Lisa Lewis
Principal investigator Lisa is Professor in Theatre & Performance at the Faculty of Creative Industries, and Co-Director of the Centre for Media and Culture in Small Nations, University of South Wales. She is a theatre practitioner, and her research practice-based, focusing on diverse performances of Welsh culture. Her recent book Performing Wales (2018, UWP), explored the museum, heritage, festival and theatre as ways of sustaining relationships between people, memory and place in Welsh culture. Lisa has worked with numerous museums and heritage sites on the interpretation and performance of Welsh history and culture. In Welsh and Khasi Cultural Dialogues Lisa directs the performance strands of the research as well as leading on the project more broadly. 
Desmond Kharmawphlang
Research Consultant Desmond is Professor of Literary and Cultural Studies and Head of the Department of Cultural and Creative Studies at North Eastern Hill University, Shillong, Meghalaya in Northeast India. He is an expert in creative writing and folklore, a renowned Khasi poet and author, and as an expert in folkloristics, particularly in the Khasi context. Desmond has published widely on folklore, folklife, orality and culture in relation to the Khasi Hills. 
Gareth Bonello
Musician Dr Gareth Bonello is an award-winning Welsh musician and singer, renowned for several critically acclaimed records under the name The Gentle Good. Gareth completed a PhD in tandem with Welsh and Khasi Cultural Dialogues, entitled ‘Deialogau Diwylliannol Cymreig a Khasi: Ymchwil drwy Ymarfer Creadigol’ (Welsh and Khasi Cultural Dialogues: Research through Creative Practice), which investigated the legacy of the Khasi-Welsh relationship in music and song (funded by Coleg Cymraeg Cenedlaethol and USW). For this he learnt to play the traditional Khasi instrument, the duitara. The musical collaboration between Khasi-Welsh artists will be released in an album called Sai-thaiñ ki Sur (weaving of voices) on Naxos World. |
Aparna Sharma
Co-investigator Aparna is an Associate Professor in documentary film, film theory, and post-colonialism at the department of World Arts, Culture and Dance, University of California, Los Angeles. She is a documentary film maker, and her research is practice-based, exploring modes and vocabularies of documentary film that address issues of cultural representation and focusing on communities displaced from the national imagination of India. Since 2009, she has been working in India's north-eastern region – and is now working on a documentary about the representation of the north east in photography, which includes work on the missionary archive of photographs. 
Helen Davies
Senior Research Assistant Dr Helen Davies is a specialist in sociolinguistics and media and her work focuses on minority languages. As part of Welsh and Khasi Cultural Dialogues Helen’s research explores language, translation between minority cultures (Khasi and Welsh), and the way in which language mediates cultural identity in the Welsh-Khasi exchange. She also leads the research theme on the gendered nature of missionary exchange. 
Lapdiang Syiem
Performer Lapdiang A. Syiem is an independent theatre artist based in Meghalaya, India. Her work revolves around adapting and re-interpreting Khasi folk narratives into a contemporary setting. She has been writing and devising her performances since 2016. A graduate of the National School of Drama, New Delhi with a specialisation in acting and physical theatre from the Commedia School, Copenhagen, Denmark, Lapdiang has been trained in performing techniques in classical, folk and contemporary, including an introduction to Kuddiyattam, and the circus arts in Kerala. She has performed widely around the country in India and abroad in Pakistan, China, Denmark, Sweden, Estonia, Switzerland and Wales. |
Rhys ap Trefor
Perfomer Rhys is a Welsh actor in theatre, television, film and radio, working mainly, though not exclusively, in Welsh language theatre and media. He studied Theatre, Film and Television at Aberystwyth University. He has appeared in numerous Welsh language television series such as Gwaith Cartref (Homework), Byw Celwydd (Living a Lie) and Pili Pala (Butterfly). Rhys is also a director and writer working across various media and platforms. |
Benedict Hynñiewta
Musician Benedict is a visual artist and musician from the Khasi Hills. He is a lecturer in arts and music at the Department of Cultural and Creative Studies, NEHU, Shillong, and is a General Council member of the Lalit Kala Akademi, the National Academy of Art of the Government of India. Benedict is an experienced flautist who specialises in the Khasi flute; he explores techniques and styles from all over the world as well as the tunes of the Khasi folk tradition.nment of India. |
Advisory Board
Jane Aaron, Emeritus Professor of English, University of South Wales. A renowned expert on Welsh literature in the English language, she has written about nineteenth century Welsh women's writing in the context of British Imperialism. Prior to her retirement in 2011 she was head of the Centre for Gender Studies.
Uttam Bathari, Deputy Director of Research at the Indian Council of Historical Research, North East Regional Centre, Guwahati University. Lead researcher on the case of North East India in a project entitled 'Imagined Sovereignities: Boundaries of Statehood and Globalisation' for the Peace Research Institute, Oslo, funded by the Norwegian Research Council. He has published widely on the history of the North East.
Aled Gruffydd Jones, historian. Former Chief Executive and Librarian of the National Library of Wales, he has written extensively on the relationship between Wales, the British Empire and the Indian sub-continent in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. He was formerly Sir John Williams Professor of Welsh History and Senior Pro Vice-Chancellor of Aberystwyth University.
Tiplut Nongbri, Professor, Centre for the Study of Social Systems, School of Social Science, Jawaharlal Nehru University, Delhi. Areas of expertise include sociology of family and kinship, Ethnicity, Tribes and Marginalised Groups, Gender Studies and Environmental Sociology. She has authored books on gender and the Khasi family structure, on Khasi women and matriliny, and masculinity and Christianity in India's North East.
Mike Wilson, Professor of Drama, School of English, Drama and Publishing, Loughborough University. An expert in storytelling and digital technology, on which he has published extensively. He was formerly Professor of Drama and Dean of the School of Media and Performance, University College Falmouth.
Uttam Bathari, Deputy Director of Research at the Indian Council of Historical Research, North East Regional Centre, Guwahati University. Lead researcher on the case of North East India in a project entitled 'Imagined Sovereignities: Boundaries of Statehood and Globalisation' for the Peace Research Institute, Oslo, funded by the Norwegian Research Council. He has published widely on the history of the North East.
Aled Gruffydd Jones, historian. Former Chief Executive and Librarian of the National Library of Wales, he has written extensively on the relationship between Wales, the British Empire and the Indian sub-continent in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. He was formerly Sir John Williams Professor of Welsh History and Senior Pro Vice-Chancellor of Aberystwyth University.
Tiplut Nongbri, Professor, Centre for the Study of Social Systems, School of Social Science, Jawaharlal Nehru University, Delhi. Areas of expertise include sociology of family and kinship, Ethnicity, Tribes and Marginalised Groups, Gender Studies and Environmental Sociology. She has authored books on gender and the Khasi family structure, on Khasi women and matriliny, and masculinity and Christianity in India's North East.
Mike Wilson, Professor of Drama, School of English, Drama and Publishing, Loughborough University. An expert in storytelling and digital technology, on which he has published extensively. He was formerly Professor of Drama and Dean of the School of Media and Performance, University College Falmouth.