Bhargavi Narayanan
Bhargavi assists with data collection and strategy.
Creative Research Strategist
Bhargavi is a Media Researcher, Scholar, and Educator with extensive experience designing, planning, and implementing qualitative, mixed-method research engaging socially vulnerable communities. Trained in documentary filmmaking she has worked with indigenous, caste-oppressed, and low-income urban publics across India and has developed cultural resources for their intangible cultural heritages. She has led collaborative publication projects for community archive initiatives for indigenous arts and linguistic heritage. The photography book on Seraikella Chhau, one of her most successful publication projects, was crucial in garnering publicity for the art form and gaining recognition as one of the folk dances of the Indian State Jharkhand.
Experienced in creating, curating, and publishing across media platforms, Bhargavi has served as contributing editor and facilitated publication of scholarly research journals such as Indian Folk Life, Indian Folklore Research Journal, and the Media Fields Journal. She is currently pursuing a PhD in Film and Media Studies at UC Santa Barbara. Her dissertation engages media events, publics, and infrastructures as key nodes of the popular where social imaginaries and narratives of belonging are contested, reshaped, and affirmed.
Bhargavi is a mother of two kids. In her free time, she leverages her community engagement experience to raise funds for her kids’ public school to fund inclusive enrichment programs that celebrate diversity, artistic expression, and holistic learning.