The International Dissertation Research Fellowship (IDRF) Photo Competition is offered every year to IDRF recipients. Prizes are awarded for the best single photo, the best self-portrait, and best photo essay following a vote by IDRF fellows and staff.
Alexander Brey: From Hunter to Guardian. This park ranger at the Dana nature reserve in Jordan once hunted the ibexes, hyenas, and chukar partridges that inhabit the nature reserve. Today he protects them from poachers and shares his experience and knowledge with visitors from around the world. Many of the prey depicted in early Islamic images of hunting and predation have been endangered by over-hunting and competition for grazing with pastoral animals like sheep and goats. In Jordan, ibexes, onagers, and oryxes only survive in parks like the Dana reserve. The park benefits from Jordanian royal patronage, blending a tradition of royal wildlife preserves that goes back to the ʿAbbasid period and earlier with more recent concepts framed in terms of conservation. Location: Jordan
IDRF Fellows Pick (tie)
Sahana Ghosh: A Bridge that Needs Mending. India-Bangladesh border, West Bengal: This colonial railway bridge across the river Dharala dangles, like a raw nerve-ending, as the river now marks the increasingly closed international border between these two nation-states. Part of the bridge, which lay on a thriving commercial route now totally severed, has disappeared, and the river has shifted course leaving vast sand banks exposed during winter. This picture, taken in December, shows schoolchildren watched over by the Indian Border Security Forces keeping guard by the bridge. Location: Coochbehar district, India
Fellowships Office Pick
Zoe Graham: Fishing Boat in Maputo Bay. A fishing boat that must have come in before the tide went out, men and women gathering around it, going about their daily routine. This is neighboring Catembe, reached by a bustling ferry that takes hundreds of people to and from Maputo city. This lonely fishing boat and the gentle movements around it, in the early hours of yet another scorching day, standing in stark contrast to the commuter frenzy, ticket salesmen cries and rattling ‘chope’ engines on the other side of Maputo Bay. Location: Catembe; Maputo, Mozambique
Self Portrait Competition
IDRF Fellows Pick
Shashank Saini: Blessings from Three Generations. Bibi(left) insisted that she wanted a picture taken with me. Her sister (center with child) was around too, so we invited her in the frame. Now, it didn’t make any sense to leave the mother-in-law (right) out either so we coaxed her to join in. The blessings came spontaneously! Location: Village Ghitorni, Delhi, India
Fellowships Office Pick
Margaret Hanson: Nauruz. Nauruz (New Year celebration). Location: Shymkent, Kazakhstan
Photo Essay Competition
IDRF Fellows Pick: Jacob Blanc
Fellowships Office Pick: Sahana Ghosh
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