Newsletter 62 - 24 May 2006
Last updated: 8 November 2011
SWEDISH SOUTH ASIAN STUDIES NETWORK
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SASNET News
• Kunal Sen visited Lund to discuss the ANERI project
The European Commission has decided to launch an Academic Network for European Research related to India (ANERI). The project aims to strengthen the ties between the European Union and India, and seeks to promote funding for specific types of India-focused research within the field of contemporary social science. It might result in the setting up of a European Centre for Indian Studies. The project is prepared by a team consisting of Dr Willem van der Geest, European Institute for Asian Studies (EIAS) in Brussels (team leader), Dr Kunal Sen, University of East Anglia, UK (as economic analyst), and Dr Lawrence Saez, London School of Economics, UK (as political analyst). They currently visit institutions and meet researchers all over Europe in order to work out a strategy for the network. On Wednesday 3 May 2006 Dr. Kunal Sen (photo above) came to Lund for a fruitful meeting with SASNET’s Staffan Lindberg and Lars Eklund. Together they discussed the role SASNET and Swedish researchers could possibly play in the further development of ANERI. More details about the ANERI project.
During the first week of May 2006 Tejaswini Niranjana, Director for the Centre for the Study of Culture and Society in Bangalore, India, visited Roskilde University in Denmark
• Kolkata journalists visited SASNET’s root node office
Kusum Jain and Geetesh Sharma (photo to the right), journalists, poets as well as social activists from Kolkata, India, visited SASNET’s root node office in Lund on Monday 8 May 2006. They have a long-standing relation to Sweden, being partly involved in the Indo-Swedish translation project. In 1995 they also published a book titled ”Double Fantasy” in collaboration with the Swedish writer Tomas Andersson. The main purpose of their current visit to Sweden is to participate in a conference with the Green Party of Sweden to be held in Borås, but they will also among other things visit Indian associations in Göteborg and Oslo, Norway. Mr. Sharma has recently published a book titled ”Whither Secularism” (Dialogue Society 2006), about how a crisis ridden Indian society may overcome its problems. Ms. Jain is President of the organsiation Women’s Sahayog, based in Kolkata.
Research Community News
• Swedish support to research projects related to Sexual and Reproductive Health in India
In March 2005 the Swedish Government decided on a new country strategy for India for the period 2005-2009. The strategy implies a new kind of co-operation between Sweden in India mainly focusing on technical assistance and building partnerships of mutual interests between Swedish and Indian actors. The focus areas are: Respect for democracy and human rights; Environmental protection that will benefit the poor; and Scientific cooperation in selected areas that will benefit the poor. In light of the comparative advantage that Sweden has in Sexual and Reproductive Health & Rights, Children's Rights and HIV/AIDS, the Swedish International Development Cooperation Agency, Sida, now therefore supports and allocates funds to a number of projects and partnerships involving Swedish universities.
The Faculty of Health Sciences, Linköping University, and the Department of Health Sciences and Nature, Skövde University get substantial support for their collaboration project with Pravara Institute of Medical Sciences in Loni. The project is titled ”Developing a multi-sectoral approach model to sustainable health and development through institutional collaboration between India and Sweden”. It was formally launced on 13 March 2006 when Maria Norrfalk, Director General of Sida, visited the project run in India (see photo from Ms. Norrfalk’s visit) (more information about the project).
International Maternal and Child Health (IMCH), Department of Women’s and Children’s Health, Uppsala University, is involved in two major projects; ”Integrating social support for reproductive and child health and rights, Phase II” (more information); and ”Increasing Access to Comprehensive Abortion Care Services in India” (more information); and the Division for Reproductive and Perinatal Health, Department of Woman and Child Health, Karolinska Institutet Medical University, Stockholm, is involved in another Sida funded project titled ”Developing inter-institutional collaboration between institutions in India and Sweden for improving midwifery and emergency obstetric care services in India” (more information).
• Prof. Sujata Patel holds the keynote lecture at the 19th ECMSAS conference in Leiden
The 19th European Conference on Modern South Asian Studies (ECMSAS) will be held 27–30 June 2006 in Leiden, the Netherlands. A list of the 49 panels approved for the conference is also available – go for the panels list. The keynote lecture, titled ”Is there a South Asia? Beyond Colonial Modernity and its Binaries” will be given by Prof. Sujata Patel of the Sociology Department of the University of Pune, India.
On one of the conference days a special roundtable will be held in the framework of the newly established research programme ”Illegal but Licit: Transnational Flows and Permissive Polities in Asia”. The roundtable is organized by Prof. Willem van Schendel (University of Amsterdam and International Institute for Social History) and Dr Sikko Visscher (University of Amsterdam/Asian Studies in Amsterdam). The conference will be held in Leiden University’s Lipsius Building at Cleveringaplaats 1.
