Mary Ann Chacko is an Assistant Professor in the School of Arts and Sciences. Her research interests include critical childhood and youth studies, citizenship education, role of police in schools and gender issues in education. She has a doctorate in Curriculum Studies from Teachers College, Columbia University, New York.

Dr Chacko began her teaching career at Montfort Anglo-Indian Higher Secondary School, Tamil Nadu. She also worked as a Guest Lecturer in Siliguri BEd College, North Bengal University and as an Adjunct Assistant Professor at Teachers College, Columbia University. She joined Ahmedabad University in January 2018. 

My research interests lie at the intersection of anthropology of state and schooling, citizenship pedagogies, and critical childhood studies. Using anthropological methodologies my current research examines a uniformed youth organization and the different collaborations, educational spaces, and pedagogical practices through which it trains young people to be ‘participatory citizens’ in contemporary India.  

Peer-reviewed journals:

• Chacko, M.A. (under review) English education as 'readymade leadership': Re-inscribing distinction through the Student Police Cadet project in Kerala, India.  South Asia: Journal of South Asian Studies.
• Chacko, M.A. (2019) Freedoms in the khaki: gendering a ‘gender-neutral’ uniform, Gender and Education, DOI: 10.1080/09540253.2019.1632419
• Chacko, M.A. (2010). "Bend It like Beckham": Dribbling the Self through a Cross-Cultural Space. Multicultural Perspectives, 12(2), 81-86.

• Chacko, M.A. (2016). Politics of Education in Colonial India by Krishna Kumar. Pacific Affairs, Volume 89, No. 4. University of British Columbia.
• Lesko, N., Chacko, M.A. & Khoja-Moolji, S. (2015). The Promises of Empowered Girls. In J. Wyn & H. Cahill (Eds.), Handbook of Children and Youth Studies. Springer.
• Chacko, M.A. (2015). Schooling as Counter-Socialization: Krishna Kumar’s Contributions to Curriculum. In William Pinar (Ed.), Curriculum Studies in India: Intellectual Histories, Present Circumstances. Palgrave Macmillan.
• Chacko, M.A., & Ross, E.W. (2011). Re-visioning Global Education. Review of Kirkwood-Tucker, Toni Fuss (Ed.). (2009). Visions in Global Education: The Globalization of Curriculum and Pedagogy in Teacher Education and Schools: Perspectives from Canada, Russia, and the United States. Theory and Research in Social Education, 39(1), 148-157.
• Khoja-Moolji, S. & Chacko, M.A. (2011)."Post-colonialism, Impact on Women". The Multimedia Encyclopedia of Women in Today's World. Sage Publications.

Courses developed and taught at Ahmedabad University

Schooling and Society (EDU 101)

This course examines how differences such as gender, caste, dis/ability and class become normalized in society, particularly through processes of schooling. Schooling in this course is understood as the social processes and interactions through which we teach and learn or are “schooled” into particular attitudes and perspectives on differences in society. A critical examination of the normalization of differences are considered crucial because of the ways in which these processes of normalization inscribe inequalities and injustices in society. 

Interrogating Disability in Culture and Education (SPS 252)

This course adopts a disability studies perspective to critically examine the lived experiences of young people with disabilities, particularly their interactions within educational institutions. Apart from a scholarly and interdisciplinary engagement with the historical marginalization, disability rights movement, current debates, and lived experiences of persons with disabilities, students undertake field visits to educational institutions in Ahmedabad to learn about the schooling experiences of young people with disabilities. 

Foundations Programme (Democracy and Justice)

Democracy and Justice is one among four interdisciplinary and immersive 4-week thematic courses attended by all incoming undergraduate students in their first year at Ahmedabad University. 
 

• 2019- 2020    Spencer Conference Grant, Spencer Foundation, U.S.A. 
• 2017              Provost Doctoral Dissertation Grant, Teachers College, Columbia University 
• 2016              Taraknath Foundation Award, South Asia Institute, Columbia University
• 2016              Provost’s Grant for Professional Development, Teachers College, Columbia University
• 2016              Asia on Its Own Terms: Towards New Terminology and Narratives for Research in Asian Studies Doctoral Summer Scholarship, Tel Aviv University, Israel
• 2014-2015     AC4 Graduate Fellowship, Earth Institute, Columbia University
• 2013-2014     Dean’s Doctoral Research Fellowship, Teachers College, Columbia University 
• 2004-2005     Judy and Morris Fish Graduate Scholarship in Education, Concordia University

• American Anthropological Association (AAA)
• Comparative Education Society of India (CESI)
• Comparative and International Education Society (CIES)