I am a Jewish Refugee from Vienna who was thrown out of her High School in 1938 after Hitler annexed Austria. An odyssey via Yugoslavia, Albania, Italy and Germany helped me to reach England in April 1939. (see my autobiography "Swimming Upstream").
I began my working life as a machinist in one of London's East End Sweat shops and continued sewing soldiers uniforms in Manchester during the war. In 1945 I started a four year evening classes course in "Industrial Administration" at the end of which I was given the "Sir Murdoch McDonald Award" and got a scholarship to take the Oxford University Diploma in "Economics and Political Science" and received another scholarship to take a B.Sc Economics (Hon) at Manchester University. This degree provided the basis for a Rockefeller Research Fellowship that enabled me to prepare for a Ph.D. under the supervision of Profs.Max Gluckman, M. N. Srinivas and Sir W. Arthur Lewis. My Ph.D. thesis focused on "The Impact of the large South Indian Canal Irrigation System on the socio-economy of Mysore villages". This involved two years primary data collection between 1954-6 (one year in an irrigated and another year in a dry land village). In 1958 I received my doctorate.
After marrying Dr. A.L. Epstein a renown Social Anthropologist we got in 1959 Fellowships at the Australian National University which enabled us to conduct field studies in Papua New Guinea (PNG) for two years.
I have continued to update my Indian and PNG field studies over the past 55 years and have published 14 books and over 50 articles relating and analysing my Action Research. The PNG nominated me in 2004 for an OBE award for "Services rendered to Rural and Women's Development especially in PNG" In 2009 I was nominated as one of the "UK Achieving Women". My Indian Professional Colleagues organised in my honour in 2010 a three day "National Seminar on Economic and Socio-cultural Change in the era of Globalisation" at Mysore University. Recently the RAI (Royal Anthropological Institute) has presented me with the "2012 Lucy Mair Medallion" for my many years of "Innovative Poverty-focused Action Research". I published 14 books and over 50 articles and have done the background research for four Documentaries. Moreover, I have done numerous World Bank, UN, ADB. ILO and NGO consultansies.
