Centre of South Asian Studies: Seminars: Recent Episodes
Cambridge University
Audio files of the weekly seminars held at the Centre of South Asian Studies, as well as of other events in the Centre's academic programme.
A panel discussion hosted by the Centre of South Asian Studies, moderated by Dr Kamal Munir (Director, Centre of South Asian Studies) with a panel comprising Dr Natalya Naqvi (LSE), Omar Iqtidar (Citibank), Dr Adeel Malik (Oxford University), and M.K. Syed (Coutts Bank).
Ms Jahangir delivered the annual Centre of South Asian Studies Lecture on South Asian Public Affairs.
Professor Venkatachalapathy, of the Madras Institute of Development Studies, examines the ways in which swearing and abusive language have changeover the years, and how this reflects and informed changes in Tamil-speaking society.
The 43rd annual Kingsley Martin Memorial Lecture was delivered by Professor Ajay Skaria, of the University of Minnesota, who imagines thinking about religion alongside Gandhi: using some of Gandhi's comments and writings to pursue questions which were not those Gandhi was considering, in a process he calls a 'faithful betrayal'.
Dr Sherman, of the London School of Economics, examines one of the pillars of Nehruvian India: socialism. She demonstrates how India had, by 1960, developed its own distinctive brand of socialism and socialist thought and how this more 'individualistic' socialism shaped Indian society, politics and economy.
Dr Buehler, of the School of Oriental and African Studies, introduces a legal and constitutional history of Indonesia before going on to examine the role of Islamist activists looking to create a constitution based on Shari'a law. He also looks at how the nature of Indonesia's democracy shapes the way in which politicians present themselves to the electorate with regard to Islam and piety.
Professor Brown, of Royal Holloway, University of London, examines empirical and historical data on China and India, investigating the role of the state and changing strategies to achieve success in a new global environment.
Dr Condos, of Queen Mary, University of London, investigates the representations of colonial British character. He argues that the commonly presented traits of stoicism and courage masked an underlying fear and vulnerability, and that the pervasive anxiety in British colonial society precipitated violence and led to the placing of absolute power being placed in the hands of remote colonial officials.
Professor Su from Mandalay Technological University and a Charles Wallace Burma Trust Visiting Fellow at the Centre of South Asian Studies, examines the nature of the architecture and cultural heritage of central Yangon, arguing that, although both authenticity and integrity have to some extent been compromised, it still reflects the UNESCO World Heritage Convention Operational Guidelines – ‘The respect due to all cultures requires that cultural heritage must be considered and judged primarily within the cultural contexts to which it belongs’.
Activist and writer Harsh Mander delivers the inaugural Centre of South Asian Studies Lecture on Public Policy, examining the invisibility of poverty in Indian society.
Dr Almeida introduces the topic of her forthcoming book about Anglo-Indians in Britain and the ways in which the adjusted their identities to fit in with the country in which they found themselves.
Dr Hassan, of the Centre for Equity Studies - Missal, New Delhi, investigates the challenges facing minority groups in South Asia, particularly in the face of majoritarian constructions of national identities. He advocates an increased role for states, working together regionally, in protecting and advancing the rights of religious, ethnic caste and linguistic minority groups.
Professor Ahuja (University of Göttingen) investigates the intense period of industrial unrest that followed the end of the Second World War, unsettling social and economic structures and changing the regime of labour regulation with lasting effects.
In the 1950s a small group of researchers initiated a conversation, fuelled by bouts of intense fieldwork, about land, kinship and social order in rural Sri Lanka. The research was revisited in the 1980s. The third scene in the lecture is contemporary, looking at how the rural has become synonymous with poverty and its pathological consequences – self-harm and suicide, alcohol abuse and violence. What links these scenes, and what will become the subject-matter for this lecture is, in Raymond Williams’ words, “a problem of perspective”.
Dr Iqtidar introduces her work into piety and liberalisation in Islamic thought among migrant populations from the Tribal Areas of Pakistan.
In this seminar, Dr Guha critiques the ‘archaeology of origins’, which is on the rise within South Asia, and considers the practices and visual documents of archaeology as artefacts of history.
Professor Gayer of CNRS/CERI - Sciences Po, Paris, examines cases in which communities in Indian cities overcome tensions to resist communal violence and how different religious communities do, in some cases, co-exist.
Professor Simpson, of the School of Oriental and African Studies, relates the findings of his research project into the changes found in Indian villages one the past 60 years.
The Dr B.H. Farmer Seminar. Professor O'Hanlon examines the letters written in India by women in the eighteenth century, revealing what they can tell us about gender and society.
