Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin - Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences - Institute of Asian and African Studies

South Asia Chronicle

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The South Asia Chronicle is a bilingual (German-English) online journal that functions as an interdisciplinary platform for exploring the history, politics, economics, society and culture of the region South Asia. In examining questions on a diverse range of themes and issues such as environment, sport, migration, gender, media, literature, and more, the "South Asia Chronicle" particularly takes international and transregional aspects into consideration.

The open-source journal is issued by the South Asia Studies Department of the Institute of Asian and African Studies and published by the Open-Access-Publikationsserver der Humboldt-Universität. It appears annually in winter, between December and February.

The volume is divided into three rubrics. The Focus is a thematic section with a guest editor in charge of commissioned articles that highlight cultural, social, economic and political topics of contemporary as well as historical relevance. The second rubric Forum provides a space for contributions that, while falling outside the thematic focus of the volume, are of particular contemporary or scholarly relevance. The final rubric is reserved for review essays that review recent literature on a topic and discuss it within a larger frame of the state of the art.

Instructions for Authors

If you are interested in guest editing a Focus section, please get in touch with us via email with your proposal, which should include an abstract and a tentative list of contributors.

Manuscripts for the Forum section can be submitted via email all year round for a first review. If your article is accepted, you will have the opportunity to revise it before final submission in March. Subsequently, the paper will undergo a second round of internal reviews. The annual volume is published in winter, usually between December-February.

The length of the articles can vary from 8,000-10,000 words or 55,000-80,000 characters. We reserve our right to shorten or edit articles.

Authors will find the detailed style sheet here:

English style sheet

 

Contributors are responsible for ensuring they hold the permission to reproduce any copyrighted material used in their articles. They are required to include the appropriate acknowledgements in the manuscript.

Editors

Editor (V.i.S.d.P) : Prof. Dr. Michael Mann,
Editorial Team: Johannes Heymann, Jannes Thode

Contact

southasiachronicle@hu-berlin.de

 

 

 

Volumes and thematical focus

 

2023 (13): Pashtun Millennials: Striving for Alternative Futures

Very often scholars resort to markers of group identification such as nation, race, ethnicity, or tribe to describe and explain socio-political phenomena in a certain geographic region and thus hegemonic narratives about groups of people emerge. An inherent challenge in such discussion is that these identifiers and narratives are often conceived of as static and immutable whereas lived reality is rapidly changing. Many public and academic discussions about ‘the Pashtuns’ are framed by stereotypes and prejudice that appear to no longer fit everyday life. Many young Pashtuns have set out to resist these prevalent narratives and they seek to define their Pashtun-ness (Pashtunwali) on their own terms. The articles in this FOCUS examine how young Pashtuns engage in these negotiations on various platforms, via multiple media and in diverse settings. A secondary aim of the FOCUS section is to explore the commonalities of this generation that we call Pashtun millennials. The articles explore the activities, practices, struggles, opportunities, hopes, and dreams of Pashtun millennials and how they make sense of themselves and their communities.

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The FORUM section provides a thematic and methodological variety of recent researches on South Asia. This year’s section covers articles with contents ranging from the agricultural practices in the Indian Brahmaputra valley to the cultural anthropology of water mother deities in the Chennai area.

Out of this year’s four contributions to the journal’s signature REVIEW ESSAY section, the two articles by Andrea Fleschenberg and Shehzad Ali take up the broader frame of the FOCUS section, Pakistani politics and society in general, and the Pakistan-Afghanistan border area in particular. Melitta Waligora’s essay focuses on an under-researched topic with its discussion of the biography of an Indian anarchist, and Jai Prasad reviews literature on the relations between Adivasi rights and Indian forest politics.

 

 

Editor (V.i.S.d.P): Prof. Dr. Michael Mann

Editors FOCUS: Mateeullah Tareen, Abida Bano, Sarah Holz

Editorial Team: Johannes Heymann, Jannes Thode, Lila Miran             

 

 

FOCUS
 
 
 
Abida Bano, Sarah Holz, Mateeullah Tareen Pashtun Millennials: Striving for Alternative Futures

Mateeullah Tareen

Pashtun Millennials' Political Participation
through Civic Engagement in Balochistan,
Pakistan

Rahat Shah, Sayed Attaullah Shah

Preserving Tradition and Embracing Change:
A Study of Masculinities in Pashtun Society
Muhammad Ali Dinakhel, Neelam Farid A Comparative Analysis of the Poetry of Pashtun
Female Millennials in Afghanistan and Pakistan
Aisha Alam, Abida Bano A Journey of a Thousand Miles:
A Step Toward a Pashtun Women's Movement in
Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, Pakistan
FORUM
 
Tanusree Paul Lockdown Humour and Gender Ideologies:
A Critical Analysis of Social Media Memes
Ayushi Dhawan

A Classic Case of "Waste Dumping"
or a Latent Opportunity:
Alang-Sosiya and the Making of the World's
Largest Shipbreaking Yards

Luise Haufe

Water Mothers, in the Village – in the City?
Amman Deities at Village Ponds in Peri-Urban
Chennai, South India

Marie Fritsch

Negotiating Adivasi Agency:
The Sarna Dharam Code in Jharkhand, India

Micha Knispel, Niels Kunicke, Geetika Kakati Charmeleons:
The Agrarian Practice on a Brahmaputra Island
REVIEW ESSAYS
Jai Prasad The Primacy of Politics:
Interrogating Indigeneity and Ecology in India
  Shehzad Ali The Politics of Migration, Peace, and Governance:
Reflections on the Recent Academic Discourse on
Refugees and the Post-Conflict Dynamics in the
Tribal Region of Pakistan
 
Melitta Waligora Nachdenken über Anarchismus in Südasien:
Ein Forschungsbericht
 
Andrea Fleschenberg Research Kaleidoscope:
Reading Notes on a South Asian Postcolonial
State

