Profile
Biography
Sri Lankan by birth and disposition, Janaka Jayawickrama was trained in India, the USA, and UK as a social anthropologist. He is mostly known for his work on concepts of care, health, and wellbeing related to disasters, conflicts, and uneven development. During 2014 – 2016, Janaka has been an Advisor to the United Nation’s World Humanitarian Summit, held in Istanbul, Turkey (23-24 May 2016). He continues to advise the UN and International Agencies on humanitarian affairs and development programmes.
Janaka is interested in Yoga, meditation, Chinese martial arts, music, arts, creative literature, and movies.
Research
Overview
Janaka’s research covers a range of fields. He is passionately interested in the question of how lived experiences through crises generate concepts; how we might examine philosophical traditions from Asia, Africa, Latin America, and the Middle East as generative of theoretical and practical approaches to facilitate wellbeing; how to reduce the gap between human beings and nature; and how the impact of historical processes and events on the present day are joined together in the making of the critical. His work on wellbeing, inclusivity, and the need for harmonious relationship with nature has appeared in many anthologies.
Teaching
Undergraduate
Janaka has taught undergraduate and graduate level courses in which he collaborates with students to take them through major concepts (health and wellbeing, disasters, development, networks, relations, ethics, and global governance) embedded in sociological, geographical, political, and historical texts. Janaka has taught courses on Research Methods, Humanitarianism, Sustainable Development, Disaster Risk Reduction, Society and Space, Global Public Health, and Conflict Analysis. Janaka has supervised and mentored more than 20 PhD and postdoctoral students and more than 200 postgraduate students.
Publications
Selected publications
Jayawickrama, J., and Madhanagopal, D., (2024), Reintroducing Nature into Health and Wellbeing: Learnings from Ancient South Asia, New York: Springer Nature.
Wright, J., and Jayawickrama, J., (2024), Under the Gaze of Global Mental Health - A Critical Reflection, London: Palgrave Macmillan.
Jayawickrama, J., Chakraborty, A., and Zhang, Y., (eds), (2024), Climate Change, Population Health, and Island States: Socio-Cultural Dimensions, London: Routledge.
Jayawickrama, J., (2023), “Those Who Make an Enemy of the Earth Make an Enemy of Themselves”: Climate Change and Human Activities from a South and Southeast Asian Perspective. In Madhanagopal, D. and Momtaz, S. eds (eds), Climate Change and Risk in South and Southeast Asia: Socio-political Perspectives. New York: Routledge.
Wright, J. and Jayawickrama, J., (2022), We Need Other Human Beings in Order to be Human: Examining the Indigenous Philosophy of Umunthu and Strengthening Mental Health Interventions, Culture, Medicine, and Psychiatry, (45), pp.1-16.
