The Sophia Irene Heredia Centre for Women’s Studies and Development has grown out of a feeling of gender equality. SIHCWSD seeks to explain the socio-economic, historical, cultural, and political reasons for women’s subordination. It seeks to act as an instrument for women’s development and to promote gender equality by sensitising women and men about women’s rights and entitlements .
Goals & Objectives:
The overarching goal of the Centre is to accelerate the development of women.
The specific goals of the Centre are:
To identify issues and problems of women and undertake studies relating to women’s roles and status in society.
To develop significant educational programmes especially those linked to social needs.
To encourage research programmes with special emphasis on applied research directed to solving problems relating to women’s development.
To collect information and build a resource pool of documentation and reference material on women
To encourage and support action programmes for women’s development
To develop the leadership potential in women.
Important objectives of women’s studies are as follows:
To facilitate the process of understanding, recognizing and giving due importance to the contribution made by women and men.
To examine the reasons for subordination of women and for male domination
To empower women to attain gender justice and play an effective role in all decision-making processes
To evolve development alternatives with women
To ensure visibility of women as change agents for the enhancement of the status of women.
To identify and understand the roots of inequality that result in invisibility, marginalization and exclusion of women from the intellectual world
To support social action aimed at equality, development, peace, education, health and employment of women.
To organize seminars, workshops, debates, talks and discussions
To screen films that highlight the issues above .
To fulfil these objectives, SIHCWSD offers the following facilities:
Library Reference Services
Referral Services
Documentation Services
Current Awareness Services - CAS
Selective Dissemination of Information – SDI
Reprographic Services
Internet Services
Networking with other Women’s Studies Centre’s
Dossiers on women–related themes
The centre is rooted firmly in the principles of academics, advocacy and action. Based on this the centre has five major focus areas based on this, they are
PG Courses
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Master of Arts in Gender Studies
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Post Graduate Diploma in Nutrition, Diet and Fitness
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Post Graduate Diploma in Therapeutic Diet
Add-on Certificate Courses
Certificate Course in Women’s Empowerment
Certificate Course in Social Work Focusing on Issues Related to Women and Girls
Certificate Course in Personal Finance Management
Certificate Course in Entrepreneurship
Certificate Course in Basic/Intermediate Baking
Certificate Course Gender and Mainstream Media in India
Certificate Course in History of Food
Research and publications
Our peer reviewed journal, Urdhva Mula (ISSN 2277-7954) is available online to all those who subscribe to it and we are in the process of making online our documented articles from newspapers both English as well as regional (Hindi and Marathi) on Women’s issues. The Centre is equipped with an extensive documentation centre which focuses solely on Women’s issues like sexual harassment, domestic violence, gender inequality among others from (2001-2024).
Consultancy and Collaboration
SIHCWSD conducts multiple courses throughout the academic year, all of which are designed to address the needs of a diverse set of students. Hence, while the emphasis of some was on the acquirement of skills, others focused on the acquirement of knowledge. As is norm, every year the Sophia Centre for Women’s Studies and Development conducts Certificate courses in Women’s Empowerment; Social Work Focusing on Issues Related to Women and Girls; Basics in Baking; Personal Finance Management and Entrepreneurship Training. We also conduct PG Diploma courses in Counselling as well as Food and Nutrition. Since 2021, we have started a MA programme in Gender Studies.
The activities and involvement in the current year have been extremely encouraging for the advancement of the centre including organizing online talks and conferences in collaboration with national organisations like the IAWS (Indian Association of Women’s Studies) and international bodies like Friedrich Ebert Stiftung (FES), Germany. We have factored in the need for restructuring our courses to reach a larger audience by making a few of them accessible online to suit the need of the target groups. This has helped us to conduct our programmes on a national as well as international level.
Over the years we have collaborated for academic, training and outreach programmes with several organisations including UNICEF, MAVIM, YWCA, Akshara, Akanksha, Stree Mukti Sanghatana, Navjeevan Trust, CEHAT, CCDT, AAMRAE, VACHA, Silver Innings, MAVA, Young Star Trust, among others. The centre functions as a referral centre and the staff of the centre has provided consultancy services to several organisations.
It is extremely heartening for us as an organisation to recognise that our outreach programmes have benefitted numerous economically disadvantaged young girls and women. A key component of our programmes is that they are not stationary, but mobile, which means we meet those in need of outreach services at the location at which they are. SIHCWSD members and collaborators have conducted capacity-building workshops; entrepreneurship training as well as skill-based vocational training for the focus groups within as well as in the suburbs of Mumbai. We are thankful to all our sponsors, well-wishers and the organisations we have partnered with over the years.
STAFF OF THE CENTRE
Honorary Director : Dr. (Sr.) Ananda Amritamahal (English Literature)
Coordinator : Dr. Lata Pujari (History)
Academic Advisor : Dr. Vibhuti Patel (Economics)
Senior Programme Officer : Ms. Deepti Anil (Foods and Nutrition)
Librarian : Ms Zarina Vapiwala
Office Assistant : Ms Shraddha Kajare Satam
Attendant : Mr. Hayward Lopez
The Consultative Committee of SCWSD
Dr. Laxmi Lingam (Women’s Studies)
Dr. Maithreyi Krishnaraj (Economics)
Dr. Nandita Gandhi (Women’s Studies)
Dr. Suma Chitnis (Education)
Dr. Usha Thakkar (Political Science)
Annual Reports:
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2022-2023
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2021-2022
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2020-2021