2022 (12): Christliche Mission in Indien vom 18. bis zum frühen 20. Jahrhundert. Fragestellungen, Herausforderungen und Perspektiven der Forschung / Christian Mission in India from the 18th to the Early 20th Century. Questions, Chanllenges and Perspectives of Research

The FOCUS section of the 2022 issue of the South Asia Chronicle engages with current academic questions, challenges, and perspectives of research on Christian missions in India between the 18th and early 20th century. Comprising already published, reworked, and new articles the section aims at presenting mile stone contributions to the thematic field as well as current research approaches. The original publication details of already published and reworked articles are mentioned separately for transparency reasons. Hence, the FOCUS brings together articles on a variety of topics ranging from Christian missionaries’ contact with slavery in India, their positioning in colonial contexts as well as the missionaries’ impact on knowledge production. The text selection specifically sheds light on the significant German missions’ historic entanglements with the sub-continent.HINDOO IDOLS.jpg

The FORUM section reflects the journal’s purpose to give space to various current research contributions with South Asia related topics. Hence, a broad range of articles from international scholars and diverse methodological backgrounds are represented in the 2022 issue – for instance, texts about Bodo Historiography, the Ahmadiyya community in Germany, and narratives in Indian cinema. 

In the Review Essay section co-editor Tobias Delfs provides insights into German naturalists in 18th and 19th century colonial India.

Editorial Team: Johannes Heymann, Lila Miran, Jannes Thode              

 

 

FOCUS
 
 
 
Tobias Delfs, Johannes Heymann Christliche Mission in Indien vom 18. bis zum frühen 20. Jahrhundert: Eine historisch-thematische Einführung

Tilman Frasch

„Deliver their Land from Error's Chain“: Mission und Kolonialherrschaft in Indien, 1793-1845

Johannes Heymann

„Auferstanden aus Ruinen?“: Der konstitutive Charakter der Great Rebellion für die Gossner Mission in Chhotanagpur, 1857-1869. Begriffe, Ereignisse, Erzählungen
Chris Wingfield South Asian Artefactual Histories from the London Missionary Society Museum, 1814-1826
Georg Berkemer Der Missionar und die Könige: Quellenkritische Überlegungen zu Ernst Pohls Aus den Anfängen unserer Breklumer Mission
Thomas Ruhland Between Grassroots-Scholarship and Commerce: The Trade in Natural History Specimens by the Moravian South Asia
Judith Becker

Will Sweetman

FORUM
 
Vatsala Shoukla Women's Reservation in Corporation: What do Women's Lived Experiences Reflect
Sudeshna Banerjee

People's Voice beyond Borders: Looking for an Alternative Border Narrative in Bollywood Cinema

Farah Hasan

Encountering Hidden Transcripts: Behind the Antagonism of the India-Pakistan Narrative

Erin Kelso

Truth in Progress: Second-Generation Ahmadi-Muslim Performing Integration in Germany

Shalini Sharma Being Black in India: The Journeys of Afro-American Writers in Independent India
Justin Mathew

Badge of Labour: Marginal Lives of the Labouring Poor in the Port of Cochin

Jona Vantard

Activism and Historiography: Bodo New History after 2003

REVIEW ESSAY
Tobias Delfs Kolonialismus ohne Kolonien? Deutsche Naturforscher in Südasien im 18. und 19. Jahrhundert

 

 

2021 (11): Print Journalism in India: Historical Perspectives and Contemporary Developments

The current issue of the SACh actually concentrates on two aspects. On the one hand, the FOCUS section deals with print journalism in India as it developed in the colonial and post-colonial era. Originally planned as a separate edited volume, the project collapsed due to corona confusions. As a consequence, Amelia and I decided to publish the contributions of the those patient authors who were still available in this volume of the South Asia Chronicle which is why the FOCUS section has become rather voluminous.

On the other hand, in this volume a particular emphasis lies on the RESEARCH REVIEW section. The editorial board decided to expand the notion of a research review and to share the experiences of doctoral field research during the corona pandemic which are accompanied by a theoretically framing essay. Of course, a couple of conventional review articles have also been included in the section.

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The FORUM section comprises, as usual, articles on various aspects on cultural, political, historical and sociological aspects, like reflections on the academic literature produced after the last general elections in India, or on the politicisation of Dehli's Muslims in the 1910s.

Editor (V.i.S.d.P): Prof. Dr. Michael Mann

Guest Editor FOCUS: Dr. Amelia Bonea
Editorial Team: Johannes Heymann, Lila Miran, Domenic Teipelke              
 
 
                 
Fig.: Mehwish Zuberi's research assistant at field site © Mehwish Zuberi

 

 

FOCUS
 
 
 
Amelia Bonea

Print Journalism in India:
Historical Perspectives and Contemporary Developments. An Introductory Note

Part 1: Advocacy, Identity, and Politics

 

Ranjith Thankappan

Printing Politics:
Sadhujanaparipalini and the Social Movement of Slave Castes in Travancore

Uma Ganesan

Advocacy Journalism and the Self-Respect Movement in Late Colonial South India

J. Devika

Identity Assertions and Print in Malayalam and Tamil-Speaking Regions in the Early Twentieth Century:
Some Comments

Part 2: Women and Journalism
 
Hisae Komatsu The Emergence of Women’s Voices in Early Twentieth-Century Hindi Magazines
Paromita Pain 'It’s Hard. It’s even Harder when You Are a Woman':
Indian Women Political Journalists in Print and Online Media

Ammu Joseph

Part 3: Science and Technology
 

Vaibhav Singh

Arvind Das

Shiju Sam Varughese

FORUM
 
Pratyush Kumar A Kisan at the Crossroads of History, Politics and Law:
Political Thought and Action of Swami Sahajanand Saraswati
Verena Horne

The Politicisation of Muslim Delhi in the 1910s:
Mohamed Ali, Comrade and the Public Sphere

