Dublin Core
Title
Oral History: Balbir Singh
Subject
Oral Histories at Virginia Tech
Description
Dr. Balbir Singh is a Sikh Punjabi and Bengali Indian born and raised in Brooklyn New York, where she also attended SUNY at Buffalo for her undergraduate studies. Throughout her undergraduate career, she focused heavily on anti-colonial comparative literature and completed an undergraduate honors thesis on Algerian literature and the conversation around French colonialism. She then went on to complete her master’s and doctoral degree on the Sikh diaspora at the University of Washington. Following the completion of her PhD in 2016, she studied at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign in Asian American studies and gender studies as a postdoc student.
She then began a second postdoc at the University of Texas in Austin in women’s, gender, and sexuality studies, but left the program after being accepted to a position at Virginia Tech in the Department of Religion and Culture as well as with the ASPECT PhD program. She and her partner Dr. Allan Lumba, a professor and researcher in the Department of History at Virginia Tech have lived in Blacksburg since 2018.
“I think what's one thing that's really great about Virginia Tech is that it has a pretty good, sizable Asian and Asian American population,” Singh said. “The ACE center is a really major resource and not only as space, but I think it's significant that, you know, there are cultural centers and I think every university should always have cultural centers.”
While Dr. Singh has been at Virginia Tech for two years, the academic 2019-2020 year was cut short due to her maternity and parental leave. However, she is looking forward to engaging with more of the students in her department and on campus once she returns in the spring 2021 semester.
“What's great about the Asian American community is that automatically, there's a sort of sense of solidarity amongst different Asian populations,” she said. “And so to me that's really important. I think that if someone who –– you know, for me, a lot of the work that I do is like ethnic studies based –– that it’s really important to also be involved with not only just teaching students, but also being able to just have informal mentorships and communication with students. And I think the Asian American student population being as large as it is, is really great. I only hope to see it, even more recognizable on campus, even more organized on campus, especially because there is so much politically going on right now.”
She then began a second postdoc at the University of Texas in Austin in women’s, gender, and sexuality studies, but left the program after being accepted to a position at Virginia Tech in the Department of Religion and Culture as well as with the ASPECT PhD program. She and her partner Dr. Allan Lumba, a professor and researcher in the Department of History at Virginia Tech have lived in Blacksburg since 2018.
“I think what's one thing that's really great about Virginia Tech is that it has a pretty good, sizable Asian and Asian American population,” Singh said. “The ACE center is a really major resource and not only as space, but I think it's significant that, you know, there are cultural centers and I think every university should always have cultural centers.”
While Dr. Singh has been at Virginia Tech for two years, the academic 2019-2020 year was cut short due to her maternity and parental leave. However, she is looking forward to engaging with more of the students in her department and on campus once she returns in the spring 2021 semester.
“What's great about the Asian American community is that automatically, there's a sort of sense of solidarity amongst different Asian populations,” she said. “And so to me that's really important. I think that if someone who –– you know, for me, a lot of the work that I do is like ethnic studies based –– that it’s really important to also be involved with not only just teaching students, but also being able to just have informal mentorships and communication with students. And I think the Asian American student population being as large as it is, is really great. I only hope to see it, even more recognizable on campus, even more organized on campus, especially because there is so much politically going on right now.”
Creator
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Publisher
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Date
2018 – present
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Oral History Interview Item Type Metadata
Interviewee
Balbir Singh
Interviewer
Tahreem Alam
Duration
36:16