Panels

The panel aims to highlight various transcultural and multilingual ideas that have shaped contemporary South Asian society. It seeks to explore the need to examine the cultural plurality of pre-modern and early modern South Asia. The panel further seeks to discuss and therefore seeks presentations which deal with various modalities in which gender informs and underpins the formation of ideas, narratives, and conceptualization of roles, especially within South Asian religious-spiritual imaginaries. We particularly invite presentations that underscore the importance of lesser-known agents, texts and geographical locations in adding textures to the tapestry of twentieth century metanarratives like Pan-Buddhism, Pan-Islamism, and Pan-Asian messianic aspirations and evaluate how transversal lenses help us mediate these complexities of thought-overlaps.

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The aim of this panel is to evaluate the impact of socio-political and cultural transformations on gender representations in diverse media forms in South Asia - from celluloid to digital cinema and from television to streaming platforms. Since the 20th century, the audiovisual cultures in South Asia have undergone massive changes in response to political, religious and cultural shifts as well as technological transformations. For instance, cross-currents of increasingly dominant right-wing ideologies and radical protests are reflected in the prevailing audiovisual culture in India (Gehlawat 2024; Paunksnis 2023). Similarly, the onset of a neoliberal postfeminist culture, which has altered the rhetoric of women’s empowerment (Gill 2007), has pervaded the Indian media ecosystem (Chakraborty Paunksnis 2023). This demands painstaking appraisals of mediated representations employing a critical cultural studies framework. Such local examples must be analyzed vis-à-vis technological changes as the pervasive nature of mediatization has strong impact on society (Hepp 2020). Besides interrogating the myriad representations of gender in various South Asian media forms, the papers in this panel will also consider the following questions: How are media’s representations of gender influenced by the ideologies of the political establishments? Does globalization and neoliberal postfeminist culture contribute to the discourse of women’s empowerment? What impact of shifting patriarchal power dynamics is visible on the representation of masculinity? How do the mediated representations respond to the questions of intersectionality and Queer subjectivity? In which way can the gender question be positioned vis-à-vis the interplay between modernity and indigenous knowledge systems? How is gender’s negotiation with technology represented in media? Is the language of gender-based movements re-formulated in continually transforming media ecosystems? The panel seeks to create a discursive space for facilitating contesting arguments on the proposed theme. It welcomes contributions interrogating the varied representations of gender dynamics in South Asian media.

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This panel delves into the multifaceted world of mantras, emphasizing their significance as sacred utterances used in rituals, prayers, contemplation, and wellness practices. Originating in southern Asia, mantras have played pivotal roles in rites, meditation, worship, and healing traditions spanning millennia. The research explores the materiality and performative aspects of mantras, examining their roles in healing and magical practices across cultures. Central to our investigation are questions about how mantras function through various sensory modalities and the kinesthetic elements that enhance their transformative potential. Our interdisciplinary approach considers mantras not merely as linguistic constructs but as dynamic, multimodal experiences expressed through manuscripts, stones, voice, meditation, movement, amulets, tattoos, aroma, and attire. This panel features contributions from scholars in anthropology, religious studies, history, and digital humanities, drawing insights from ongoing research initiatives such as the MANTRAMS project. Discussions encompass the global dissemination of mantras through diasporic networks, new religious movements, and digital platforms, highlighting their enduring significance in traditional and modern contexts.

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Dr Jondhale Rahul Hiraman and Dr Sayantan Mondal launched an ambitious research and digitisation project on Dalit Literature in Marathi and Bangla Dalit periodicals which is now being further developed in partnership with Prof. Judith Misrahi-Barak and Dr Nicole Thiara. This project invites one to the unchartered territory of Dalit periodicals and traces the complex relationship some of these periodicals shared with the little magazine movement, especially its innovative production-circulation strategies and disruptive energy that challenged the mainstream literary status quo. What prism do these little magazines of the second half of the 20th c. offer for reading 21st c. India? Why is it crucial that they should be preserved and why is this not only about the preservation of the past but also about the salvaging of the future? Why should Western societies and cultures be committed to the project? Additionally to raising such questions, this panel introduces the wider project and focuses on four distinct new areas of research: Dr Jondhale Rahul Hiraman will present on ‘Marathi Dalit Periodicals and the representation of the Caste Question’. Dr Sayantan Mondal presents: ‘Recovering the Ephemeral: Production and Circulation of Bangla Dalit Periodicals’. Dr C. Chandra Sekhar will explore ‘Echoes of Change: Dalit Contributions to Christian Periodicals in Colonial Telugu India’. Dr J. Balasubramaniam will discuss ‘Unfurling Voices: The Role of Tamil Dalit Print Media from 1869 to 1970 in Shaping Public Discourse and Modern Identities’ We also invite paper proposals that critically engage with the under-researched area of Dalit Periodicals within the broad research field of Dalit Studies.