Nora Therese Witt

Political Development in India after the 2019 Lok Sabha Election:
Review of Its Depiction in Academic Literature

Shivani Yadav

Nuclear Resistance Movements in India

Frank Heidemann The Idea of Minicoy:
Nineteenth Century Writers on an
Indian Ocean Coral Island
Siddhartha Mukerji

Translating ICT into Social Advantage:
The E-District Programme in Uttar Pradesh

K.P. Girija

Therapeutics to Cosmetics:
Reviving a Knowledge Tradition

REVIEW ESSAYS

 

 

 
 
 
Part 1: Researching in Times of a Pandemic
 

Andrea Fleschenberg, Sarah Holz

Mapping Academic Debates on Methods, Ethics and Theorising during the COVID-19 Pandemic: Knowledge Productions in Uncertain Times

Rahat Batool, Andrea Fleschenberg, Laurent Glattli, Aseela Haque, Sarah Holz, Muhammad Salman Khan, Shulagna Pal, Rahat Shah and Mateeullah Tareen

Researching South Asia in Pandemic Times:
Of Shifting Fields, Research Tools, Risks, Emotions and Research Relationships

Sumrin Kalia

Magnifying Dissent:
Researching Religious Outrage amidst the Pandemic

Muhammad Salman Khan Covid-19 and Interview Mode Debates:
Reflections on Using WhatsApp for Voice-only Interviewing
Mehwish Zuberi Between Disconnects and Flows: Reflections on Doing Fieldwork in Rural South Punjab during the Covid-19 Pandemic
Part 2: Review Essays
 
Johannes Heymann Diskursive Kontexte protestantischer deutscher Missionen im kolonialen Indien:
Eine Annäherung aus drei Blickwinkeln
Mustafa Ghulam Intercultural Higher Education:
A Challenging Situation for the Scholars from Developing Countries in Developed Countries due to the Gap between Research Levels

2020 (10): The Memorial Reproduction of 1971 in Present-day Bangladesh

 

Focus:

In 2021 Bangladesh will celebrate its 50th anniversary of the Liberation War, independence from Pakistan and the foundation of its nation state. The articles in the Focus section throw fresh light on the events of 1971 as well as the way these events have been memorialised in the past and are monumentalised for the upcoming anniversary. It becomes clear that Bangladesh as a nation state - as every nation state - needs various forms of remembering and celebrating. The 50th anniversary also documents the persistence of the South Asian Subcontinent's post-colonial political order.

Forum:
This section covers various articles ranging from historical aspects like the concepts of sovereignty the East India Company developed between the seventeenth and the nineteenth centuries in India, or the ethnographic study on tea production and tea trade in Central Asia, to the question of Muslim voices in present-day India as well as mass migration into contemporary Dhaka, Bangladesh. The contributions reflect the journal's aim, namely to cover a variety of thematic as well as geographic aspects within South Asia and beyond.
 
Review Essays:
Four essays deal with the latest research results regarding the role of alcohol in British India, predominantly in the nineteenth century, the question of bonded labour in South Asia and the Indian Ocean rim, and the political dimension of archaeology and heritage sites in Pakistan and India. Finally a report on training programmes for teachers sheds some light on the latest educational initiatives in Lahore, Pakistan.
 
Editor (V.i.S.d.P): Prof. Dr. Michael Mann
Guest Editor FOCUS: Dr. Farhan Karim
Editorial Team: Sadia Bajwa, Domenic Teipelke, Dr. Jana Tschurenev
 

 

Focus

Farhan Karim

The Memorial Reproduction of 1971 in Present-day Bangladesh: An Introductory Essay

Nusrat Sabina Chowdhury

A Second Coming:
The Specular and the Spectacular 50 Years On

 

Elora Halim Chowdhury

Muktijuddho Film as Disruptive Archive, Filmmaker as Witness

Seuty Sabur

Shahabag to Saidpur: Uneasy Intersections and the Politics of Forgetting

Nubras Samayeen Re-Constructing ’71: The Visual Landscape of Bangladeshi Nationalism Now
Anooradha Iyer Siddiqi The Bangladesh Liberation War Museum and the Inconclusivity of Architecture

Naeem Mohaiemen

FORUM
Arik Moran High Tea in Central Asia:
Palampur Fair and the Kangra Tea Enterprise
Dietrich Reetz

Muslim Voices in India: The Transformation of Leadership and Grassroots Activism

Moritz von Brescius

The Private Side of Cultural Brokerage: Autobiographical Practices and the
Self-Constructed Archives of
Imperial Exploration

Jean-Philippe Dequen

Who Is Sovereign? Evolution of the Concept of British Sovereignty in India, Seventeenth to the Early Nineteenth Century

Iftekhar Iqbal Governing Mass Migration to Dhaka:
Revisiting Climate Factors
Lesley Branagan Aspiring in a "Bad" Neighbourhood: The Gendered Constraints on Social and Physical Mobility in Urban India
Review Essays
Martin Krieger Die Geschichte des Alkohols in Indien: Ein Forschungsbericht

Christine Molfenter

Beyond Slavery: Historical Studies on Bonded Labour
in the South Asian and Indian Ocean Regions

Laurent Glattli

Conservation and Contestation at South Asian Heritage Sites

Mustafa Ghulam, M. Imran Yousuf, Tanja Pudelko Evaluation Process & Competence Assessment: An Advanced Training Program for School Teachers in a Government High School in Lahore, Pakistan

 

 

 

2019 (9): Himalaya and Trans-Himalaya: Connecting Histories, Transcending Disciplines

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Focus:
Translocal studies are becoming increasingly important, especially with reference to historical subjects. The overwhelming concern with the history of nation states in South Asia and beyond - as elsewhere - has obscured many translocal histories of moving people, goods and wares as well as artefacts, devotional objects and forms of religious rituals. With the latest research on media/film, historiography, syncretism and imaginations of geography, the present section pays tribute to the recent developments in historical, social and anthropological studies that highlight trans-Himalayan studies. The articles provide new insight into a mountainous world that has never been static.
 
