scholarly journals Identity, Religion and Difference in the Borderland District of Poonch, Jammu and Kashmir

2021 ◽  
Vol 3 (1) ◽  
pp. 24-34
Author(s):  
Malvika Sharma

This article (part of a special section on South Asian border studies) is an exploration of a multi-religious ethnic group in the borderland district of Poonch in Jammu and Kashmir, India. The work focuses on the Pahari ethnicity and looks at how prominent religious identities within this group have been continuously aligning themselves along religious lines in the post-partition era. Partition of the Indian subcontinent in 1947 acted as a major disruption in the construction of identities. The evolution of national and ethnic identities went hand in hand with the evolution of religious identities, with the latter being more pronounced than the former. Such a fixation along religious lines in the socio-cultural and political sphere led to changes in everyday inter-community relations. Through oral histories and other accounts, this ethnography understands the new set of interactions that emerged in Poonch which have been shaping identities, while also analysing identity construction and its impact on the social organisation of space and neighbourhoods in general in the post-partition era. Key Words: Borderland, Border, Boundaries, Community, Communalism, Difference, Ethnicity, Identity, Inter-community interaction, Nation, Nation-State, Othering, Religion 

2007 ◽  
Vol 24 (3) ◽  
pp. 46-69
Author(s):  
Fauzia Ahmad

I explore British South Asian Muslim women’s experiences of higher education and how it impacts identity construction and negotiation. Through semi-structured interviews with thirty-five undergraduate and post-graduate Muslim female university students, I reflect on their perceived and actual experiences. By stressing how representations of them influence their participation and experiences, I analyze how individual subjectivities are mediated and negotiated while reflecting common experiences. I also consider their accounts of the social and personal benefits they felt that they gained during their studies, as well as to the more disturbing and racialized aspects of their experiences. They differentiated between three overlapping forms of beneficial experience: academic, social, and personal. While instances of anti-Muslim racism were rare or subtle, certain university structures and expectations of what being a mainstream student means often contributed to a noted sense of “othering.” I conclude by highlighting how their accounts of their university experiences directly challenge those stereotypes that misrepresent educated Muslim women as “religious and cultural rebels.”


2021 ◽  
Vol 3 (1) ◽  
pp. 12-23
Author(s):  
Sampurna Bhaumik

This article (part of a special section on South Asian border studies) is an ethnographic study of the daily lives and narratives of borderlands communities in the border districts of Cooch Behar and South Dinajpur along the West-Bengal–Bangladesh border. In order to emphasise the significance of borderland communities’ narratives and experiences to our understanding of borders, this paper explores the idea of borders as social spaces that are inherently dynamic. In attempting to understand the idea of borders through everyday lives of people living in borderland communities, this paper highlights tensions and contradictions between hard borders manifested through securitization practices, and the inherently dynamic social spaces that manifest themselves in people’s daily lives. Conceptually and thematically, this paper is situated within and seeks to contribute to the discipline of borderland studies. Key Words: Borders, Social Spaces, Security, Bengal Borderlands, South Asia 


2021 ◽  
Vol 3 (1) ◽  
pp. 35-45
Author(s):  
Rachel Irene D'Silva

By reviewing the case of the Rohingya, a marginalized community in the postcolonial state of Myanmar, this article (as part of a special section on South Asian border studies) explores the perspective of Rohingya refugees and conceptualizes social borders from the voices of the refugees. Juxtaposing postcolonial borders with narrations of Rohingya in India brings out the politics of the marginalized communities in the country’s borderlands. The article shows how borderscapes are shaped for refugees that articulate ideas of social justice and recognition. Building on international studies of the Rohingya, I conducted fieldwork into the situation of the Rohingya in India. The resulting interviews add to our understanding of Rohingya refugees and address a scarcity of literature on the Rohingya in border studies. Through the analysis, I discover the history of the Rohingya identity in Myanmar, which contextualizes their statelessness. Social borders and state legislation reinforce barriers to citizenship and sharpen the exclusion of migrants, refugees, and other stateless peoples in South Asia.  Keywords: South Asia, Refugees, Rohingya, post-colonial states, boundaries, borders, margins, Southeast Asia, marginal communities.


2007 ◽  
Vol 24 (3) ◽  
pp. 46-69 ◽  
Author(s):  
Fauzia Ahmad

I explore British South Asian Muslim women’s experiences of higher education and how it impacts identity construction and negotiation. Through semi-structured interviews with thirty-five undergraduate and post-graduate Muslim female university students, I reflect on their perceived and actual experiences. By stressing how representations of them influence their participation and experiences, I analyze how individual subjectivities are mediated and negotiated while reflecting common experiences. I also consider their accounts of the social and personal benefits they felt that they gained during their studies, as well as to the more disturbing and racialized aspects of their experiences. They differentiated between three overlapping forms of beneficial experience: academic, social, and personal. While instances of anti-Muslim racism were rare or subtle, certain university structures and expectations of what being a mainstream student means often contributed to a noted sense of “othering.” I conclude by highlighting how their accounts of their university experiences directly challenge those stereotypes that misrepresent educated Muslim women as “religious and cultural rebels.”


