Anokha Venugopal OC ‘23

 

Keystone Foundation, India (2023-25)

Anokha Venugopal (she/her) ‘23 is a visual learner. As an Environmental Studies major and French minor, Anokha is passionate about utilizing media, specifically photography and videography, as a tool for social and environmental change. From working as a media intern for Buzz Women, an India-based NGO addressing poverty amongst rural women, to studying sustainable development with the International Sustainable Development Studies Institute in Thailand, Anokha’s EOS 7D camera has remained a constant companion in her travels. At Oberlin, Anokha’s interests in media and environmental communications motivated her to work as a Photo Editor for the Oberlin Review, Public Outreach board member for the Green Edge Fund and Asian Diaspora Coalition, contributing photographer for the Office of Communications, and Sustainability Intern for the City of Oberlin. As a Shansi Fellow, Anokha hopes to explore and document local conservation systems and climate mitigation efforts across Asia. She believes in using her storytelling skills to highlight communities and individuals whose stories are often overlooked.

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Insane/Mundane/Between Frames
Insane/Mundane/Between Frames

By Anokha Venugopal ‘23, Keystone Foundation Fellow

There is the beautiful mundane, like the dogs I say hi to on my way home. There is also the beautiful insane: being able to spend a week in Mudumalai Tiger Reserve for ‘work’; groggily answering the field center door at 6:30 am to Justin Anna (Anna: older brother, a term of respect) armed with a smile and a pair of binoculars, asking me if I’m ready to go birdwatching. We walk down the road, through a small clearing in the bushes on the side of the road, and find ourselves in a vast grass landscape. Frozen, heads tilted all in the same way, staring at us are a group of white spotted deer, many of them with fuzzy antlers burgeoning from their heads, boys to men.