Forum:
The first three article in this section extend the Focus' themes of movement and connection. The article on India's politics on China's Silk Road Project is followed by one on migration from South Asia to Europe in the interwar period. The third article examines how centralising rule in Pakistan during the 1950s and 1960s were legitimised through architectural discourses and practices that hybridized Western ideas and ideologies with South Asian architectural traditions. The Forum concludes with an analysis of collaborative governance and devolution in contemporary Pakistan.
 
 
 
Review Essays:
The three articles deal with the latest research in diverse fields. First, the review of recent publications in the field of trans-Himalayan studies provides a useful addition to the Focus section. The next essay gives a state of the art on education and student politics in Pakistan. The final article is a recent field study on the results of higher education at Pakistan's universities. 
 
Editor: Prof. Dr. Michael Mann
Guest Editor: Prof. Dr. Queeny Pradhan
Editorial Team: Sadia Bajwa, Domenic Teipelke, Dr. Jana Tschurenev
 

Content

Focus

Queeny Pradhan

Introduction: Himalaya and Trans-Himalaya: Connecting Histories, Transcending Disciplines

Neeladri Bhattacharya

Pastoralists in a Colonial World

 

Vasudha Pande

Changing Imaginaries of Geographies and Journeys in Kumaun & Tibet

Laura Yerekesheva

Syncretism of Religious Beliefs in Western Himalayas’s Lahoul

M. N. Rajesh The Battle for Ancient Tibet in the Modern Narratives of the People’s Republic of China and the Tibetan Exiles with Reference to Indic influences
Romita Ray Love on Wheels: The Toy Train and the Tea Plantation in Pradeep Sarkar’s Parineeta (2005)

Debarati Sen

 
Forum

Christian Wagner

Facing Global China: India and the Belt and Road Initiative

Svenja von Jan

Entangled Biographies: Non-elite South Asian Migrants to Northern Europe in the Interwar Period

Farhan Karim

Interpreting Rural: Doxiadis vis-à-vis East Pakistan

Sumrin Kalia

Towards Collaborative Governance: The Case of Pakistan

Review Essays
Nokmedemla Lemtur Trans-Himalayan Discourses: Tracing Landscapes, Colonialism, Modernity and Reconfigured Livelihood in the Mountains

Sadia Bajwa

Student Politics and National Education in West Pakistan: A Review Essay

Mustafa Ghulam

Innovative Teaching Methods in Higher Education in Pakistani Universities An advanced training Program for University Teachers at ARID University, Punjab Pakistan

 

 

2018 (8): Inequality, Difference, and the Politics of Education for All

sach 8 The FOCUS section thematically concentrates on the politics of educational expansion and reform in modern India (19th-21st centuries) in relation to the issues of social inequality, and social difference. From the nineteenth century onwards, diverse actors were involved in building, contesting, and reshaping the colonial education system and its successor in independent India. Administrators, missionaries, social movements, and various reform associations have pursued diverse strategies to increase the reach of formal schooling, improve its quality, or adjust its social and political agendas. The case studies presented in this focus section explore both, efforts directed at the supply and regulation of modern education - such as institution-building, teacher-training, and the spread of expert knowledge - and policies to enhance the attractiveness of schools, and improve school attendance. All these efforts were in different ways responding to, and reshaping social inequality, and participated in the making and managing of social and cultural difference.

The FORUM section consists of five articles that rely on historical, statistical and anthropological sources, focussing on a diverse range of topics and are grounded in the disciplines of history, international relations, anthropology, economics and sociology. The themes engaged with include- physical anthropology, its development in Germany and travelling instruments that have informed the research of an Indian scientiest; the Indian state´s foreign policy vis-à-vis the Tibet question in the early postcolonial period and its historical precedents; a study of India´s energy sector and a roadmap towards affordable and sustainable energy; the intersection of disability and gender in the everyday struggles of women with disabilities in the city of Lahore in pakistan and questions pertaining to the protection of labour, tripartite mechanisms and management of industrial relations in colonial and early postcolonial India through the life trajectories of two important Labour Ministers.

The REVIEW ESSAYS rubric brings together four contributions, with each review unpacking relevant questions in diverse areas of research. These include- an essay on situating Northeast India as a region in historical and contemporary scholarship and its production as a place of remoteness and difference; imaginations and projections of the Muslim world in cinema and popular culture; the intersection of anthropology and law in developing a more user-centric understanding of the workings of legal frameworks and a review of historical and contemporary literature on the Rourkela Steel Plant in India through the lens of vocabularies of development, modernisation and industrialisation.

Impressum
Editor (v.i.S.d.P.): Prof. Dr. Michael Mann
Editorial Board: Dr. Anandita Bajpai, Domenic Teipelke, Daniel Schulze
Guest Editor FOKUS: Dr. Jana Tschurenev

 

 

Focus

Jana Tschurenev

Inequality, Difference, and the Politics of Education for All

Marcelo Caruso, Maria Moritz

Ann Taylor Allen

Indian and American Women in the International Kindergarten Movement, 1880s-1930s

Elija Horn

Alva Bonaker School Lunch and Social Inclusion in the Context of Urban Poverty
Forum
Thiago Pinto Barbosa
Madhumita Das Continuity and Change in India’s Early Tibet Policy:  1947 to 1960
Michael von Hauff, Tara Chandra Kandpal
The Way to Sustainable Development Goal 7 "Affordable, reliable, sustainable, and modern energy"
Sadia Akbar Disability Experiences and the Negotiation of Disabled Identity: Narratives of Physically Impaired Women in Pakistan
Shivangi Jaiswal Labour Ministers, State and the Prism of Law, 1942-52
Review Essays
Saba Sharma
 
Framing Northeast India: Perspectives and Positions
Jyothidas KV Imaging the Muslim World through Cinema and Popular Culture
Siddharth Peter de Souza Towards a User-centered Engagement with Law
Josefine Hoffmann

