The 'Technology-in-Society (“TiS”) Research Cluster' was formed in 2020 as part of the Institution of Excellence (IOE) visioning process with 9 faculty members from the HSS Department. It has grown to include 12 faculty members, 5 doctoral scholars and 1 postdoctoral scholar in 2025.
The research cluster brings together a number of faculty in disciplines across the department who share a common interest in understanding the importance of technology as a constitutive force in today's world. We have built capacity within the department, engaged in collaborations across the institute, and outreach beyond IIT Delhi to understand how our worlds are shaping and being shaped by technology.
With faculty members drawing upon multiple disciplinary perspectives, the cluster has been able to build synergies and conduct research on a wide-ranging set of questions in the social sciences focusing on inequality and livelihoods, justice and democracy, work and ethics, health and environment, language and power, contamination and climate, second language learning and structural barriers therein to name a few. We have had vital conversations on common constructs, critiques and engagements around the ubiquity of technology that are reshaping conversations across and within (inter)disciplines (digital humanities, science and technology studies, critical agrarian studies, medical humanities to name a few).
Not only has the research cluster successfully bridged disciplinary silos within the department, it has also spearheaded several multidisciplinary projects with people from the engineering and natural sciences at IIT Delhi (Civil, Biotechnology and Bioengineering, Rural Development and Technology, Computer Science) and beyond (University of Queensland, Sorbonne University, Oxford Internet Institute, People's Archive of Rural India).
The TiS research cluster has been able to develop a PhD track within the Department and five research scholars have been admitted into the same since 2023. We are able to offer a set of relevant courses as well as close mentoring to these students.
The TiS research cluster wishes to enhance its collaborative impact through research, teaching and outreach, not only nationally,
but also internationally. Now that disciplinary units within the Department have more-or-less reached "critical mass," the cluster feels that it is time to hire outside the framework of strict disciplinarity. Over the next five years, we would like to hire at least two to three new faculty who have established interdisciplinary expertise in the interface between technology and society. Climate change, pollution / waste and artificial intelligence are three key areas where we would like to build expertise in the research cluster. We also propose to start a minor area for UG students in addition to a colloquium series at the institute on themes related to technology in society.
