HISTORIAN

France

Biography

Vanessa Caru is a graduate of ENS-Lyon and a history professor. In 2010 she defended her doctoral dissertation on Workers’ Housing and the Social Question, Bombay (1850-1950) (Le logement des travailleurs et la question sociale, Bombay (1850-1950)), in which she refutes the long-predominant approach to the urban history of the colonial world, according to which colonial urbanism was a process imposed from above by a power presented as a homogenous block. The intervention of the authorities in this area fostered the emergence of new claims and organizing methods, such as the creation of tenants’ unions among the popular classes. The study of such mobilization, and in particular the role played by unions, worker’s parties, and the “untouchables” movement, supplements her analysis of the ways in which workers are politicized, which until now has been limited to the sphere of work. Her current research concerns the role of technology in governing urban societies in contemporary India, which she is conducting on the basis of a study of a professional group, namely public works’ engineers of the colonial period.