Rourkela in der Literatur damals und heute: Perspektiven auf Entwicklung, Modernisierung und Industrialisierung

Link to the 8th volume of South Asia Chronicle

 

2017 (7): Revisiting Partition Seventy Years Later: Of Layered Echoes, Voices and Memories

The FOCUS section of volume 7 is titled "Revisiting Partition Seventy Years Later: Of Layered Echoes, Voices and Memories". The articles in the special issue contribute to the existing historiography on Partition by giving cognizance to experiences of displacement, relocation, trauma, re-shaping of lives as well as their periodic re-telling. They re-turn to oral history as a source that informs the writing of Partition to emphasize the multifarious and fragmented nature of remembrance and testimony. In doing so, they bring forth, and even magnify, the absence of singular narratives while simultaneously puncturing official statist silences on Partition or the inculpating discourses that lay blame on a religious ‘other’. At the same time, the contributions revisit literary works that have been crucial in shedding light on the human dimension of Partition, its deep-felt impact on innumerable partitioned lives. The articles take us through sites ranging from Faqiranwalla, Sheikhpura and Lahore in present day Pakistan to Delhi, Haryana, Dandakaranya, Kolkata and the Andaman Islands in present day India. 

The FORUM section consists of eight articles that rely on historical, linguistic, literary and oral history approaches. Among others, they deal with topics as diverse as the perceptions of India in Germany and the USA, countercultures and movements in the Indian and Pakistani public sphere(s), the revival of vernacular languages in transforming social spaces, and the roots of resurgent political authoritarianism in India.

The REVIEW ESSAYS rubric comprises contributions that present overviews of scholarly engagement with the topics of land property rights, transitions from colonial to the national education system and the changing social and professional life-worlds of engineers in India.

 

Inhalt

 

Focus

Anandita Bajpai & Maria Framke

Revisiting Partition Seventy Years Later: Of Layered Echoes, Voices and Memories

Pippa Virdee & Arafat Safdar

From Mano Majra to Faqiranwalla: Revisiting the Train to Pakistan

Christina Oesterheld

Gemeinsamkeit und Trennung in Romanen der Urdu-Schriftstellerin Qurratulain Hyder

Nonica Datta

Reframing Partition: Memory, Testimony, History

Subhasri Ghosh

In Search of 'Home': Dandakaranya and the East Bengali Migrants, 1957-1977

Anasua Basu Roy Choudhary

Governing Peace at the Time of Transition: Politics of Rehabilitation in Post Partition West Bengal

Uditi Sen

Memories of Partition’s 'Forgotten Episode': Refugee Resettlement in the Andaman Islands

Forum

Ravi Ahuja

Authoritarian Shadows: Indian Independence and the Problem of Democratisation

Hashim Bin Rashid

Remembering lam Din: The Construction of Memory, Religious Affect and Blasphemy in the Muslim Public Sphere in Colonial Punjab and Contemporary Pakistan

Sara Kazmi

The Marxist Punjabi Movement: Language and Literary Radicalism in Pakistan

Hermann Kreutzmann

Language Variegation across the Pamir: Hindukush-Karakoram: Perceptions and Mobilities

Jürgen Schaflechner

"Forced" Conversion and (Hindu) Women’s Agency in Sindh

Aleksandra Boss

Between Protest and Privilege: South Asian Religious Signifiers and the US Counterculture

Rahela Khorakiwala

Judicial Iconography and Access to Justice in the Bombay High Court

Martina Franke

Einfach nur wie „ein Fass ohne Boden“? Südasien als Beispiel der globalen Nord-Südwahrnehmung in der BRD

Review Essays

Maxim Bönnemann

The property puzzle: India’s land governance in transition

Jana Tschurenev

Women, Early Childhood Education, and Global Reform Movements: New Perspectives on Colonial and National Education in India

Stefan Tetzlaff

Engineers and Social Change in Colonial and Postcolonial India: Considerations between Recent Literature and Future Research Possibilities

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

2016 (6) Law in Context: Case Studies from India 

 

  The FOCUS section of volume 6 is titled "Law
  in Context: Case Studies from India." 
  Drawing on an interdisciplinary approach, the
  FOCUS contributions examine law in the
  contexts of society, culture, religion and
  com­mu­­nity and point to the manifold ways in
  which law is being practised and understood
  in India. The articles engage with different
  layers of law and identify various actors and
  locales where law and legal dis­courses are 
  shaped. The contributions cover a wide
  spectrum of interesting topics, such as spirit
  based justice systems,
law and religion, women's rights, farmers' rights and the incorporation of
international law into national or local systems.

The FORUM includes seven articles on topics ranging from History,
Literary Studies, Musicology and Anthropology to an overview of
India-related holdings in German archives.

The final rubric REVIEW ESSAYS contains contributions that present
current and historiographical overviews from History, Film Studies
and International Relations.

 

Contents

 

Focus

Tanja Herklotz & Sarah Holz

Law in Context: Case Studies from India

Michael Dusche

Butas and Daivas as Justices in Tulu Nadu: Implications for the Philosophy of Law

Jean-Philippe Dequen

Reflections on the Shayara Bano Petition: a Symbol of the Indian Judiary's own Evolution on the Issue of Triple talak and the Place of Muslim Personal Law within the Indian Constitutional Frame?

