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- Convenors:
-
Margret Frenz
(Ministry of Science, Reserch and Arts)
Roger Jeffery (University of Edinburgh)
- Location:
- Room 111
- Start time:
- 27 July, 2016 at
Time zone: Europe/Warsaw
- Session slots:
- 2
Short Abstract:
This panel is on the economic, social, and cultural influence of India on European cities, including Edinburgh, Dundee, Oxford, Lisbon, and Paris. The panel will address methodological and intellectual debates concerning the role of colonial experiences on the urban context in the long 19th century.
Long Abstract:
Most discussions of the influence of India on Europe in the nineteenth century centre around discourses within a particular state, and are rarely comparative across European countries. By contrast, this panel will focus on the economic, social, and cultural influences of India on European cities across at least the three imperial powers of Portugal, France, and Great Britain, including Lisbon, Paris, Edinburgh, Dundee, and Oxford. Participants will discuss the impact of art collections and exhibitions, cultural and educational institutions, and architectural landmarks on European cities which originated in the Indian subcontinent. In addition, there will be reflection on how ideas of India and Indian culture informed public debate and discourse in key urban settings, and on individuals who circulated between colony and metropole. The panel will address methodological and intellectual debates concerning the role of colonial experiences on the urban context in the long 19th century. Tentative Panellists include Dr Anne-Julie Etter, Université de Cergy-Pontoise; Dr Margret Frenz, University of Oxford; Professor Roger Jeffery, University of Edinburgh; Dr Carla Alferes Pinto, CHAM/Portuguese Centre for Global History; Professor Jim Tomlinson, University of Glasgow.
Accepted papers:
Session 1Anne-Julie Etter (Cergy-Pontoise University)
Paper short abstract:
This paper explores the constitution and influence of Indian collections in France, and more especially in Paris, during the 18th and 19th centuries. It includes a comparative perspective with Indian collections that were set up in Britain at the same period.
Paper long abstract:
This paper examines the constitution and role of Indian collections in France, and more especially in Paris, during the 18th and 19th centuries. In the course of this period, French presence in India varied in nature and degree, from missionary enterprises to the rise of commercial interests, which in turn led to the development of political and colonial ambitions. French India was however reduced to five trading posts in the second half of the 18th century. In the following decades and throughout the 19th century, French people, including so-called adventurers who worked for Indian sovereigns or the East India Company, travelled to and stayed in these establishments and elsewhere in India. This framework sheds light on trajectories of individuals who travelled between France and India and their contribution to the shaping of collections that made their way to France (manuscripts, miniatures, statues, coins and objets d'art). This paper will explore the canals through which objects were collected in India and brought back to France, the institutions and places in which they were kept and displayed, as well as the role they had in knowledge production and their influence on cultural life in the urban setting. It will offer a comparative perspective with Indian collections in Britain.
Carla Alferes Pinto (FCSH - NOVA)
Paper short abstract:
In this presentation I will address the question of Indo-Portuguese art combining the interpretation of documental and visual data that express the importance of 19th century exhibitions and of art museum collections for the reception of Indian origin artefacts in Portugal.
Paper long abstract:
In December 1881 the expression Indo-Portuguese was first applied to the arts. Used in the catalogue of the "Special Loan Exhibition of Spanish and Portuguese Ornamental Art" by J.C. Robinson (1824-1913), the ethnic characterisation was confined to the so called decorative arts.
Although the Portuguese public collections were being gathered at the time, this new interpretation was ignored by Portuguese historians and art historians, also expressing the tension between "professionals" and the Portuguese 'intelligentsia' during the preparation and the following criticism to the "Exhibition of Portuguese and Spanish Ornamental Art" (Lisbon,1882).
In this presentation I will combine the interpretation of documental and visual data from some 19th century exhibitions (Colonial, Industrial, and International) and of art museums collections in order to provide an overview of the ways by which Indian origin artefacts were received (and perceived) in Portugal.
My goal is, in one hand, contribute to a better knowledge of the process by which curators created the collections, by questioning the reception and classification of manufactured Indian objects in Portugal, and, at the same time, understand in what sense the 'nationalization' of objects and their integration into a narrative of the Portuguese empire contributed to condition their artistic perception.
I will argue that Portuguese political, religious, and cultural context was crucial to the classification and interpretation of Indian objects and that such ambiance was immediately embodied in their reception, even if the objects were considered to be artistic (or not) by Goan authorities.
