Ideas live many times, changing and adapting when they are in the hands of successive thinkers and leaders. Dr. B. R. Ambedkar, for example, credited American philosopher John Dewey as being central to his work on the annihilation of caste. Perhaps Dewey’s work on education and democracy as central to reform took on a new life and meaning as Ambedkar imagined representation and opportunity for Dalits. Ambedkar also travelled to present-day Sri Lanka to learn about Buddhism, thoughts that would continue to inspire him and those that followed him after his life. Similarly, Bangladeshi poet Kazi Nasrul Islam wrote about Turkey’s first President Kemal Ataturk in a way that stirred pre-Independence Bengal, as it thought about the Bengali language and the independence of present-day Bangladesh, “to its depths.” Mahatma Gandhi often corresponded with Russian author Leo Tolstoy, leading to a shared commitment to non-violence that shaped political life in India and South Asia. A study of South Asian nations, national imagination, and political movements reveals many such serendipitous and critical links, where interaction between cultures and people shape thought and life. What are the other surprising interchanges and exchanges that formed how nation-states in South Asia were formed? What thoughts about freedom, expression and citizenship travelled to create the social movements that have existed in South Asia for years?  
 
As we conclude our four-part look at cultural history in South Asia, we want to end by celebrating the political thought that has driven independence, democracy, citizenship, protest, nation-building, and rights in South Asia, and understand the linkages inherent in this thought.

This is the final session of Cultural Encounters: South Asian History in the 'Third Space,' this year's edition of our annual summer learning series, taking place virtually over June and July. Over four sessions and with panels of experts, we will explore the ways in which cultural similarities, hybridity, and interaction have shaped South Asia.The programmes focus on the colonial vs. local; food histories; religious histories; and histories of freedom. For more, visit this link. 

SPEAKERS

Sharif Hozoori is an Institute of International Education Scholar Rescue Fund (IIE-SRF) fellow, MESA Global Academy scholar, and visiting scholar at the Einaudi Center’s South Asia Program. He previously worked as an assistant professor of International Relations in Kabul, Afghanistan. His area of research includes Afghanistan politics and foreign policy, identity politics, and cultural studies. He is interested in South Asia and Middle East Studies as well. His recent book, published in Persian, explores the political elites and foreign policy of Afghanistan during Mullah Omar's Emirate and Karzai's Republic. Hozoori is a 2024 Global Public Voices freedom of expression fellow and was previously featured as a GPV media voice in 2022–23.

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Tushar Shetty is an economist-in-training at the International & Development Economics programme at HTW Berlin. He is the producer and host of Beyond the Indus, The Diplomat Magazine's South Asia podcast, where he interviews leading academics, journalists and policymakers about political, economic and geostrategic issues in and around South Asia. His work and interviews have been featured in platforms and outlets like The Diplomat Magazine, The Telegraph, Human Rights Watch, THF Radio and Alex Radio Berlin. 

Manu Goswami is Associate Professor of History at New York University, USA. The author of Producing India: From Colonial Economy to National Space (Chicago, 2004), and co-Editor of Political Imaginaries in Twentieth Century India (Bloomsbury, 2022). Her expertise includes 19th and 20th century India, history of economic thought, political economy and social theory. 

OUTREACH PARTNERS