Wednesday, September 26th
4:00pm-5:30pm
Room 208, Knox Hall

Presentation by Andrew Ollet (MESAAS):

"Language and the Parameters of Literature"

 

When we speak of "English literature," "Arabic literature," "Sanskrit literature," we're qualifying a signifier that is supposed to be stable across cultures (though the word "literature" itself is a neo-Latin coinage from 17th-century Europe) with linguistic or national unities that have been constructed as sites of difference. We allow language to set the boundaries of, and thus function as a parameter for, "literature." I will critically examine this "parametric" function in the context of the language or languages called Prakrit. What exactly does a term like "Prakrit literature" refer to? Conversely, what does it mean to call Prakrit a "literary language"? It is well known that, within the large and long-lived cultural formation of the "Sanskrit cosmopolis," Sanskrit, Prakrit, and Apabhramsa collectively and exhaustively delimited a domain of textuality in which kavya, "literature strictly speaking," was situated. But this broad formulation doesn't tell us how, for example, these different languages are mapped onto the literary archive (internally differentiated by theme, genre, meter, and so on), or onto the field of literary production (divided into region, social groups, religious communities). In this talk I will focus on how language difference is mapped onto a literary tradition-something that extends through time, is produced through implicit and explicit processes of appropriation and exclusion, and is structured by relations of precedence and influence. The evidence will come from what authors actually say about Prakrit's relation to literary traditions, from their own citation practices (including especially the topos of kaviprasamsa, "praise of poets"), the ways in which they themselves are cited, and the "source" and "target" languages of commentaries and abridgements. I will show how the tools of Social Network Analysis might allow us to analyze and visualize complex relations such as these. From this perspective, as we might have expected, language is neither an exclusive nor an irrelevant parameter; boundaries between languages were semi-permeable. More important and interesting is the exact significance of "semi-": What are the asymmetries between Sanskrit, Prakrit, and Apabhramsa? What can these tell us about their status and audience? And how does language relate to religious affiliation, or other potential parameters of a literary tradition?

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The format will be:
30 minutes: presentation;
30 minutes: discussion;
thereafter reception (food and drink provided).

Tuesday, November 15th
4:10pm-5:30pm
Room 207, Knox Hall

Presentation by Katherine E. Kasdorf (Art History and Archaeology):

"Seeing a City Through its Temples: Halebid and the Hoysala Capital"

Examining the temples of Halebid, Karnataka - formerly Dorasamudra, capital of the Hoysala dynasty between the mid-11th and mid-14th centuries, I argue that the temples of a particular locality should be understood not only as architectural entities with various ritual and political purposes, but also as components of a greater urban setting that has historically encompassed a range of activities,
communities, and forms.  By comparing the temples' architectural and
sculptural forms, their sources of patronage, and their sectarian
affiliations, and by considering the architectural character of
distinct zones and potential routes of access between surviving
features, we can understand much about the urban forms and social
organization of the Hoysala capital.  Furthermore, the alterations
made to Halebid's temples and the reuse of Hoysala-period
architectural materials in temples built after the dynasty's fall
provide insight into the shifting character of the town's
neighborhoods and populations.  Complicating the familiar narrative of
post-Hoysala decline and inactivity, these later constructions attest
to the town's continued vibrancy, even after the period of its highest
status as a political capital.

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The format will be:
30 minutes: presentation;
30 minutes: discussion;
thereafter reception (food and drink provided).

Past Forums:

Spring 2011

Simranjeet Singh (Religion, 21 March): Re-Textualizing Sheikh Farid: Anamnetic Authorship in 17th Century PunjabThis paper explores the ways in which oral and written texts have been transmitted across linguistic communities of premodern Punjab. It will focus specifically on the understudied but critically important personage of Sheikh Farid ad-Din Masud Ganj-e Shakkar (d. 1265 CE). Popularly known as Sheikh Farid or Baba Farid, this figure continues to be revered for his contributions to the religious and cultural milieu of South Asia. This paper will look at representations of Sheikh Farid through two closely connected Gurmukhi texts: the Adi Granth, which was compiled in 1604 by the Sikh community, and a hagiography entitled Masle Sheikh Farid Ke, which was composed in the middle of the 17th century by the Mina community. With the help of Christian Novetzke's recent work on Saint Namdev and Christopher Shackle's linguistic analysis of Southwestern Punjabi, this paper aims to explore the transmission of writings ascribed to Sheikh Farid through orality, performance, textualization, and "anamnetic authorship," while also shedding light on three underrepresented entities: Sheikh Farid, the Mina tradition, and Masle Sheikh Farid Ke.

Monday, 21 February 2011
Presentation by Mohsin Mohi-ud-Din (SIPA):
"Kashmir: The Quiet Fire of South Asia" Monday, 24 January 2011
4:10pm-6:00pm
Knox Hall, Room 208, 606 W. 122nd Street
(Between Broadway and Claremont)

Presentation by Patton Burchett (Religion):
"Two Hanumans in One: Rasiks and Yogis in Early Modern Bhakti"Andrew Ollett (MESAAS, 7 March), Monday, 7 March 2011
4:10-6:00 p.m.
Knox Hall, Room 208, 606 West 122nd Street
(Between Broadway and Claremont Avenue)

Presentation by Andrew Ollett (MESAAS):
"Metrics and the History of the Natyashastra"
The Natyashastra is the fundamental text on Indian dramaturgy and related subjects, from aesthetics to dialectology. But the text is often confusing, and its role in literary and intellectual history far from clear, owing to circumstances of its compilation and transmission about which we know relatively little. The two sections of Sanskrit and Prakrit meters, however, provide some important indirect evidence for those circumstances: the form of the definitions, the content of the examples, the sequence of meters, their treatment in the only surviving commentary, and the sources of the text can help us to understand the processes by which this important text took shape.

Fall 2010

Wednesday November 3, 4:10-6:00 p.m. Knox Hall, Room 208, 606 West 122nd Street (between Broadway and Claremont Avenue)

Presentation by Pasha Mohamad Khan (Middle Eastern, South Asian and African Studies)

"Marvelous Histories; Or, Ghalib and the Simurgh"

In Delhi in the 1860s, the eminent Urdu/Persian poet Mirza Asad Allah Khan Ghalib wrote a preface to a romance (dastan/qissah), in which he defended the romance genre from the belittlement of partisans of the history (tarikh). Evoking the Shahnamah to further his argument, Ghalib raises questions regarding the line between romance and history, two genres that were often opposed, but which exhibited an alarming tendency to infect one another. The paper will consider how it is that Ghalib could regard an event, creature or object as simultaneously impossible and historical. In order to do this it will distinguish between two genres of history, the intellective and the transmission-based (`aqli and naqli), and their situations in late Mughal India.

The Forum format is as follows:
20-30 minutes: Presentation
20-30 minutes: Q & A and discussion
60 minutes: Reception (food, samosa etc., and drink provided)