Tanja Herklotz

Dead Letters? The Uniform Civil Code through the Eyes of the Indian Women's Movement and the Indian Supreme Court

Chiara Correndo

Of Women and Myths: Revising Analytical Approaches to Gender Issues in India

Rajshree Chandra

Farmers’ Rights in India: "Globally Sui Generis"

Forum

Frederik Schröer

Of Testimonios and Feeling Communities: Totaram Sanadhya’s Account of Indenture

Tihomir Popović

Shere Khan in Somerset: Musikalische Indienbilder in Dora Brights Dschungelbuch-Liedern (1903)

Stefan Binder

'Let Us Become Human through Beef and Pork': Atheist Humanism and the Aesthetics of Caste

Ali Usman Qasmi

Textsbooks for History and Urdu in Punjab: Transiting from the Colonial to the Post-Colonial Period

Hannelore Lötzke

Literaturnotizen aus Südasien: Zum 100. Geburtstag des Hindi-Schrifstellers Bhisham Sahni (1915-2003)

Anna Sailer

'Spinners', 'Madrassis' and 'Hindus': Jute Workers' Strikes in Titagarh in the Late 1930s

Anandita Bajpai, Theresa Suski & Johannes Heymann

Tracing India in German Archives: Entangled Pasts in the Age of Digital Humanities

Review Essays

Maria Fuchs

The Public Sphere in South Asia: A Review Essay

Alexander Benatar

Der indische Subkontinent als Spielfeld des Kalten Krieges: Deutsch-deutsche Beziehungen in Indien und Pakistan

Saima Haq

Independent Cinema in India: An Emerging Cinematic Form

 

 

 

 

 

 

 


 

 

 

 

 


 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 



Link to the 6th volume of the South Asia Chronicle

 

 

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2015(5) South Asia and the World Wars in the Twentieth Century

During the two World Wars ‘aliens’ of all skin and eye colours, linguistic groups, cultures and faiths were brought to Europe in the form of colonial soldiers and Black Americans who fought for the Allies. Among them were Africans, Egyptians, Turks, Palestinians, Arabs, Indians (from British India), and so on. To remember these ‘strange foreigners’, this year’s FOKUS of the South-Asia Chronicle deals with a specific category of these temporary soldier-migrants who were brought to Germany in thousands as captive British-Indian soldiers and camp followers in World War I and World War II. Some of them died in various prisoners of war (POW) camps, sick bays, hospitals, and sanatoria, others survived their ordeals in captivity in various internment camps or Stalags (Stamm-lager, i.e. large POW camps).

Each essay of FOKUS showcases a different range of archival deposits in various parts of Germany – in isolated cases also from Britain, India and Geneva – which has been used to recreate the lived experiences of ‘alien coloured captives’. All of them in their own ways allude to the dilemmas, anxieties, and confusions that the German officialdom faced during the two World Wars. Within this short span of time, the authors have outlined phases into which the treatment of jangi qaidis could be divided notwithstanding continued cultural confusions and linguistic misunderstandings.

The FORUM of the volume includes seven articles on diverse topics from history, sociology, and anthropology. The final rubric REVIEW ESSAYS contains contributions that present state-of-the-art and historiographical overviews on various topics.

 

 

Focus

Joshi, Vandana

South Asia and the World Wars in the Twentieth Century: An Introduction

Lange, Britta

„Wenn der Krieg zu Ende ist, werden viele Erzählungen gedruckt werden.“ Südasiatische Positionen und europäische Forschungen im „Halbmondlager“

Koller, Christian

Deutsche Wahrnehmungen feindlicher Kolonial¬truppen im Ersten Weltkrieg

Roy, Franziska

Indian Seamen in World War I Prison Camps in Germany

Kuhlmann, Jan

Die Indische Legion im Zweiten Weltkrieg: Interkulturelle Menschenführung zwischen Atlantikwall und Wehrmachtsgefängnis

Oesterheld, Joachim

The Last Chapter of the Indian Legion

Joshi, Vandana

               

Between Erasure and Remembrance: Shreds from the Lives of South Asian Prisoners of War in Stamm¬lagers, Arbeitskommandos, Lazaretts and Graves During World War II (1939-45)

Nagel, Jürgen

Asien und der Zweite Weltkrieg. Gedanken zur »anderen« Seite eines globalen Krieges

Forum

 

Popp, Silvia

Altern in Indien: Die Familie und der Staat als Überlebenshilfe

Wilhelm, Janine

Indiens koloniales Erbe der Flussverschmutzung

Hesse, Patrick

Communism and Communalism in the 1920s.  Notes on a Neglected Nexus

Paranjape, Swarali

Tools of Satire: Marathi Theatre in Colonial India. The Case of Sangeet Sthanik-Swarajya athva Munici¬pality

Sengupta, Anwesha

City Calls to City Walls: Pheriwallah/wallihs and the (Un)contested Spaces of Kolkata

Nejad, Reza Masoudi

Urban Margins, a Refuge for Muharram Processions in Bombay: Towards an Idea of Cultural Resilience

Schröder, Johannes

A Wooden Jain House Temple
from the Berlin Museum of Asian Art and its Tradition

Review Essays

Herklotz, Tanja

 

Religion-Based Personal Laws in India from a Women’s Rights Perspective: Context and some Recent Publications

Bondada, Gautam

The Role of Monetary Networks in the Trade between India and the Roman Empire

Surendran, Aardra

Studying Labour Culture in India: The Missing ‘Everyday’ of Industrial Work

Mann, Michael

Slaving, Slavery and Abolition: A View from the Indian Ocean. Notes on Some Recent Publications

Bajpai, Anandita

Report on the Inaugural Workshop of the DFG-funded project ‘Modern India in German Archives, 1706-1989’, ‘Das Moderne Indien in deutschen Archiven, 1706-1989’ (MIDA)

Merkel-Hilf, Nicole

Ausbau des asienwissenschaftlichen Informationsangebots - CrossAsia – Fachinformationsdienst Asien geht an den Start

 

Link to the 5th edition of the South Asia Chronicle

 

 

 

SACH 20142014(4) Mapping Bangladesh Studies

The volume (4:2014) includes a special issue on Mapping Bangladesh Studies. Bangladesh studies is emerging as a major field and is continually getting richer and more diverse, although it still has a long way to go. As seen through recent contributions elsewhere and in this volume of the South Asia Chronicle, more nuanced and newer lines of enquiry, especially in the field of cultural history and anthropology, are emerging.
 