2021 ◽  
Vol 3 (1) ◽  
pp. 8-11
Author(s):  
Dhananjay Tripathi

In this special section, New Border Studies in South Asia, BIG_Review Board Member and regional specialist Dhananjay Tripathi edits a collection by emerging scholars of the Indian subcontinent. Through new research and fieldwork, themes explored include identity formation, postcoloniality, forced displacement, and looking beyond the human-centric world in border governance 


1997 ◽  
Vol 36 (4I) ◽  
pp. 321-331
Author(s):  
Sarfraz Khan Qureshi

It is an honour for me as President of the Pakistan Society of Development Economists to welcome you to the 13th Annual General Meeting and Conference of the Society. I consider it a great privilege to do so as this Meeting coincides with the Golden Jubilee celebrations of the state of Pakistan, a state which emerged on the map of the postwar world as a result of the Muslim freedom movement in the Indian Subcontinent. Fifty years to the date, we have been jubilant about it, and both as citizens of Pakistan and professionals in the social sciences we have also been thoughtful about it. We are trying to see what development has meant in Pakistan in the past half century. As there are so many dimensions that the subject has now come to have since its rather simplistic beginnings, we thought the Golden Jubilee of Pakistan to be an appropriate occasion for such stock-taking.


Author(s):  
S.A. Kirillina ◽  
A.L. Safronova ◽  
V.V. Orlov

Аннотация В статье изучены общие и специфические черты идейных воззрений, пропагандистской риторики и политических действий представителей халифатистского движения на Ближнем Востоке и в Южной Азии. В ретроспективном ключе прослеживается эволюция представлений о сущности и необходимости возрождения института халифата в трудах исламских идеологов, реформаторов и политиков Джамал ад-Дина ал-Афгани, Абд ар-Рахмана ал-Кавакиби, Мухаммада Рашида Риды, Абул Калама Азада. Внимание авторов сосредоточено на общественно-политических дискуссиях 2030-х годов XX столетия, а также на повестке дня халифатистских конгрессов и конференций этого периода. На них вырабатывались первые представления современников о пост-османском формате мусульманского единства и идейно-политической роли будущего халифата. Авторы демонстрируют различие между моделями реакции мусульман Ближнего Востока и Южной Азии на упразднение османского халифата республиканским руководством Турции. Установлена многоаспектная взаимосвязь между халифатистскими ценностями, проосманскими настроениями и формами самоотождествления, которые сложились в арабских и южноазиатских обществах. Отдельно намечено соотношение между подъемом халифатистских настроений и радикализацией антиколониальных действий мусульман Индостана.Abstract The article deals with analysis of common and specific features of ideas, propaganda, rhetoric and political actions taken by representatives of the movement for defense of the Caliphate in the Middle East and South Asia. The retrospection showing the transformation of conception of the Caliphate and the necessity of its revival in the works of eminent ideologists and politicians of the Muslim world Jamal al-Din al-Afghani, Abd al-Rahman al-Kawakibi, Muhammad Rashid Rida and Abul Kalam Azad, is also given in the article. The authors also focus on the social and political discussions of the 1920s 1930s, as well as on the agenda of Caliphatist congresses and conferences of this period. They helped to elaborate the early representations of post-Ottoman pattern of the Muslim unity and the ideological and political role of the future Caliphate. The authors demonstrate the difference between the forms of reaction of Muslims in the Middle East and South Asia to the repudiation of the Caliphate by the Republican leaders of Turkey. The article establishes a multi-aspect interaction between the Caliphatist values and forms of self-identification, emerged in Arab and South Asian societies. The correlation between the rise of Caliphatist attitudes and radicalization of anti-colonial actions of South Asian Muslims is also outlined.


Author(s):  
Happymon Jacob

The India–Pakistan border in Jammu and Kashmir (J&K) has witnessed repeated ceasefire violations (CFVs) over the past decade. Indeed, with relations between India and Pakistan degrading, CFVs have gone up exponentially. These CFVs have the potential to not only begin a crisis but also escalate an ongoing one. To make things worse, in the event of major violations, political leadership on either side often engage in high-pitched rhetoric some of which even have nuclear undertones. Using fresh empirical data and oral history evidence, this book explains the causes of CFVs on the J&K border and establishes a relationship between CFVs and crisis escalation between India and Pakistan. In doing so, the book further nuances the existing arguments about the escalatory dynamics between the two South Asian nuclear rivals. Furthermore, the book explains ceasefire violations using the concept of ‘autonomous military factors’.


2021 ◽  
Vol 74 (1) ◽  
pp. 181-214
Author(s):  
Eleanor Barnett

Through Venetian Inquisition trials relating to Protestantism, witchcraft, and Judaism, this article illuminates the centrality of food and eating practices to religious identity construction. The Holy Office used food to assert its model of post-Tridentine piety and the boundaries between Catholics and the non-Catholic populations in the city. These trial records concurrently act as access points to the experiences and beliefs—to the lived religion—of ordinary people living and working in Venice from 1560 to 1640. The article therefore offers new insight into the workings and impacts of the Counter-Reformation.


Urban History ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 47 (4) ◽  
pp. 568-588
Author(s):  
Frederik Buylaert ◽  
Jelten Baguet ◽  
Janna Everaert

AbstractThis article provides a comparative analysis of four large towns in the Southern Low Countries between c. 1350 and c. 1550. Combining the data on Ghent, Bruges and Antwerp – each of which is discussed in greater detail in the articles in this special section – with recent research on Bruges, the authors argue against the historiographical trend in which the political history of late medieval towns is supposedly dominated by a trend towards oligarchy. Rather than a closure of the ruling class, the four towns show a high turnover in the social composition of the political elite, and a consistent trend towards aristocracy, in which an increasingly large number of aldermen enjoyed noble status. The intensity of these trends differed from town to town, and was tied to different institutional configurations as well as different economic and political developments in each of the four towns.


Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document