SASNET will be represented at the conference both by Prof. Staffan Lindberg (chairing panel No. 32 on ”Post Green Revolution Agrarian Transformation in South Asia: Ecology and Peasant Life under Globalization”) and by Lars Eklund. More information on the conference web site.
• Doctoral dissertation in Oslo about changing consumption in Kerala
Harold Wilhite, Research Fellow at the Centre for Development and the Environment (SUM), University of Oslo, Norway, will defend his doctoral thesis, titled ”Why is consumption changing in Kerala? An ethnographic approach”, on Friday 2 June 2006, 13.15. Before that, at 10.15 he will give his trial lecture about ”Everyday technologies and the transformation of life worlds”. The thesis deals with cross-cultural perspectives from India and Norway on consumption, socio-cultural change and sustainability. It tries to develop a policy-relevant theory of consumption which takes due account of the socio-cultural dynamics of change. Indian findings are compared with Norwegian consumption practices in order to highlight important socio-cultural determinants of consumption such as comfort, identity, time use and notions of the "good life". Venue: Auditorium 2, Georg Sverdrups hus, Oslo. More information.
• Göteborg seminar in honour of Björn Hettne when he retires
In June 2006 eminent Swedish South Asia researcher Professor Björn Hettne, Dept. of Peace and Development Research (PADRIGU), School of Global Studies, Göteborg University, retires from his position. Prof. Hettne, who is also Chairman of SASNET’s board, has been working on International studies since the 1970’s. In his honour, Göteborg University arranges a seminar (for invited guests only) at Jonsered Manor 14–15 June 2006. The seminar is titled ”New Scenes for International Cooperation – Björn Hettne and Internationalisation of Higher Education”. Professor S. D. Muni, Centre of South, Central & South East Asian Studies at Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi, India, will be one of the keynote speakers at the seminar.
• Columbia University multimedia presentation of Dr. Ambedkar's famous work
The Columbia Center for New Media Teaching and Learning (CCNMTL) in New York USA enhances teaching and learning through the purposeful use of new media. CCNMTL builds course web sites to develop advanced projects that act as demonstrations and explorations of pedagogical and curricular possibility. One such South Asia related project recently published is a multimedia presentation of Dr. B. R. Ambedkar's famous ”The Annihilation of Caste” presentation. Ambedkar was the first highly educated (Ph.D., Columbia University), politically prominent member of the Hindu "Untouchable" castes., and wrote this paper for the 1936 meeting of a group of liberal Hindu caste-reformers in Lahore. After reviewing the speech, conference organizers revoked Dr. Ambedkar's invitation. He then self-published the work, which became an immediate classic. It is now being edited for classroom use by Fran Pritchett; with explanatory annotations; and several other major texts by Dr. Ambedkar. Faculty interview videos have also been added and a timeline created. Go for the Ambedkar project.
• Journal of South Asian Development (JSAD) now fully available online
The peer-reviewed Journal of South Asian Development (JSAD) is now fully available online. The biannual magazine is published by Sage India and distributed worldwide. It is edited by Rajat Ganguly, Senior Lecturer in Politics & International Studies at the School of Development Studies, University of East Anglia, Norwich, UK. The first volume came out in April 2006, and includes articles by Pranab Bardhan about ”Awakening Giants, Feet of Clay: A Comparative Assessment of the Rise of China and India”; by Premachandra Athukorala about ”Outward-oriented Policy Reforms and Industrialisation: The Sri Lankan Experience”; Raymond C. Taras about ”Rising Insurgency, Faltering Democratisation in Nepal” and Joseph Devine about ”NGOs, Politics and Grassroots Mobilisation: Evidence from Bangladesh”. More information.
• Documentary films about Dalits in India and Nepal shown in Danish TV
During the period 8 May–14 June 2006, the Danish Radio broadcasts a documentary series of five TV programmes on Dalits in India and Nepal. Text (in Danish) plus photos and video clippings from the programmes also appear on an impressive sub site of the DR web site, http://www.dr.dk/uroerlige/da/forside/. The first programme is a shocking story about manual scavengers in India, and other programmes focus on items such as prostitution among badi women in Nepal, debt slavery, the jogini tradition in South India, and caste violence in Bihar. Go for the photo series, and the video clippings.
