Photo: T. Otten
Tina Otten studied Ethnology, Ancient American Studies and Psychology at the Free University of Berlin. With the title Healing through Rituals. On how to deal with disease in the Rona people of the Orissa highlands, India, She received her doctorate in 2003. Subsequently, Otten worked as a lecturer at the Ruhr University in Bochum, the Free University Berlin, the Westphalian Wilhelms University Münster and other institutions in Germany. Tina Otten is currently a freelance lecturer.
Her scientific research interests are concentrated in the Indian region, with a special focus on Odisha's tribal areas. In these regions she works on topics related to social structure and globalization, oral traditions in India, gender and health, ritual and social structures, recent ethnographies of Central India and medical ethnology. Since 1997, she has repeatedly undertaken long-term research stays in the Indian highlands to study these topics. Together with Georg Pfeffer and Edward Simpson, she worked on several projects in Odisha, which included producing a documentary film about the changes in social life in Bisipada, Odisha, India.
