She is Professor of Social Anthropology at the University of Oxford,[1] and author of the award-winning Nightmarch: Among India’s Revolutionary Guerrillas,[2] a finalist for the 2019 Orwell Prize for Political Writing.
[10] Shah was raised in Nairobi, Kenya in an extended Gujarati Indian family until she moved with her grandmother, parents and sisters to England at the age of 15.
She graduated with a first-class BA Honours in Geography from Newnham College, University of Cambridge in 1997, and then moved to the London School of Economics to undertake an MSc and PhD in social anthropology.
At London School of Economics, Shah was closely involved in the establishment of the International Inequalities Institute where she convenes a research theme on the Global Economies of Care.
[12] Shah has conducted long-term anthropological fieldwork in eastern India where she lived amongst its indigenous peoples, also called Adivasis, for four and a half years.
Shah is the author of three books and numerous academic articles on topics including indigenous rights and environmentalism; citizenship and revolution; inequality and poverty; seasonal migration and agrarian change; education and affirmative action; development and corruption; leadership and democracy.