivates are capitalism and socialism, is the real grey eminence that has crafted the alienated misery of our epoch,

d) that we need to "break with the enlightenment" to escape the modernist cage,

e) that gender struggles far predate class and other struggles, with women's oppression being the original paradigm of power and domination, and define the "degree of civilization" of a societal form,

f) that men and women are distinct sub-species embodying a "paradigm of masculinity" and a "paradigm of femininity", respectively, correlated to violence and nurturance, that are basically instinctual in nature despite their cultural variation,

g) that we are, as hominids, basically tribal beings with clan and family being the surrogates for herd and pack in the animal world, of which we are a part,

h) that all our utopias founder on the rock of masculine drives for domination,

i) that only tribal society based on affective ties has managed to contain the predations of masculine drives within the healing matrix of kinship: and remains our best template of a modest amelioration.

Publications: academic

Political Economy and Laissez-Faire: Economics and Ideology in the Ricardian Era. New Jersey: Rowman and Littlefield, 1986.

Explorations in Political Economy [Edited], NJ: Rowman and Littlefield, 1991.

Capitalism and Social Theory, N.Y.: M.E.Sharpe, 1992.

Paradigms in Economic Development: Classic Perspectives, Critiques, and Reflections (Edited). New York: M.E. Sharpe, 1994.

Against Economics: Rethinking Political Economy, London: Avebury Publishing, 1997.

Breaking With the Enlightenment, NJ : Humanities Press, 1997.

Against Eurocentrism, N.Y.: Macmillan, 2005.

The Challenge of Eurocentrism: Global Perspectives, Policy and Prospects [Edited], N.Y.: Macmillan, April, 2009].

Towards Immediacy in World Peace: Papers and Proceedings of the World Peace Congress [Co-edited] New Delhi: Aakar Books, 2010.

The Post-Human Society: Elemental Contours of the Aesthetic Economy of the United States, Seattle: CreateSpace, 2013.

Publications: literary

The 'Forever Young' Regime: A 21st Century Primer on Youthfulness And Well-Being (Non Fiction), Seattle: CreateSpace, 2013.

Revue: A Boutique of Verse (Poetry), Seattle: CreateSpace, 2013.

The Matter with Danny (Fiction), Seattle: CreateSpace, 2013.

The Last Journey: A Voyage to the Center of the Soul (Fiction), Seattle: CreateSpace, 2013.

Representative articles

"Postscript: Self-Determination – Birth of a Notion" by Rajani Kanth

"Against Eurocentred Epistemologies: A Critique of Science, Realism and Economics" by Rajani Kanth

"Eurocentrism, Realism, and the Anthropic Cartography of Emancipation" by Rajani Kanth

Major lectures

Beyond Eurocentrism: The Next Frontier

Challenging Eurocentrism: 45 Theses

Lecture videos

The Challenge of Eurocentrism and Beyond Eurocentrism, lectures delivered at the R. K. Kanth's Festschrift at the American Economics Association meetings, Chicago, January 2007

Rajani Kannepalli Kanth's Keynote Address at the First World Peace Congress, August 2007

Rajani Kannepalli Kanth's Keynote Address to the Second World Peace Congress 2008–2009, Part 1, February 2009

Rajani Kannepalli Kanth's Keynote Address to the Second World Peace Congress 2008–2009, Part 2, February 2009

Other videos

Rajani Kannepalli Kanth's poem Millennium video, presented at World Peace Congress 2008/09

Other addresses

Rajani Kannepalli Kanth's Keynote Address at the Third World Peace Congress, July 2010

Reviews

"Rajani K. Kanth and Eurocentrism: A Critique" by Nick Hostettler

"A Voyage into America – Discovering the New Wretched of the Earth" by John M. Hobson

"A review of Breaking With The Enlightenment: The Twilight of History and the Rediscovery of Utopia" by Alex Prichard

Awards and honors

He was honored with a Festschrift at the American Economic Association Meetings in Chicago, January 4, 2007. He received a Curriculum Development Award at the University of Utah and a Rural Utah Research Award on the Status of Utah Women in 1991/92. He won a College Medal at Loyola College.

The World Peace Congress

He founded the World Peace Congress in Salt Lake City in 2007, holding its first Congress. It has since held two further Congresses – in India, and in Thailand. He continues to serve as its Trustee. A poem of his, set to backdrop music, named Millennium, offers his rationale for launching the World Peace Congress.

References

Rajani Kannepalli Kanth Wikipedia