Rate My Professor Banu Subramaniam

Banu Subramaniam is Professor of Women, Gender, Sexuality Studies in the Social Science faculty at the University of Massachusetts Amherst. Trained as a plant evolutionary biologist, she holds a Ph.D. in Zoology and Genetics from Duke University (1994) and a B.S. from the University of Madras, India. Her research explores the philosophy, history, and culture of the natural sciences and medicine as they intersect with gender, race, ethnicity, and caste. Subramaniam examines postcolonial biologies, the biopolitics of Hindu nationalism, feminist science and technology studies, and the colonial legacies in botany and biology. She investigates how scientific concepts like invasive species and migration reflect broader social and political dynamics. Her work bridges biology and feminist theory, contributing significantly to environmental humanities and the history of science.

Subramaniam's career at the University of Massachusetts Amherst includes key appointments in Women, Gender, Sexuality Studies, where she has advanced interdisciplinary scholarship. She received the Chancellor's Medal in 2016, the highest faculty honor at UMass Amherst for service. Other major awards include the Samuel F. Conti Faculty Fellowship (2022-2023) to complete her book Decolonizing Botany: Empire and the Environmental Humanities, the Michelle Kendrick Prize (2020) from the Society for Literature, Science, and the Arts, and the Ludwik Fleck Prize (2016) from the Society for Social Studies of Science. Her influential publications feature Holy Science: The Biopolitics of Hindu Nationalism (University of Washington Press, 2019), which analyzes the fusion of science and religion in contemporary India, and Ghost Stories for Darwin: The Science of Variation and the Politics of Diversity (University of Illinois Press, 2014), probing evolutionary biology's racial and gendered narratives. She co-edited Making Threats: Biofears, Biopower, Biopolitics (Rowman & Littlefield, 2009). Subramaniam's scholarship has shaped feminist STS, earning recognition for blending empirical science with critical social analysis, and she has delivered public lectures on decolonizing science and race in representations.