In addition it holds four contributions in its FORUM rubric on recent discourses and developments in South Asia: an article comparing the construction of the Muslim as Minority in India and western Europe; one on the new urbanism, law and the city of Bengaluru; a third on the emergence of a transnational religious community; and finally a piece that engages with the question of women's rights in India in light of the recent debate on sexual violence in India.

The final rubric of the volume is dedicated to review essays, which present the state-of-the-art and historiographical overviews on a various topics.

 

Contents
Focus
Iqbal, Iftekhar State of Bangladesh Studies
van Schendel, Willem Blind Spots and Biases in Bangladesh Studies
Bose, Neilesh

Periodisation and the Twentieth Century                                        Grappling with the Pre-Histories of Bangladesh

Shehabuddin, Elora Feminism and Nationalism in Cold War East Pakistan
Jalais, Annu

Bengali `Bihari´ Muharram                        The Identitarian Trajectories of a Community

Stille, Max Islamic Non-Friday Seremons in Bangladesh
Gerharz, Eva

What is in a Name?                       Indigenous Identity and the Politics of Denial in Bangladesh

Forum
Groneweg, Merle

`Muslims´ after Partition and 9/11 The Construstion of a `Religious Minority´ and its Challenges to `Secularism´ in India and Western Europe

Nair, Janaki

"The City is History"                               New Indian Urbanism and the Terrain of the Law

Koschorreck, Dhanya Fee

Ravidassia - Weder Sikh noch Hindu?     Aushandlung und Festigung von Identität innerhalb einer global vernetzten (religiösen) Gemeinschaft

Dusche, Michael

Women's Rights in India                     Hierarchical Ethics vs. Egalitarian Morality

Research Articles
Unger, Corinna R.

India's Green Revolution                         Towards a New Historical Perspective

Nath, Sushmita Changing Trajectories of Indian Political Thought
Holz, Sarah Reforming Tradition and Traditions of Reform in Muslim South Asia
Sinha, Nitin `Opinion´ and `Violence´ Whiteness, Empire and State-Formation in Colonial India
Beutner, Stephan

Maoisten in Indien                                      Neue Ansaätze und Einsichten

 

 

Fig.: Tom Vogelgesang
2013(3) Stadtentwicklung und Urbanisierung

Südasien hat eine der ältesten Stadtkulturen der Welt. Gegenwärtig ist eine rasante Verstädterung in den Ländern des südasiatischen Subkontinents zu beobachten, einschließlich der Entstehung von Megacities.

Großstädte und besonders die Megacities des globalen Südens scheinen Problemzonen zu sein, die der eingehenden wissenschaftlichen Untersuchung und anschließender nationaler wie internationaler Kontrolle durch weltweit anerkannte Regulierungsmaßnahmen in Bezug auf Stadtplanung, Stadtentwicklung und Stadtpolitik bedürfen. Eine Innenbetrachtung aus der Sicht der Bewohner findet selten statt, was im Gegensatz zum anhaltenden Zuzug in die Städte steht, der offensichtlich für die Attraktivität urbaner Siedlungsräume spricht.

Diesem westlich geprägten Diskurs, der seine Ursprünge in der europäischen Kolonialherrschaft hat, als unzivilisierte außereuropäische Völker ebenfalls beobachtet und kontrolliert werden mussten, um sie an die eigene für höher stehend erachtete Zivilisation heranzuführen, möchten die Beiträge des Fokus-Teils in dem vorliegenden Band entgegenwirken.

Die Beiträge in der Rubrik „Fokus“ des aktuellen Bandes zeigen neben den Problemen einer Stadt in Südasien vor allem die Chancen, die sich mit ihr verbinden. Städte erfüllen vielfältige Funktionen in einer Gesellschaft, die über die rein verdichtete Ansiedlung von Menschen hinausgehen. Medien, Handel, Industrie und Gewerbe, Dienstleistung und Arbeit sowie Migration und Zirkulation von Menschen stehen hier im Mittelpunkt.

Link zum Band 3 der Südasien-Chronik auf dem edoc-Server der Humboldt-Universität

 

Contents

Fokus
Waligora, Melitta Drei Mythen zur Geschichte der Stadt Kolkata
Iqbal, Iftekhar First Master Plan for Dhaka City
Strümpell, Christian The Making of a Working Class in West-Odisha
Schneider, Nadja-Christina Medialised Delhi – Youth, Protest, and an Emerging Genre of Urban Films
Devadas, David Inclusion and Exclusion – Emergent Social Milieus in Kashmir‘s Suburbs
Kreutzmann, Hermann Islamabad – Living with the plan
Forum
Gugler, Thomas K. Buddhist Zion – Sri Lanka’s Sinhalisation Politics toward its Muslim Minority
Schulz, Mascha Migrating Men – Mobile Women? – How women cope with male seasonal migration in Bangladesh
Werner, Hanna Wasser als Gegenstand (kultur-)politischer Debatten in Indien
Lüder, Stefan Grenzen wissenschaftlicher Erkenntnis – Wissensproduktion und Wissensdiskurse um „Ethnizität“ in Nepal
Oesterheld, Christina Ein enfant terrible der Urdu-Literatur – Saadat Hasan Manto zum Gedenken
Wahdat, Sabine Gift oder Immuncocktail? – Diskurse um die „erste Milch“ bei indischen Frauen und der WHO
Forschungs-
berichte
Mann, Michael Environmental History and Historiography on South Asia
Molfenter, Christine Overcoming Bonded Labour and Slavery in South Asia

 

 

Sach2012

2012(2) Klima – Umwelt – Zukunft

Das Wirtschaftswachstum Indiens, aber auch das Pakistans, sowie die nach wie vor steigende Bevölkerung rückt das Thema Nachhaltigkeit natürlicher Ressourcen wie Wasser, Boden und Luft in das Zentrum wirtschaftlicher und politischer Debatten. Fossile Energiegewinnung, fortschreitende Luftverschmutzung und eine intensive Wassernutzung lassen in südasiatischen Ländern die Frage nach dem Klima und ihrem Wandel dringlicher denn je erscheinen.

