Ramya Ravishankar

Days after I finished the M.Sc., I began classes at Columbia Law School in New York City in pursuit of my Juris Doctor (J.D.). While the pedagogy in law school was very different to the one at Oxford, I strongly believe my master’s degree helped me with my J.D. The interdisciplinary nature of the M.Sc. and its epistemology component allowed me to reflect on the philosophical underpinnings of the laws of contract, property, and tort, among others. Moreover, the research and writing skills I developed when writing my thesis were useful in writing legal memos and research papers.

While in law school, I continued to be active in international human rights and development work, which had been a focus of my M.Sc. thesis. For example, I interned at the Bertha Foundation in London and at the International Justice Program at Human Rights Watch in New York. I also worked in Burma with Justice For All, a local independent law firm, on issues ranging from constitutional reform to land confiscation to grass roots advocacy strategies--themes that were all covered in some manner or other in the various modules of the M.Sc. In fact, I was surprised by many of the parallels between India's and Myanmar's legal and developmental trajectories despite their distinct political and economic histories. 

Currently, I work as an attorney in New York at Skadden Arps, a full service international  law firm. In my spare time, I read Indian diasporan fiction and volunteer at a few nonprofits, including South Asian Youth Action, a group that mentors high school students of South Asian background--interests that drew me to apply for the M.Sc. in the first place.