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This panel delves into the critical dimensions of governance and politics in Bangladesh, examining transformations driven by endogenous mechanisms and ideational shifts. Dr. Mohit Ul Alam’s paper on the student quota reform movement elucidates the historical and ideological complexities of state policies, particularly the contentious reservation system for descendants of 1971 Liberation War veterans. Alam contends that despite judicial reforms, the ruling party’s use of force to suppress protests underscores broader struggles over political dominance and ideological control. Dr. Md. Manzoorul Kibria’s research on the Halda River highlights the socio-political ramifications of water governance, illustrating how corruption, environmental mismanagement, and local activism influence ecological sustainability. His study provides insights into the roles of government agencies, local communities, and NGOs in addressing the threats to one of Bangladesh’s key ecological resources. Rajib Nandy’s exploration of mobile journalism (MoJo) investigates how digital technologies are transforming news production and dissemination in Bangladesh. While MoJo empowers citizen journalists and facilitates real-time reporting, Nandy identifies infrastructural deficiencies and ethical concerns that hinder its full potential. Finally, Dr. ASM Mostafizur Rahman’s paper presents a historical institutional analysis of Bangladesh’s socio-economic transformations. Rahman challenges conventional theories of exogenous donor-driven pressure, arguing that policy learning and ideational shifts within the state have been pivotal in Bangladesh’s globalization through the garment industry. Collectively, these papers explore the multifaceted challenges of governance in Bangladesh, from higher education to environment, media, and industry. The panel offers a nuanced understanding of how societal forces and governance structures interact with endogenous pressures, shaping Bangladesh’s political and economic transformation.

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Muslims in India are currently facing multifaceted challenges, including political and economic marginalization, physical degradation, and attacks on their religious and cultural expressions. This panel endeavors to analyze the character and underlying causes of anti-Muslim violence within the Indian context. Specifically, it seeks to address whether this violence is a consequence of the prevailing political supremacy of Hindutva or if it is animated by the country's political structure and culture. The panel also aims to identify the social and political transformation that the Hindutva regime is producing today. It seeks to identify and evaluate both historical ruptures and continuities represented by this regime. In addressing these inquiries, the panel proposes to uncover and interrogate the epistemologies and strategies that have come to facilitate, justify, and obscure anti-minority violence in India. We invite an investigation of diverse facets such as geographical variations, institutional frameworks encompassing courts and bureaucracies, and social domains including family, community, and religious establishments. We seek to illuminate the discernments of Muslim life experiences and ethical dimensions, with the overarching goal of refining the understanding of Muslim subjectivities to develop theoretical frameworks for comprehending the Indian state, its legal system, and political landscape. Additionally, the panel invites papers that deliberate on narratives of resistance, reparative measures, and reconstruction strategies, and critically evaluate the potential and limitations of existing political discourses—such as those related to citizenship, Islam, and syncretism—on the trajectory of Muslim and minority futures in India. This panel is sponsored by South Asian Muslim Studies Association and presentations will be considered for a publication output.

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This double panel brings together new research in queer South Asian diaspora studies with an emphasis on political, cultural and creative forms of resistance and expression. We are particularly interested in: • The emergence of transnational queer South Asian networks from the 1970s to the present day; • The articulation of queer South Asian identities through/against queer and feminist vocabularies in North America and Europe; • Creative forms of queer resistance and/or expression, especially in terms of gender, racialisation, caste, and class; • Queer archives: methodologies for apprehending the queer South Asian diaspora (eg. oral history; ‘absences’ of material; new kinds of archives); • ‘Decolonial’ approaches to queer diaspora studies; • Queering the Brown Atlantic: new theoretical and historical routes through queer South Asian diasporas.

