Mar 02 2024 to Mar 02 2024 4 p.m.

EVENT HAS ENDED

Where

Bangalore International Centre

7 4th Main Rd, Stage 2, Domlur 560071

Event Description

This session will be a discussion around the themes in the anthology Liberalism and Its Encounters in India: Some Interdisciplinary Approaches (Routledge 2023). Exploring multiple trajectories of liberalism in India, it moves away from traditional approaches and draws upon resources from other disciplines – those subjects which some might think don’t strictly fall under political science or theory – like anthropology, literature, philosophy — to critically engage with the condition of late capitalist modernity in India. The essays in the volume trace liberalism’s journey through modern Indian history to give us a new standpoint to understand current debates and also point to some internal contradictions of Indian liberalism. The talk and discussion will be followed by a Q&A session with the audience. Speakers Gayatri Menon Sociologist Gayatri Menon is a sociologist who works on the political economy of development, focusing on urbanization, displacement, and questions of home. She has a PhD from Cornell University in Development Sociology. She has taught at the graduate and undergraduate levels and in India and the US. She also has extensive experience in the NGO sector, having worked on rural livelihoods and indebtedness in Maharashtra, on agricultural practices and politics in Garhwal, and on land tenure and housing rights. Lakshmi Arya Thathachar Dean, Research & Associate Professor, RV University Lakshmi Arya Thathachar has a PhD in Modern Indian History from Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi. She has been a Fulbright-Nehru Postdoctoral Research Fellow at Emory University, Atlanta, and a Charles Wallace Postdoctoral Fellow at the School of Oriental and African Studies, London. She has also been a Fellow at the Indian Institute of Advanced Study, Shimla, and a Gender, Sexuality and Law Visiting Fellow at Keele University, UK. Lakshmi’s research interests are interdisciplinary and traverse history and philosophy, particularly political philosophy, epistemology, philosophy of religion, and the socio-cultural history of modern India. She is currently Dean- Research and Associate Professor at RV University, Bengaluru. Lakshmi also writes creatively. Her poems and short stories have been published in various literary journals. R Krishnaswamy Associate Professor & Co-Director, Centre for Social and Political Research Dr. R. Krishnaswamy is Associate Professor and Co-Director for the Centre for Social and Political Research. He works at OP Jindal Global University, Sonepat, Haryana. He has a Ph.D from University of Delhi in Philosophy. He has held a research fellowship at University of Carleton, Ottawa, Canada. He has been a HESP/CEU post-doctoral fellow at the philosophy department at Central European University, Budapest, Hungary (now in Vienna). One of his current interests is researching issues like normativity of language, use-theory of meaning and other related problems in philosophy of language. He has also published works in political/social philosophy. His recent book Wittgenstein and the Nature of Violence (Routledge, 2020) explores what role linguistic behaviour plays in how we engage with each other on the political and the social plane. His second book The Call for Recognition: Naturalizing Political Norms (2023) explores whether our rational capacity to use language can create a viable discourse-theoretic model towards recognising our innate need for social recognition. Atreyee Majumder Anthropologist, National Law School of India University Atreyee Majumder is an anthropologist. She earned her doctoral degree from Yale University (2014). She has been an Andrew Mellon Postdoctoral Fellow at the Jackman Humanities Institute, University of Toronto (2016-18). Her doctoral work on industrial decline and spatial life in eastern India culminated in her first book Time, Space, and Capital in India: Longing and Belonging in an Urban-Industrial Hinterland (Routledge, 2019). Her current research agenda is located at the intersection of anthropology, theology, and the philosophy of religion, specifically concerned with the devotional practice of ‘Bhakti’. She is a poet, and her first book of poems The Book Blue is out from Red River Press this month (2024). She teaches social sciences at National Law School of India University, Bengaluru.