Sich verändernde Umweltbedingungen sind nicht nur in den wachsenden Großstädten und ihren Lebensräumen zu beobachten, sondern auch auf dem Land und in der Landwirtschaft machen sich inzwischen die Belastungen der Umwelt durch massive Ressourcennutzung bemerkbar. Entgegen der geläufigen Darstellung in unseren Medien, die zu oft ein apokalyptisches Bild von Umweltbelastung und Umweltverschmutzung schaffen und Indien neben China als einen Hauptverursacher künftigen Klimawandels ausmachen, versuchen die Beiträge in diesem Band zu zeigen, welche zum Teil höchst erfolgversprechende Konzepte zur nachhaltigen Gestaltung der Umwelt im städtischen wie ländlichen Raum existieren.

Link zum Band 2 der Südasien-Chronik auf dem edoc-Server der Humboldt-Universität

 

Contents

 

Fokus
Schneider, Nadja-Christina „Zivile“ Nuklearenergie nach Fukushima
Amjath-Babu, T.S.; Kächele, Harald; Kutter, Thomas; Müller, Klaus; Nautiyal, Sunil; Raju, K.V.; Specht, Kathrin Confronting the Climate Change Challenge
Chidambaram, Bhuvanachithra; Zikos, Dimitrios Congestion Mitigation Measure in Hyderabad
Banerjee, Sudeshna The March of the Mega-city
Forum
Lötzke, Hannelore; Oesterheld, Christina Literaturnotizen: Jubiläumsgeburtstage südasiatischer Autoren
Bertram, Caroline Counting the Poor in India
Bajpai, Anandita Imagining a 'Secular' India
Frese, Heiko Women‘s Power - The Anti-Arrack Movement in Andhra Pradesh
Waligora, Melitta Die Grenze zwischen Indien und Bangladesh als Konfliktzone
Forschungs-
berichte
Bajwa, Sadia Crisis and its Beyond
Djahangiri, Keyvan Die Dänisch-Englisch-Hallesche Ostindien-Mission
Framke, Maria Encounters with Fascism and National Socialism in non-European Regions
Razak, Khan Recovering Minority Pasts
Mann, Michael Return of the Empire - A New Agency of the Old East India Company?
Sinha, Nitin Continuity and Change - The Eighteenth Century and Indian Historiography
Buchbesprechungen

 

 

Sach2011

2011(1) Netzwerke im Indischen Ozean

Nicht erst seit den letzten beiden Jahrzehnten ist der Indische Ozean ein Wirtschafts- und Kulturraum, der durch migrierende und sich in anderen Regionen niederlassende Menschen entstand und in vielerlei Hinsicht zusammenwuchs. Bereits im 12. Jahrhundert bestanden intensive Austauschbeziehungen zwischen den Anrainergebieten, teils über Karawanen, teils über Küsten und teils über Hochseeschifffahrt organisiert. Seit dem Auftauchen der Europäer wirkten im 16. Jahrhundert lediglich weitere Konkurrenten im Handelsnetzwerk des Indischen Ozeans mit. Erst ab der Mitte des 19. Jahrhunderts kann von einer wachsenden europäischen, schließlich britischen Dominanz gesprochen werden. Trotz der Kolonisierung weiter Teile Ostafrikas, Süd- und Südostasiens durch europäische Mächte im 19. Jahrhundert, die neue Strukturen in die Netzwerke des Indischen Ozeans brachte, blieben dessen alte in vielen Fällen bestehen. Mit der Unabhängigkeit der Kolonien ab der zweiten Hälfte des 20. Jahrhunderts, vor allem aber seit dem Ende des Kalten Krieges und seiner bipolaren Weltordnung, hat sich der Indische Ozean seit den 1990er Jahren zu einer Weltregion weiter entwickelt, zu einem Raum, der diese Bedeutung eigentlich nie verloren hatte.

 

Link zum Band 1 der Südasien-Chronik auf dem edoc-Server der Humboldt-Universität

 

Contents

 

Fokus
Mann, Michael Arbeitsnetzwerke im Indischen Ozean
Dusche, Michael Kultureller Wandel durch Migration
Betz, Martin Von arbeitenden Pilgern und selbstlosen Agenten
Berkemer, Georg Der Indische Ozean als Teil eines globalen Strategiezusammenhangs im Zweiten Weltkrieg
Schneider, Nadja-Christina Neue Mobilitäten muslimischer Frauen in Indien
Houben, Vincent Der Indische Ozean aus südostasiatischer Perspektive
Forum
Robotka, Bettina Pakistani Floods 2010
Reetz, Dietrich Migrants, Mujahedin, Madrassa Students
Andressen, Sven Jahresrückblick auf die wirtschaftliche Entwicklung Indiens und die deutsch-indischen Wirtschaftsbeziehungen 2010
von Hauff, Michael Challenges for the national sustainability strategy of India
Francis, Sabil The IITs in India
Feuerstein, Patrick; Mayer-Ahuja, Nicole Everywhere is becoming the same?
Gugler, Thomas K. Politics of pleasure - Setting South Asia Straight
Kukuczka, Anne Negotiating ethnic identity in the Himalaya
Pester, Tobias Behind the curtain of a Theatre State
Jürgenmeyer, Clemens Indien zwischen Mehrheits- und Konsensdemokratie
Berichte
Wildhardt, Eva What makes India urban? - Analyse einer Ausstellung im Hinblick auf die Präsentationstechniken des Wissenstransfers
Framke, Maria; Moritz, Maria Conference report - Identifying new Themes in South Asian History
Gatzmaga, Heike Deutsch-Indisches Studentensymposium
Buchbesprechungen