Margret Frenz (Ministry of Science, Reserch and Arts)
Paper short abstract:
Indian influences on British academic, cultural, and social institutions were significant, but often went unnoticed. This paper will shed light on several architectural landmarks in contemporary Oxford and its surroundings that are connected with India.
Paper long abstract:
Indian influences on British academic, cultural, and social institutions were significant, but often went unnoticed. This paper will shed light on several architectural landmarks in contemporary Oxford and its surroundings that are connected with India. Indian maharajas and businessmen initated, financed, and built museums, mansions, and wells in and around Oxford between the nineteenth and mid-twentieth century. I will explore the establishment of these buildings as well as their interpretation and reception. What was the purpose in creating such landmarks, and what was to be demonstrated by building them? I argue that firstly, this could reflect the notion that Indians and Britons should be equal, for instance, in terms of actively determining and defining the discourse on India. Secondly, it illustrates an understanding of india as a nation in its own right within the imperial framework. Thirdly, these buildings could be understood as self-referential -- in order to create a home-like atmosphere in some parts of the metropole, but also, in order to shape the self-perception of Indian communities in Britain. The elephant on the roof was but one element in this story.
Blake Smith (Northwestern University / EHESS)
Paper short abstract:
This paper examines three moments of South Asian presence in Paris before and during the Revolution. From these cases, in which South Asians were guests or prisoners of the state, it traces a decisive shift in France's engagement with the Subcontinent.
Paper long abstract:
This paper examines three moments of South Asian presence in Paris before and during the Revolution. In the first, the French government received nearly fifty cotton-weavers from Mysore, its principal strategic partner in the Subcontinent. Within a few years of their arrival, however, these weavers, sent to teach their techniques to the French, were dismissed as irrational and lazy. Even as they departed, new Mysorean guests arrived: a diplomatic embassy seeking an alliance. While Louis XVI rejected their proposals, the ambassadors' dress inspired new fashion trends in the French public. No longer a source of economic knowledge, Mysore now supplied exoticist inspiration. In a final case, a Bengali merchant was taken to Paris and forced by the revolutionary government to translate the Rights of Man in order to spread the Revolution's principles to South Asia. This unique propaganda effort reflected a desire to 'civilize' the Subcontinent.
From these cases, in which South Asians were guests or prisoners in Paris, this paper argues for a decisive shift in French attitudes to and engagement with the Subcontinent.
Jim Tomlinson (University of Glasgow)
Paper short abstract:
This paper focuses upon three attempts (from the 1890s and 1920s) to understand India, produced in Dundee in the face of competition from the Calcutta jute industry. These are used to analyse how 'Indianness' was understood, and how these understandings shaped attitudes and behaviour in Dundee.
Paper long abstract:
From the late nineteenth century Dundee entered into a complex economic relationship with India as a consequence, above all, of the growing competition between its staple product, jute, and the same industry based in Calcutta. Over the half century from the 1880s this relationship spawned a number of visits to the sub-continent and attempts by Dundonians to understand India and the underpinnings of the industry with which Dundee found itself in competition. This paper focuses upon three such appreciations, two produced by Dundee residents in the 1890s, one in the 1920s, in order to analyse how 'Indianness' was understood, and how these understandings shaped attitudes and behaviour towards India in Dundee.
Roger Jeffery (University of Edinburgh)
Paper short abstract:
Edinburgh's residents who had lived and worked in India had varied impacts on its social and political life. Contrary to the stereotype, not all held reactionary views. This paper explores India's role in the campaigns for women's medical education.
Paper long abstract:
Scotland's capital was affected in many different ways by sending so many people to India - and receiving some of them back. In some years, 10% of those leaving its schools pursued careers in India, and about 10% of students on its medical courses were born in India towards the end of the 19th century. Unlike other 'imperial' British cities (such as Glasgow and Liverpool), Edinburgh was more heavily involved in the trade in people and ideas, than in commerce and finance. Not all of those who lived in Edinburgh after their Indian experiences were Scots-born, and many returning Scots lived elsewhere in Britain. Attention has been paid to the returning nabobs in the early 19th century. This paper, however, will consider the India-returned from 1871 to 1901. In the latter year, the census reported that more than 1,250 people born in India were living in the city - the largest number for all the censuses up to 1911. Who were these people? What impact did they make on the city and its role as an intellectual, social, economic and political hub? Using a case study of the campaigns for medical education for women, this paper will show that at least some of the 'India-returned' played a prominent role in this movement (and the linked campaigns for women's suffrage), and will also discuss why Indian experience might have been significant.