Image: Courtesy of Dev N. Pathak, Sociology, SAU.
About The Department - Vision and Beyond



Over the last half century or so, a vast body of knowledge(s) on the region has evolved within South Asia that mostly remain within the countries of their origin due to a number of reasons. In this specific context, there is a crucial need to share some of this knowledge in contemporary times when, despite assertions of localisations and mini-narratives, the universal does retain its emphasis through a constant dialectics of the two. The debate between the local and universal or mini-narratives and meta-narratives continue to rage, and is more clearly visible in the context of South Asian context. Even so, we are acutely aware of the non-existence of regular and serious forums for South Asian scholarship in social sciences to showcase our own research and thinking. We are also quite conscious of the fact that the process of establishing sociology in the region has created its own peculiarities which has established close inter-relationships between sociology and social anthropology, history, cultural studies, archeology and other related disciplines. We consider the porousness of South Asian sociology one of its most enduring strengths. On the other hand, we are not unaware of the unfortunate regressions sociology has experienced in different South Asian contexts over the last 30 years or so marked by numerous institutional failures.



It is within the context(s) outlined above that the Department of Sociology at South Asian university, initiated in 2011 witihn the Faculty of Social Sciences contributes to teaching, training and knowledge production. It is not intended to be a mere forum for the production of cutting-edge intellectual knowledge and exchange of that knowledge traversing across national borders in South Asia and beyond. Our expectation is that this knowledge would dislocate the persistence of an imposed framework emanating from the colonisation process and postcolonial politics of knowledge. Despite the passage of over fifty years since the process of official decolonization began in the region, much of the analyses of our problems, situations, histories and dynamics emanate from Euro American academia; this is certainly the case when it comes to conceptual formulations and theoretical approaches that are being employed in exploring the region’s social and cultural complexities often without much self-reflection.



The Department of Sociology strongly believes in the need to reformulate this situation by effectively centering South Asia without naively shunning thought from these established centers of knowledge be they in Europe or North America. We believe in an active and robust engagement with these issues within South Asia. In this context, through the work of its faculty and the research of graduate students, the Department would bring forward the newer forms of knowledge that comprehends and represents the South Asian context with a more authoritative and nuanced voice. We strongly believe in the need to actively intervene in the process of knowledge formation through a constant sharing of knowledge that the region produces as well as through interaction with the world beyond the region.



The courses taught in the Department as well as the research carried out by its faculty members reflect this overall vision and our collective commitment towards innovation, move beyond untenable stereotypes, and explore a new world of knowledge within the discipline of Sociology.


Class of 2011, Department of Sociology, South Asian University; Image: Courtesy of Dev N. Pathak, Sociology, SAU.

Thursday, March 26, 2015

Sociology Seminar Series 2015 - When Words Will Not Do

When Words Will Not Do:
Sinhala Buddhist Monks, and the 
Emergence of Violence

By
Pradeep Jeganathan
Shiv Nadar University


ABSTRACT: This paper is an attempt to re-visit an old chestnut in anthropology, most famously addressed by the renowned S.J. Tambiah: “If Buddhism preaches nonviolence, why is there so much political violence in Sri Lanka today?” My attempt is to think the emergence of violence, in relation to Sinhala Buddhist practice; I do not address the question of ‘quantity.’ I do so by marking a dispersed set of objects which form an archive of the practice of a particular set of Sinhala Buddhist monks. I excavate sites in this archive, thinking the imbrication of perlocutionary utterance and gesture, in each instance. It is my contention, that this mode of analysis, taken as a whole, will illuminate the emergence of violence, in relation to particular configurations of Theravada Buddhism, in Sri Lanka.

Pradeep Jeganathan is Professor in the Department of Sociology, School of Humanities and Social Sciences at SNU. His research interests focus on the perpetration of violence, survival and bad death. Simultaneously he also has begun research on familial and romantic love. He also has continuing interests in colonial forms of knowledge, post-colonial nationalism and subalterneity and Theravada Buddhism. Cyber-cociality and cyber-subjectivity is another interest. While in Sri Lanka he took an active role in public intellectual life, writing a regular Oped column in a major Sunday newspaper, and appearing occasionally on TV shows, and blogging. His publications include ‘Living with Death: Human Narratives in the wake of Sri Lanka’s Civil Wars’ and ‘Unmaking the Nation: The politics of identity and history in modern Sri Lanka’ (edited with Qadri Ismail). His novel ‘At the Water’s Edge’, was short listed for the Gratiaen Prize in 2004.

Date: 
1st April 2015, Wednesday
Time: 02.30 PM

Venue:

FSI HALL
South Asian University

Akbar Bhawan
Chanakyapuri 
New Delhi 110021

ALL ARE CORDIALLY INVITED


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