Colonialism on Spatial Transformation: A Socio-Spatial Analysis of the Outdoor Transitional Spaces of Sri Lankan House

Sri Lanka, under the British from the early 19th century to 1948, saw a rapid growth in urban areas and the emergence of metropolitan bourgeoisie. Increasing demand for housing was met through housing schemes and private houses on smaller plots. Previous colonials, the Portuguese and the Dutch, adapted and continued the traditional house forms where outdoor transitional spaces such as verandas and courtyards remained as an integral part responding to climate and socio-cultural needs. However, the British period saw the advent of two noteworthy types of housing—a smaller re-adapted traditional house and an imported version of an all-enclosed house. This study evaluates the shift in socio-spatial role of the outdoor transitional spaces of single-unit houses from pre-colonial time up to independence using graphical analysis of the plan form combined with interviews on use of space.

‘Authorizing the Peril’: Mythologies of (Settler) Law at the End of Time

The promised paradises of colonial capitalism and neoliberalism are set in a perpetually elusive future (Fitzpatrick 1992). This future is not a set destination, but an endless linear journey set to the thrum of ‘progress’ and ‘development’. This paper considers, in the context of recent cases relating to development in the Athabasca tar sands region, what the law of the Canadian settler state does when it is faced with interruptions and ruptures in its timescape. Drawing on Fitzpatrick’s seminal work, The Mythology of Modern Law, I argue that a conceptualisation of law’s behaviour in these contexts as functionally mythological highlights some of the elusive ways that settler law maintains a stranglehold over legal imaginaries of oil and gas developments: by distorting and flattening the pasts and presents of Indigenous societies that pre-dated (and continue to co-exist with) the settler state on ‘Canadian’ land, by mediating between the ‘origin’ of the settler state and the daily rhythms of colonial time through ‘Eternal Objects’ such as property and economic development, and by asserting a general ‘objectivity’ of law to evade any direct grappling with the stark possibilities of the ‘end of the world’ created by the climate crisis. I conclude, drawing on Indigenous scholarship and the work of de Goede and Randalls, that a meaningful response to the climate crisis requires re-enchanted attachments to life that necessitate a departure from the one-dimensional temporality of the mythologies of settler law.

Mahadma Gandhi and Netaji Subbash Chandra Bose from Political Philosophy Perspective

Mahatma Gandhi and Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose were two legendary personalities, gigantic in their political moral and ethical stature. Both of them were two worthy sons of Mother India but in many aspects, they were so different from each other. However, among all the Indian Freedom Fighters, Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose’s ranking concerning his contribution to Indian freedom struggle and popularity is next only to Mahatma Gandhi. Interestingly, historians, military strategists, anti-colonialists and political scientists have had the veteran revolutionary as a subject of serious academic discussions. Tum mujhe khoon do mein tumhein azaadi doon ga” - These words were uttered by the great revolutionary of colonial time, Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose. The intention behind the statement comes from Netaji's idea that India could never get freedom through peaceful means unlike Mahatma Gandhi (Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi), whose ideology was more non-violent. On one hand there was Subhas Chandra Bose and on the other hand there was GANDHI. The relationship between these two characters is very important. In this paper, I try to analyse the differences and even similarities between two great figures of India in term of political philosophy. Received 9th December 2020; Revised 2nd March 2021; Accepted 20th March 2021

From Interstellar Imperialism to Celestial Wayfinding: Prime Directives and Colonial Time-Knots in SETI

This article traces parallels between James Cook’s 1768 Endeavour voyage to measure the transit of Venus and current initiatives searching for extraterrestrial intelligence (SETI). While separated by vast time and space, both are united in their appeal to celestial frontier science in the service of all humanity, and contain discrepancies between their ethical protocols and probable outcomes. Past, present, and future colonial projects are interwoven by drawing on Dipesh Chakrabarty’s “time-knot,” Star Trek’s “prime directive,” and firsthand experience in SETI’s Indigenous studies working group. This analysis cautions against the current trend toward unabated interstellar imperialism and suggests alternative approaches for engaging outer spaces and beings through celestial wayfinding.

Racializing Performances in Colonial Time-Spaces

Starting from the premise that colonialism begat the racial systems that continue to undergird hierarchies of power and privilege, the chapter argues that colonial time-spaces (chronotopes) remain productive of racial orders. Even in ostensibly postcolonial contexts, colonial-era racial logics have long half-lives and often continue to circulate through performances that represent or re-enact colonial time-spaces. The chapter traces the semiotic workings of racial performances, from mundane everyday interactions to staged spectacles (and back), in order to examine how they selectively highlight or erase the genealogies connecting past and present and performatively enact configurations of racializing signs that can mark physical bodies, social types, locations, voices, dispositions, and practices, usually in overdetermined, if not necessarily consistent ways. The chapter draws upon critical theory and ethnographies of performance in the Americas to discuss the case of Cuban bozal, a figuration of “untamed” African presence in contemporary Cuban religious and folklore performances.

Cosmopolitan Planetarity: Translating Multilingual Affectivity

As an umbrella term, the planetary has become a type of placeholder for many different ways of rethinking how the human and the non-human interact in relation to space and time (national time, colonial time, deep time). As well, when we engage with marginalized epistemologies associated with, for example, Indigenous and other nonEuropean cultures, what kind of planetarity is constructed then? And what types of affect does planetarity generate (for example, between the human and the in/non-human) in these contexts? Language and the necessity for multilingual translations of affective concepts are at the core of such questions. My paper will consider an uncomfortable cosmopolitan planetary affect in relation to the Inuit writer Tanya Tagaq’s Split Tooth, the Korean novelist Han Kang’s The Vegetarian and the Japanese German writer Yoko Tawada.

Islam dan Budaya Masyarakat Gayo, Provinsi Aceh: Kajian Sejarah dan Sosial

This article argues that Gayonese community practice Islam through the culture and less concern with religious texts. Although the wave of islamization since the colonial time and post-independence was high, the process does not succeed in introducing what the local scholars called as Islamic tradition. Such situation forces the following ulama to defend culture by finding justification for every practice instead of abolishing it. There are two factors leading to the situation. First, ulama of colonial and post-colonial time did not succeed in finding what they called as Islamic tradition replacing the existing tradition. second, lacking of regeneration of reformer Ulama that drive the living reformer ulama to support culture by inserting Islamic values and norms into the culture. This effort is crucial as the Gayonese refers more to the culture than the religious texts. This Article historically studies the development of Islam in Gayonese community. It frames its historical analysis from the Dutch colonial period to post independence of Indonesia Republic. It generally observes the impact of islamization in the past to the current situation. This article brings back the fundamental question in socio-anthropological studies about Islam that why do Muslim who refer to same source of text understand and practice Islam in widely various expression. The question is applied to this research exploring the development of Islam in Gayonese community inhabiting Central Aceh and Bener Meriah District. Thus, this research questions how did Islam develop in colonial time and its impact to the local culture? did there a debate about religion and culture take place during the colonial time and post-independence of Indonesia? How does the past event affect the current practice of Islam in Gayonese community? the questions are explored historically by collecting relevant literatures and collective memory of the local people. The collective memory data were collected from 2015 to 2019