South Asian Photographs Across the Disciplines: The Uses of Visual Evidence

A Seminar Series for Spring 2015

A Humanities/Humanity Project of the Whitney Humanities Center at Yale

Faculty Organizers: Professors Laura Wexler (American Studies/WGSS), Kishwar Rizvi (Art History/South Asian Studies), Tamara Sears (Art History/South Asian Studies) and Inderpal Grewal (WGSS/South Asian Studies)

Co-Sponsored by: WGSS, Art History, South Asian Studies Council, LGBT Studies, Photographic Memory Workshop, sepiaEYE, New York.

Over the past two decades, the study of the history of photography in South Asia has gained increasing traction in many disciplines and fields across the humanities. Thanks to the work of many pioneering scholars, South Asian photography and photographic practices are now considered to be a vibrant field of interdisciplinary scholarship and research.

Photographs pertaining to South Asia are part of several collections at Yale, and are as varied as their locations. Within the broader context of colonialism and modernity, the South Asia material at the Yale helps situate South Asia within a global context.  Alongside their art historical significance in the context of photography in South Asia, the collections are important resources for the study of the cultural and political history of the region.

This seminar series will focus on four different disciplinary and interdisciplinary conversations that take as a starting point Yale’s collections of South Asia photographs. Our goal is to bring together many pioneering scholars to assist us in developing critical methods for researching and circulating the Yale collections.

Participation: While the Opening reception is open to the public, any students, scholars or researchers wishing to join the seminars are invited to sign up to participate. We encourage broad participation across disciplines.  Because space is limited, registration is required.  The website for registration will be up in early January.

Yale students have the option to obtain credit for attending all four seminars by enrolling as an independent study course with one of the series coordinators.

Register