Biography
I did my full-time doctoral research between 2016 - 2022 at the National Institute of Advanced Studies, Bangalore through the institute’s fellowship. My doctoral thesis titled ‘Beyond the protected built heritage sites: A geospatial study of Malaprabha River Valley’ had made significant contribution to critical heritage studies, and geospatial analysis validated by fieldwork. The thesis also had broader implications for historical and archaeological studies.
My Masters in Structural Analysis of Historical Constructions carried out in University of Minho, Guimarães, Portugal and Czech Technical University, Prague, Czech Republic was aided by the Erasmus Mundus Scholarship. My doctoral research was an extension to my fourteen years of field based professional learnings (2002 – 2016) in heritage conservation. I was specialising in historic structures documentation, condition assessment, and formulation of conservation strategies. I gained my Bachelors in Architecture from Bangalore University, Bangalore in 1999.
Research
Building on my fourteen years of professional experience my research interests are towards a multidisciplinary exploration of lived landscapes to understand the integral relationship between heritages built environments, physiographic features (such as water, and geology), and the physical geography. My work focuses on studying the indigenous water harvesting and management systems that has sustained past built environments since many centuries. I largely use field and satellite remote sensing data and carryout my analysis through a geospatial approach to study lived landscape.
Key Publications
1. Kuili Suganya, Mythrayi Harshavardhan, M. B. Rajani (2022). Hydrological maps as a tool for exploring historical water systems at Badami, Karnataka, India. Water History, Springer Nature https://10.1007/s12685-022-00309-8
2. Kuili Suganya, Mythrayi Harshavardhan, M. B. Rajani (2022). The Significance of Ancient Water Systems and the Sacred Groves in the Landscape of Badami, Karnataka: A Geospatial Study. In Shalini Dhyani et al. (Eds): Blue-Green Infrastructure across Asian Countries, Improving Urban Resilience and Sustainability. Springer Nature, Singapore https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-16-7128-9_17
3. Kuili Suganya, M.B. Rajani (2021). Advantages and Challenges in Identifying Heritage Sites Using Historical Records and Geospatial Tools: Malaprabha River Basin as a Case Study. In Nalini Rao (Eds.) Facets of Indian Culture, Papers Read in the International Conference The Growth and Development of Indian Culture: Dr S.R. Rao Memorial Foundation for Indian Archaeology, Art and Culture, Aditya Prakashan, New Delhi. pp.38-51
4. Mythrayi Harshavardhan, Kuili Suganya, (2020). Water Harvesting Systems of the Past- A Case Study of Badami, India, Proceedings of National Seminar on Recent Advances in Geospatial Technologies & Applications, Dehradun, pp. 170-175
5. Kuili Suganya (2020). Challenges in Geospatial Documentation of Unprotected Built Heritage Sites in India, Current Science 118:6, p.877-882. doi: 10.18520/cs/v118/i6/877-882
6. Kuili Suganya, M.B. Rajani (2020). Riverfront Gardens and City Walls of Mughal Agra: A study of their locations, extent and subsequent transformations using Remote Sensing and GIS, South Asian Studies (BASAS). doi: 10.1080/02666030.2020.1721119
7. Kuili Suganya, M.B. Rajani (2018). “Underground Water Supply System in Late 19th and early 20th Century Bangalore”, Water History, Springer, Volume 10, Issue 4, pp. 291–311. doi.org/10.1007/s12685-018-0223-8
8. Ekta Gupta, Sonia Das, Kuili Suganya Chittirai Balan, Viraj Kumar and M.B. Rajani. (2017). The Need for a National Archaeological Database, Current Science, 113(10), pp. 1961-1973. doi: 10.18520/cs/v113/i10/1961-1973
Teaching and Supervisions
I was involved in teaching under graduate architecture students working in the capacity of visiting faculty mainly at the Dayananda Sagar Institutions, Bangalore. My subject specialisation involved
- History of Indian Architecture
- Heritage Conservation
- Documentation of historical constructions
- Remote Sensing and GIS
- Architectural Design
Other Professional Activities
I am involved with a non-institutional heritage initiative ‘Saythu…. Linking people and heritage’ (saythu.com) as a Lead in heritage documentation. Saythu, as a initiative carries out heritage based engagements through cultural heritage projects and consultation, field-based experiential education for schoolchildren, graduate and undergraduate students and faculty and interpretive research.
