"Between Law and Faith: Governance of custom and ritual in early colonial Bengal" lecture by Prof. Tanika Sarkar at Teen Murti House, Teen Murti Marg > 3pm on 5th December 2011
Time : 3:00 pm
Entry : Free (Seating on First-Come First-Served basis)
Event Details : The Nehru Memorial Museum and Library cordially invites you to The Public Lecture
on ‘Between Law and Faith: Governance of custom and ritual in early colonial Bengal’ by Prof. Tanika Sarkar, Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi.
Speaker's Comment : The paper looks at colonial strategies for the governance of Indian religions in the formative stage of the new state through the lens of widow immolation policies. Next to revenue matters, matters of faith constituted a critical site for knowledge and policy formation about Indian subjects. After briefly introducing the chief characteristics of the broad legal framework within which religious issues were raised and resolved, I will look closely at the different phases of the administration of immolations, contextualise and explain the shifts and try to identify the logic of the state behind the points of transition. I will look especially closely at the interactions between the state and Indian ritual specialists, traditional and modern, arguing that the opinions of the latter created an iron frame for state activities. It was only in the interstices of conflicting interpretations of sacred texts and customs that a reformist voice could emerge. It named itself as authentic faith rather than as modern liberalism.
A second register for my discussion is the new accent on the widow’s consent to immolations which colonial policies, guided by pandits’ interpretation, identified as the basis for the ritual. The bureaucratization of this category gave it a public visibility, status and function that had been missing in earlier versions of the rite. I will trace the growth of a new vocabulary of female will and consent which, eventually, would exceed the issue of her death by consent and would articulate itself as legal immunities and entitlements for her life, creating a basis for the notion of her rights.
Speaker : Professor Tanika Sarkar teaches Modern History, at Jawaharlal Nehru University, Delhi. She has also taught History at Indraprastha College, St. Stephen's College, Delhi, and at the University of Chicago and the University of Witswatersrand, Johannesberg, South Africa. She was recently elected as Visiting Fellow, Trinity College, Cambridge University in 2010.
Her publications include, Bengal 1928-1934 : The Politics of Protest, 1987. Andf Words to Win : " Amar Jiban ", A Modern Autobiography, 1997. She is also author of Hindu Wife, Hindu Nation : Religion, Community, Cultural Nationalism 2001. Her recent works include Rebels, Wives and Saints : Designing Selves and nation in Colonial Times , 2009 and a volume co edited with Sumit Sarkar, Women and Social Reform in Modern India:, 2008.
She is completing a monograph titled Between Faith and Law: Matters of Rights and Culture in Colonial Times. She is also working on a monograph entitled Gender and Sexuality in South Asia which has been commissioned by the Cambridge University Press, as a volume in the New Cambridge History of British India series. She is co editing with Sumit Sarkar a volume on Caste in Colonial India. Her most recent research concerns the history of municipal scavengers in 20th century Calcutta.
Related Events : Talks
Entry : Free (Seating on First-Come First-Served basis)
Place : Seminar Room, Nehru Memorial Museum & Library ( NMML ), Teen Murti House, Teen Murti Marg, New Delhi
Venue Info : Events | About | Map | Nearest Metro Station - 'Race Course(Yellow Line)'
Event Details : The Nehru Memorial Museum and Library cordially invites you to The Public Lecture
on ‘Between Law and Faith: Governance of custom and ritual in early colonial Bengal’ by Prof. Tanika Sarkar, Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi.
Speaker's Comment : The paper looks at colonial strategies for the governance of Indian religions in the formative stage of the new state through the lens of widow immolation policies. Next to revenue matters, matters of faith constituted a critical site for knowledge and policy formation about Indian subjects. After briefly introducing the chief characteristics of the broad legal framework within which religious issues were raised and resolved, I will look closely at the different phases of the administration of immolations, contextualise and explain the shifts and try to identify the logic of the state behind the points of transition. I will look especially closely at the interactions between the state and Indian ritual specialists, traditional and modern, arguing that the opinions of the latter created an iron frame for state activities. It was only in the interstices of conflicting interpretations of sacred texts and customs that a reformist voice could emerge. It named itself as authentic faith rather than as modern liberalism.
A second register for my discussion is the new accent on the widow’s consent to immolations which colonial policies, guided by pandits’ interpretation, identified as the basis for the ritual. The bureaucratization of this category gave it a public visibility, status and function that had been missing in earlier versions of the rite. I will trace the growth of a new vocabulary of female will and consent which, eventually, would exceed the issue of her death by consent and would articulate itself as legal immunities and entitlements for her life, creating a basis for the notion of her rights.
Speaker : Professor Tanika Sarkar teaches Modern History, at Jawaharlal Nehru University, Delhi. She has also taught History at Indraprastha College, St. Stephen's College, Delhi, and at the University of Chicago and the University of Witswatersrand, Johannesberg, South Africa. She was recently elected as Visiting Fellow, Trinity College, Cambridge University in 2010.
Her publications include, Bengal 1928-1934 : The Politics of Protest, 1987. Andf Words to Win : " Amar Jiban ", A Modern Autobiography, 1997. She is also author of Hindu Wife, Hindu Nation : Religion, Community, Cultural Nationalism 2001. Her recent works include Rebels, Wives and Saints : Designing Selves and nation in Colonial Times , 2009 and a volume co edited with Sumit Sarkar, Women and Social Reform in Modern India:, 2008.
She is completing a monograph titled Between Faith and Law: Matters of Rights and Culture in Colonial Times. She is also working on a monograph entitled Gender and Sexuality in South Asia which has been commissioned by the Cambridge University Press, as a volume in the New Cambridge History of British India series. She is co editing with Sumit Sarkar a volume on Caste in Colonial India. Her most recent research concerns the history of municipal scavengers in 20th century Calcutta.
Related Events : Talks
"Between Law and Faith: Governance of custom and ritual in early colonial Bengal" lecture by Prof. Tanika Sarkar at Teen Murti House, Teen Murti Marg > 3pm on 5th December 2011
!["Between Law and Faith: Governance of custom and ritual in early colonial Bengal" lecture by Prof. Tanika Sarkar at Teen Murti House, Teen Murti Marg > 3pm on 5th December 2011]()
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Monday, December 05, 2011
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