Summer and Winter schools
• Time to apply for participation in the 2006 Winter Course on Forced Migration in Kolkata
The Annual Winter Course on Forced Migration is again held in Kolkata, India, 1–15 December 2006. The course is held by the Mahanirban Calcutta Research Group (MCRG), popularly known as the Calcutta Research Group (CRG). This is public policy forum by a group of researchers, trade unionists, feminist thinkers and women's rights campaigners, academics, journalists, and lawyers, and CRG has become well known for its research, dialogues, and advocacy work in India and in the region of South Asia as a whole. The Winter Course on Forced Migration is an outcome of the ongoing and past work by the CRG, and other collaborating groups, institutions, scholars, and human rights and humanitarian activists in the field of refugee studies and the broad studies on displacement, human rights and humanitarian work for the victims of forced displacement. The duration of the full course is three months. A two and a half month long distance education programme precedes the fifteen-day Kolkata workshop. The programme is supported by the UNHCR, the Government of Finland, and the Brookings Institution. Applications reaching before 31 May will be considered for the course the same year. Applications reaching after that will be considered for the following year’s programme. More information.
Educational News
• Indian government decides to introduce 27 per cent quota for OBC students
On 23 May 2006 the Indian government decided to implement a 27 per cent quota for other backward classes (OBCs) in higher educational institutions from the academic year beginning June 2007, while increasing seats for general-category students. A meeting of the coordination committee of the United Progressive Alliance chose to enforce the measure by introducing a bill in the monsoon session of Parliament, which will begin sometime in July. The percentage of reservation for OBCs will be fixed at 27 per cent, in addition to the 22.5% of college places already "reserved" for Dalits, or untouchables, who are at the bottom of India's caste hierarchy, and tribal students. The decision comes amidst large-scale protests from medical students as well as business leaders and teachers all over India, who fear that it may lead to a drop in standards. More information.
Conferences and courses
• Stockholm conference about Swedes in India
A one-day conference titled ”Svenskarna i Indien” (The Swedes in India) is held in Stockholm on Thursday 17 August 2006, 08.30–17.00. The conference is organised by Föreningen Svenskar i Världen (SVIV) in collaboration with, among others, the Sweden-India Business Council, the Swedish Trade Council, Stockholm Chamber of Commerce, the Swedish Institute, and the Swedish Embassy in India. Eminent lecturers have been invited to present different aspects of Indian business, trade and culture of today. Ambassador Örjan Berner, General Secretary of SVIV, will introduce the conference, and the Indian Ambassaor to Sweden, Ms. Deepa Wadhwa, will talk about the political situation in India. Ann-Charlotte Sukhia will talk about ”Cultural Clashes between Indians and Swedes”, Percy Barnevik about ”Mass mobilisation of India’s poor – entrepeneurship as en engine of growth”, and Olle Wästberg about ”Collaboration on Research and Culture”. Venue: ALMEGA hall, Blasieholmsgatan 5, Stockholm. Register if you like to participate, before 15 July 2006. More information (as a pdf-file)
• South Asia related workshops at the 2006 World Water Week in Stockholm
The 2006 World Water Week will take place in Stockholm, Sweden, 20–26 August. The annual World Water Week in Stockholm has become a valuable meeting point and platform for the world’s water community. Usually a large number of the delegates for the workshops come from South Asia.
The overall theme for the 2006 World Water Week is “Beyond the River – Sharing Benefits and Responsibilities”, addressing livelihood improvement, land-based activities within a river basin, and society’s ability to cope with natural disasters. Ms. Sunita Narain, Centre for Science and Environment, India is one of the invited speakers for Workshop No. 2 on ”Water and Trade: Matching International Water Availability and Local Needs” (Tuesday 22 August). Dr. Arif Hasan, Urban Resource Centre, Pakistan, is invited speaker for Workshop No. 4 on ”Benefits and Responsibilities of Decentralised and Centralised Approaches for Management of Water and Wastewater” (Tuesday 22 August). Workshop No. 9 on ”Safe Water Storage and Regulation During Floods and Droughts” will be co-chaired by Prof. P. P. Mujumdar, Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore (Wednesday 23 August).
On Monday 21 August 2006, the Indian-Born scientist Prof. Asit K. Biswas, President of the Third World Centre for Water Management in Mexico will receive the 2006 Stockholm Water Prize. He will be given the prize from the hands of HM King Carl XVI Gustaf of Sweden, the Patron of the Stockholm Water Prize. His Prize Laureate Lecture is titled ”Challenging Prevailing Wisdoms”. More information on the World Water Week web site.
• Stockholm Conference on Environmental Law and Justice
An International Conference on Environmental Law and Justice will be held at Stockholm University, 6–9 September 2006. The conference is organised by Stockholm Environmental Law and Policy Centre, Among the invited speakers – scholars, judges, ambassadors etc. from all over the world – Associate Professor Bharat Desai, School of International Studies, Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi, India will speak about ”Environmental Justice in International Law-making Processes”. Prof. Balakrishnan Rajagopal (photo to the left), Associate Professor of Law and Development and Director for the MIT Program on Human Rights and Justice, will speak about ”Rights-talk versus Justice-Talk in Environmental Governance”. More information.