Dr Zavos, University of Manchester, explores the transformation of ideas of devotional service and charity in the context of diasporic identity formation amongst South Asian communities in Britain. The paper is preceded by a tribute to the Centre's former Director, Professor Sir Christopher Bayly, following his tragic loss.
Dr Bhardwaj-Datta (University of Cambridge) investigates Delhi's gendered spaces and how they were reordered by the aftermath of Partition, looking at how social space was redefined, presenting a new social history of the city and the villages on the urban fringe.
Professor Fuller, of the London School of Economics, examines how official anthropologists overcame the empiricism of nineteenth century work on caste and religion, and investigates why the impact of their work was limited in informing the political situation in colonial India.
Dr Amrith, of Birkbeck, University of London, details the various crossings of the Bay of Bengal, as world powers sought access to new resources in the East, and various waves of migrants crossed the ocean in search of new lives, or in flight from drought and other disasters, all of which created some of the most diverse and dynamic societies. The seminar also charts the decline of these movements, as patterns of connection were constrained by economic and environmental pressures in the early-mid 20th century.
Kingsley Martin Memorial Lecture - Professor Blom Hansen examines the relationship of sacrifice and asceticism to upper-caste Hindu traditions, arguing that too much emphasis is placed on renunciation as the reason for the success of the success of a variety of social and political causes in South Asia. This is shown, he says, by the way that sacrifice has influenced a number of other movements which include activity among marginalised communities as well.
Simon Layton investigates the discourses of 'piracy' and their decline throughout the nineteenth century in India.
Dr Kriti Kapila presented a paper detailing the often complex relationship between the legal system and popular culture in North India
Professor Raina, of Jawaharlal Nehru University, Delhi, examines debates in the sciences in India around the turn of the twentieth century.
Professor Dhruv Raina of Jawahrlal Nehru University, investigates controversies in the sciences in India around the beginning of the twentieth century.
Ali Khan, of the Faculty of History, investigates Muslim identity, society and politics through the Urdu-language poetry of the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries.
Dr Markus Daechsel of Royal Holloway, London, investigates urban development work in Pakistan in the 1950s and 1960s.
Rohit De of Cambridge University's Centre for History and Economics examines the constitutional contest between officials of the Indian state, welfare workers and prostitutes in the 1950s and 1960s.
Dr Pippa Virdee of De Montfort University, charts aspects of the recent history of Pakistan by examining the attitudes, culture and fortunes of the national airline.
Louise Tillin, from King's College, London, examines the relationship between politics and the provision of welfare in two Indian states.
Professor Robinson investigates the expansion and globalisation of the Muslim world by examining folk tales, astrology, astronomy, commodities and trade and the increasing interaction of the Muslim world with modernity.
Justin Jones discusses the role of Islamic courts in the 1920s and 1930s, examining the ways in which the courts maintained their relevance and influence in the face of the growing importance of the state courts in the national legal system. He argues that Islamic courts were able, contrary to established belief, to remain important in personal law, offering Muslim Indians, and particularly women, options when facing a personal legal dispute.
Dr Kumarasingham presented a paper detailing the different discussions between the British government and the soon-to-be-independent South Asian colonies, and how practical considerations led South Asian countries to seek Dominion status as an important stepping stone on the way to full independence.
Professor Kwon spoke of the often-neglected links between South Asia and South East Asia, in relation to the Cold War and post-colonial periods, arguing how we must understand the Cold War within a global history.
In the first South Asian Studies Seminar paper of Michaelmas 2013, Dr Harald Fischer-Tiné of the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology, Zurich, presented a paper which illuminated the life of the ‘unknown patriot’, whose legacy, and exile in London, Paris and Geneva from 1897 until 1930, has been re-examined and venerated in recent years, with various political and regionalist motivations. Dr Fischer-Tiné spoke of the emergence of transnational anti-colonial networks, and of Krishnavarma’s distinctly un-Gandhian approach to the freedom struggle, which has recently been memorialised in Gujarat with a remarkable, full-size replica of ‘India House’ – the Victorian North London townhouse which served as a hostel for patriotic Indian students in the early 20th century.
Behroze Gandhy, independent film-maker and critic, presents a discussion and screening of films by three Indian artists: M.F. Hussain, Tyeb Mehta and Akbar Padamsee. The sections of the seminar where the films were being screened have been removed from this audio file.
Professor Habib, visiting the University from NUEPA Delhi, attempts to investigate the intellectual nature of Bhagat Singh's legacy, rather than the more normal representation of the young activist as a martyr.