Serajul Islam Choudhury

For other people named Sirajul Islam, see Sirajul Islam (disambiguation).

Serajul Islam Choudhury
সিরাজুল ইসলাম চৌধুরী
Choudhury at University of Dhaka (Feb 2015)
Born	(1936-06-23) June 23, 1936 Baroikhali village, Sreenagar, Munshiganj District, Bengal Presidency, British India
Nationality	Bangladeshi
Alma mater	University of Dhaka The University of Leeds Leicester University

Serajul Islam Choudhury (born June 23, 1936) is a Bangladeshi literary critic, public intellectual, social and political analyst, activist, historian, educationist, editor, translator, columnist, and professor emeritus at the University of Dhaka. He is the editor of Natun Diganta. Considered the foremost oppositional intellectual of Bangladesh, he authored nearly a hundred books and countless essays in Bangla, and English.

Early life and education

He was born in Baroikhali village under Sreenagar thana in Munshigonj Zilla. His father was Hafizuddin Chowdhury. In his early life, he liked to build his career as a novelist, but his father wanted him to join the civil service after a degree in economics. On a note of compromise, he enrolled with the English department at the University of Dhaka after an intermediate of arts degree in 1952, obtained from Notre Dame College, preceded by matriculation from St. Gregory's High School in 1950. He received his master's degree in 1956 and worked briefly with Haraganga College in Munshiganj and Jagannath College in Dhaka. He completed his post-graduate diploma in English studies at Leeds University UK and for doctoral studies at Leicester University, UK.

Works

Choudhury joined as a lecturer at Department of English, Dhaka University in 1957, setting out also to be a writer. He decided not to become a bureaucrat which many around him were doing then. He counted two reasons for his becoming a writer: his work at the university, which ensured that he would not be transferred and which made scope for him to read a lot, and his temperament. In more than four decades that followed, he taught students, wrote essays, headed the department, became Dean, spawned off several academic and research processes, initiated doctoral dissertation guidance at the department, started periodicals, founded study centers and remained involved in university politics. . Serajul Islam first initiated to offer PhD degrees in English at Dhaka university. He edited journals, the university journals of arts and letters in Bangla and English — Dhaka Visvavidyalay Patrika for 15 years and Dhaka University Studies for nine years. He founded the Visvavidyalay Patrika. He founded the University Book Centre in 1978 and the Centre for Advanced Research in Humanities in 1986. In keeping with the spirit, he now runs a centre called Samaj Rupantar Adhyayan Kendra (centre for studies on social transformation), which works towards waking people up to a democracy which would mean ‘equality of rights and opportunities. Rights being equal would not mean anything unless the opportunities remain equal.’

Bibliography

Choudhury wrote books in Bengali Language.

• Anveshana (Hardcover,) [1]
• Nirbacita Praandha, (1999)[2]
• Rashtra o samskrti (1993)[3]
• Nazrul Islam (1994) [4]
• Banalira Jaya Parajaya (1994) [5]
• Apanajana (1992) [6]

External links

• Azfar Hussain's article, Bangladesh's foremost oppositional intellectual on Serajul Islam Choudhury
• A public intellectual turns 80: Serajul Islam Choudhury interviewed by Kaiser Haq
• Serajul Islam Choudhury: a tribute by Syed Manzoorul Islam
• Serajul Islam Choudhury: Our leading public intellectual by Azfar Hussain