• Competing Narratives theme for the 21st Pakistan Workshop 2007
The 21st Pakistan Workshop will take place at Rook How in the Lake District, UK, 11–13 May 2007. The theme for the 2007 workshop will be ”Competing Narratives”, and is supposed to bring together anthropologists and sociologists whose research involves Pakistan, Pakistani diaspora and South Asian Islam. These workshops, organised by the Pakistan Studies Group, normally also attract scholars and researchers from a broad range of disciplines including historians, political scientists, economists and applied social scientists. Due to limited places, an early registration is needed. More information (as a pdf-file)
Important lectures and workshops
Rana P.B. Singh, Professor of Cultural Geography, Banaras Hindu University, Varanasi, India, will give two guest lectures at Oslo University College, Norway, on Tuesday 30 May 2006. The first lecture (10.00-12.00) will focus on ”Indian Village: Social (Caste) System, Changes and Challenges in Education”, and the second (13.00-15.00) deals with ”Kashi & Cosmos: Sacred Geography of Banaras”. Venue: Pilestredet 46, Oslo. More information about Prof. Singh’s tour to Scandinavia May–June 2006.
South Asia related culture in Scandinavia
• Documentary films about India screened at Göttingen International Film Festival – and in Bergen
Several documentary films about India are screened at the 8th Göttingen International Film Festival in Göttingen, Germany, 24–28 May 2006. As before, the film festival is organized by IWF Knowledge and Media Institute, and is open to all filmmakers, but especially those from Anthropology, Sociology, Folklore and neighbouring disciplines. The India related films to be shown are: Hammer and Flame by Vaughan Pilikian, on the maritime graveyards of Northern India where ocean liners are broken down piece by piece in an unending labour using only the simplest tools (Great Britain 2005); The Age of Reason by David MacDougall (Australia 2004); July Boys (From the Coding Culture Series) by Gautam Sonti (India 2006); Final Solution (Part one) by Rakesh Sharma (scene from the film on photo above), documenting the changing face of right-wing politics in India through a study of the 2002 genocide of Muslims in Gujarat (India 2004); and Notes From the Crematorium by R.P. Amudhan (India 2005). Venue: IWF premises, Nonnenstieg 72, Göttingen. Some of these films will also be screened at the Nordic Anthropological Film Association (NAFA) 26th International Film Festival, held in Bergen, Norway 8–10 June 2006.
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| The Kuttiyattam actress Kapila Nangiar in the centre, surrounded by Bubu Munshi-Eklund, Margareta Larsson from Sagohuset, the Director of Natana Kairali Mr. Gopal Venu, and the drummer Kalamandalam Rajeev. Lund, May 4, 2006. |
• Web site about Himalayan and Mongolian Buddhist Culture
The Tibetan Museum Society is a recently established non-profit association, dedicated to advocate museum exhibitions of Asian, mainly Buddhist, art and culture from ancient Mongolia and the Greater Himalayan Region (including India, Nepal and Bhutan). Through a broad range of programs and projects, the Society's two primary focuses are: 1) to provide financial support to selected museums that enrich the arts with display of historically significant representations of Buddhist culture and 2) to protect sacred, religious shrines, from which Buddhist art is gathered for public sale or display against removal without consent, artifacts of any kind.
Delgermaa Dagva-Hatchell is the Executive Director of the Tibetan Museum Society, based in Alexandra, Virginia, USA. The web site provides on-line access to photos of museum exhibition items around the World, books and articles on relevant issues, and even an Himalayan Internet shop. Go to the Tibetan Museum Society’s web site.
New and updated items on SASNET web site
Best regards,
Staffan Lindberg Lars Eklund
SASNET/ Swedish South Asian Studies Network
SASNET is a national network for research, education, and information about South Asia, based at Lund University. The aim is to encourage and promote an open and dynamic networking process, in which Swedish researchers co-operate with researchers in South Asia and globally.
The network is open to all sciences. Priority is given to co-operation between disciplines and across faculties, as well as institutions in the Nordic countries and in South Asia. The basic idea is that South Asian studies will be most fruitfully pursued in co-operation between researchers, working in different institutions with a solid base in their mother disciplines.
The network is financed by Sida (Swedish International Development Cooperation Agency) and by Lund University.
Postal address: SASNET – Swedish South Asian Studies Network, Scheelevägen 15 D, S-223 70 Lund, Sweden
Visiting address: Ideon Research Park, House Alfa 1 (first floor, room no. 2040), in the premises of the Centre for East and South East Asian Studies at Lund University (ACE).
Phone: + 46 46 222 73 40
Fax: + 46 46 222 30 41
E-mail: sasnet@sasnet.lu.se
Web site: http://www.sasnet.lu.se
Staff: Staffan Lindberg, director/coordinator & Lars Eklund, webmaster/deputy director