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Scholars studying agrarian transition in the countries of the global south have discussed the existence of dynamism within agriculture, the possibility of varied solutions to the agrarian question and multiple transition pathways of agrarian change. By spotlighting the economic dynamism and differentiation at work in the rural economy, the panel aims to explore the contemporary processes of agrarian change in South Asia, and the implications of intensifying capitalist development on agrarian lives and livelihoods. The panel seeks an interdisciplinary investigation of the social relations and dynamics of production, property and power in agrarian and labour relations. Restructuring of production and exchange in agriculture and the resultant reconfiguration of the ways in which households reproduce themselves in this part of the world necessitate developing new approaches to studying agrarian change as well as adding new strands of empirical work to unpack the nature of the contemporary agrarian question. Interactions between caste, class, and marginalised communities in the rural, peasant autonomy, deagrarianisation, repeasantisation and emergent patterns of migration, urbanisation and non-farm employment are of particular interest. The panel invites theoretical and empirical papers that discuss the processes and trajectories of agrarian change in South Asia and speak to the problematics of production, accumulation and politics, and welcomes contributions from economists, historians, anthropologists and other related disciplines.

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This panel, that we hope to develop across multiple sections, aims to explore the experiences of political prisoners in colonial and post-colonial South Asia. We are particularly keen to understand the complex interaction between carceral institutions and experiences as reflected in a range of disciplines. We thus hope to make visible those experiences, figures, and relationships of power that have been addressed by scholarship only marginally – if at all. Though often understood as the ultimate site of state-administered power, the seclusion and secrecy of prisons often replicate aspects of the private sphere, therefore existing as a liminal space. On the one hand, abuses of power by agents of the state foster an environment of de-humanising brutality; on the other, prisons see the formation of solidarity networks, coping strategies, and forms of resistance. Scholarship on South Asia has only sparsely focused on questions of political imprisonment, and the elements of control as well as the deviant possibilities within the prison space. Further, these conversations tend to be rooted, and therefore structured around specific disciplines. Since the penal apparatus exists as a space with diverse actors, players, experiences and expressions, this panel wants to initiate an in-depth interdisciplinary conversation around political imprisonment in South Asia. We are interested in exploring the structures political imprisonment, how judicial and administrative classifications shape the prisoners’ experiences, prisoners’ experiences and potentials of resistance shaped inside and outside of the prison, the discourses of empires, nation-states and media –largely, the prison question in South Asia. Categories like class, caste, ethnicity, and gender are some of the windows which will inform our exploration of South Asian political prisoners. Overall, this panel critically enriches the scholarship on South Asian activism, colonial and post-colonial alike, through the discussion of the overlooked yet crucial aspect of political prisoners’ experiences.

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Amidst precipitating socio-political contestations, acute inequalities, glaring gaps in availability of key civic services, increased strain on resources, rising hostilities and marked intolerance of the ‘other’, it becomes critical to pay heed to the myriad negotiations that shape everyday modes of inhabitation and existence for diverse classes and communities within expanding cities. Our sprawling urban centres serve as ready sites, where many of these negotiations play out. At one level, cities offer prospects of economic advancement, upward mobility and improved standards of living. At another, they also engender exclusion and strife. When particular resident groups feel threatened, besieged and cornered within a city, it is not just their lives that are reconfigured, their inhabited urbanscapes are also reoriented. This panel seeks proposals that uncover different experiences of disenfranchisement, exclusion and marginalisation within the urban—be it on the basis of class, caste, gender, ethnicity, religion, community, differential access to infrastructure and technology, or any other reason. Possible methodological approaches may vary to include—primary field survey, data collection, ethnographic work, personal interviews, community engagement, archival exploration, analysis of urban planning and land use patterns, and more. The list is only indicative and not restrictive by any means. We are interested in contributions which deliberate on changing urban landscapes, and the ways in which different resident groups make sense of, negotiate with and respond to these changes. The panel welcomes both contemporary and historical experiences. It invites paper proposals that unpack different modes of inhabiting, navigating, engaging with and laying claims to the urban in South Asia.

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