Dear all (with apologies for cross-posting),

I'm pleased to invite all to join our full-day symposium, both in-person and virtual (zoom link in conference app), at the Madison 2024 ACSA on "Animal Subjects in South Asia," co-organizers Andrea Gutierrez and Thomas Trautmann. 

For more information please contact me at andrea.gutierrez@austin.utexas.edu 

Yours,

Andrea Gutierrez

Animal Subjects in South Asia

Abstract

Animals are intricately woven into the histories, ideologies, images, and texts of South Asia. Likewise, human lives in South Asia have perennially existed alongside non-human animals within shared ecologies. Recent decades have been marked by the “animal turn” across the scholarly landscape, and the introduction of animal studies into South Asian studies is already well underway. This symposium radically centers animals in our study of South Asia without decentering humans, exploring human understandings of specific animals throughout the historical period, from deep history to the present day.

The symposium dedicates more than half of our attention to one very exceptional animal—the elephant—with the rest of our time reserved for other animals in South Asia. Our research concerns animals as beings of their own. At the same time, focusing on animals only aids our understanding of human histories, stories, archaeologies, ethnographies, and geographies.

Schedule for Wednesday, Oct. 30

8:30-10:15  Human-Animal Relations: From Elephants to Pigeons

Anu Karippal, “'Wildness', Conservation Discourse, and Cultural Elephants of South India”

Muhammad Kavesh, “Rethinking Multispecies Hospitality in Rural Pakistan”

Sagnik Saha (virtual), “The Abject Animals: Dogs, Jackals and Donkeys in Early Indian Imagination”

Break 10:15-10:30am

10:30- 12:15 The Visual Record of Animals in South Asian History

Chiara Policardi (virtual), “Śrī-Lakṣmī and Elephants: Investigating Genesis and Valences of the Association, between Texts and Art”

Charlotte Gorant, “Elephant and cobra nāgas: Exploring ancient likenesses of curved trunks and bodies in art”

Lunch 12:15-1:45pm

1:45-3:30 Elephants through History: Understanding the Biological Animal, Animal Management & Sovereignty and Kingship

Thomas Trautmann, “Elephant science, old and new”

Andrea Gutiérrez, “Tusk-trimming within the Elephant Care Tradition (Gajaśāstra) of Early South Asia”

Ali Anooshahr, “Aurangzeb’s Elephants”

Break 3:30-3:45pm

3:45 - 5:30 Watery Beings, Fluid Identities: Animals Read through Buddhist Materials & Āyurveda

Lisa Brooks, “Unlikely Subjects: Leeches, Gender, and Personhood in Early South Asian Medical Literatures”

Jahnabi Chanchani, “Making Animal, Making Buddha”