Amartya Karmarkar

Amartya holds a bachelor’s and a master’s degree in English Literature and Languages from India. His main research interests include Feminist Theory and Criticism, Gender and Sexuality Studies, Masculinity Studies, and Film Theory. He intends to explore the female writing of the domestic space as a problematized masculine sphere where the competing fantasies of male domination/androcentric desire compete with the female desire for autonomy. His research examines whether inhabited space is inherently phallocentric and how female protagonists generate alternative spaces of existence inside a dominant patriarchal setup. 

Outside the domain of academia, he takes an avid interest in creative writing, filmmaking, user-experience research, and visual design. His recent collaboration on the script of Starfruits has been presented at the Film Bazaar (2021) [National Film Development Corporation of India] and the La Fabrique Cinéma [Cannes Film Festival 2022]. 

At UIUC, he aspires to further develop his ideas on the concept of domestic space and its intricate interrelations with the subject and aims to work on varied aspects of narrative structures in filmmaking as a visual art form that offers the possibility to dissect and reform the social, the political, and the contemporary world.     

Email: amartya6@illinois.edu