Approaches to History (393-0-22)
Topic
Partition of India
Instructors
Ashish Koul
847/467-3879
Harris 212
Meeting Info
Kresge Centennial Hall 2-425: Tues, Thurs 3:30PM - 4:50PM
Overview of class
This seminar will focus on the 1947 Partition of British India to understand how this traumatic event has become paradigmatic for colonial India and post-colonial South Asia. The Partition created more than just the two rival nation-states of India and Pakistan from what used to be British India. It also generated a long shadow that continues to define ongoing regional conflicts such as those in Kashmir, continual anxieties about majoritarian and minoritarian identity politics viewed alternately with dread and jubilation in both India and Pakistan, and a persistent desire among South Asian creative artists to make sense of the pain of this violent event. How did the Partition come about? How have scholars, commentators, filmmakers, novelists, creative writers, and those who survived the violence of this event understood and narrativized it? Why does an event that occurred seventy-five years ago loom so large in the collective memory of South Asians today?
To address these and other questions, this seminar will be divided into two parts, each based on a selected set of textual and visual materials. Part I will explore the long and complicated historiography of Partition, i.e., how Indian and Pakistani officials, historians, and scholars have written about Partition between the 1950s and contemporary times. Here we will read early accounts explaining how and why the Partition happened, in addition to exploring official narratives of Britain, India, and Pakistan about this event. Part II will focus on how Partition has been remembered beyond scholarly circles by filmmakers, novelists, and documentarians. Here, we will read and view a set of films, novels, and short stories to understand why Partition continues to be a deeply troubling subject for South Asians.
Registration Requirements
All the assigned readings will be uploaded on Canvas
Learning Objectives
In this course, students will learn to communicate their ideas coherently, both verbally and in writing; analyze textual and non-textual primary historical sources; examine the complex relationship between history and memory.
Evaluation Method
oral presentations, historiographical review essay, final paper
Class Attributes
Historical Studies Distro Area