by SUNITA SOHRABJI
President Obama presents Nobel Laureate Amartya Sen with a medal. PHOTO/AP
Nobel Laureate Amartya Sen, whose seminal research has examined the root causes of poverty, received the National Humanities Medal from President Barack Obama Feb. 13 at a ceremony at the White House.
“Sen is being awarded the 2011 National Humanities Medal for his insights into the causes of poverty, famine and injustice,” said a citation, presented to India’s most well-known economist along with the medal.
“By applying philosophical thinking to questions of policy, he has changed how standards of living are measured and increased our understanding of how to fight hunger,” read the citation.
At the presentation ceremony, Obama introduced the recipients of both the National Humanities Medal and the National Arts Medal. “Michelle and I love this event,” said the president. “This is something we look forward to every single year, because it’s a moment when America has a chance to pay tribute to extraordinary men and women who have excelled in the arts and the humanities, and who, along the way, have left an indelible mark on American culture,” he said.
“We are told we’re divided as a people, and then suddenly the arts have this power to bring us together and speak to our common condition,” said Obama.
Obama gave a shout-out to Sen, saying, “We even have an economist, which we don’t always get on stage.” The two were later seen offstage talking animatedly, according to several news sources.
Calls for comment to Sen’s office at Harvard University – where he serves as the Thomas W. Lamont University Professor in the Department of Economics and Philosophy – were returned by his assistant, who told India-West that Sen was currently traveling abroad and could not be reached.
In 1998, Sen received the Nobel Prize in Economics for his work as a whole. In a wide-ranging interview that same year with The Hindu newspaper, the Indian American economist said, “I don’t think I have done any stunning work in any particular field and economics is not a subject in which stunning work really comes like that.
“Economics is about understanding better the nature of the world – the economic world, the social world and to some extent the ethical world – in which we live. It is a matter of trying to gain a better grip on the things that affect our lives,” he said.
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