Transnational Research Group Poverty and Education in India · their impact on universal schooling...

Annual Report 2014

Transnational Research Group

Poverty and Education in India

With project partners from: Centre for Historical Studies, JNU, Delhi + Centre for Modern Indian Studies, Georg-August-Universität Göttingen + Centre for the Study of Developing Societies, Delhi + German Historical Institute London + King’s India Institute, King’s College London + Zakir Husain Centre for Educational Studies, School of Social Sciences, JNU, Delhi

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Project Partners:

• ProfessorRaviAhuja,CentreforModernIndianStudies,Georg-August-UniversitätGöttingen

• DrSaradaBalagopalan,CentrefortheStudyofDevelopingSocieties,Delhi• ProfessorNeeladriBhattacharya,CentreforHistoricalStudies,JNU,Delhi• ProfessorAndreasGestrich,GermanHistoricalInstituteLondon• DrValeskaHuber,GermanHistoricalInstituteLondon• ProfessorSunilKhilnani,King’sIndiaInstitute,King’sCollege,London• ProfessorJanakiNair,CentreforHistoricalStudies,JNU,Delhi• ProfessorGeethaB.Nambissan,ZakirHusainCentreforEducational

Studies,SchoolofSocialSciences,JNU,Delhi• DrJahnaviPhalkey,King’sIndiaInstitute,King’sCollege,London• DrIndraSengupta,GermanHistoricalInstituteLondon• DrSilkeStrickrodt,GermanHistoricalInstituteLondon• DrJanaTschurenev,CeMIS,UniversityofGöttingen• ProfessorRupaViswanath,CentreforModernIndianStudies,

Georg-August-UniversitätGöttingen

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Table of Contents

Preface 4

1. General Report 5

2. Project Reports 10I. AScriptfortheMasses?PedagogicPracticesandDidactic

TraditionsamongSylhetis 10II. CriticalMindandLabouringBody:CasteandEducationReforms

inKeralam 12III. TransformingWork:TrainingProgramsandRetailWorker-Identity

inContemporaryKolkata 14IV. EffectsofIndustrialDeclineonEducationinUrbanIndia:

AStudyofMumbai’sEx-Millworkers’HouseholdDecisionsonChildren’sSchooling,1980s-Present 17

V. RefugeeSettlementandtheRoleofEducationinCalcutta,1947-1967 20VI. MorethanFoodforSchools?LocalPerceptionsinDefiningand

ShapingtheBenefitsoftheMid-DayMealSchemeinDelhi 23VII. Whatexclusionleavesout:The“life-worlds”ofwomenin

contemporaryIndianeducationpolicies 26VIII. Marketisation,ManagerialismandSchoolReforms:AStudyof

PublicPrivatePartnershipsinElementaryEducationinDelhi 30IX. RecastingtheSelf:MissionariesandtheEducationofthe

PoorinKerala,1854-1956 32X. PrimedtoLabour:‘Education’inIndustrialandArtisan

SchoolsofColonialIndia(1860s-1940s) 34XI. SchoolingWomen:DebatesonEducationintheUnited

Provinces(1854-1930) 36XII. Documentingthelivesoftheurbanpoorwithaspecific

referencetothelinksbetweenpovertyandeducation:asetofinterviews 38

3. Conference and Workshop reports 41I. MakingWinners?TransformingIndividualsthrough

EducationinColonialandPost-ColonialContexts 41II. NationalWorkshoponCaste,ExperienceandPoverty

ofEducation:PerspectivefromSouthIndia 46

4. Events 48I. TRGWorkshopsandConferences 48II. TRGLectures 52III. Otherevents 53

5. People 54

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PrefaceAndreas Gestrich, Director German Historical Institute London

The second year of the Transnational Re-searchGroup“PovertyReductionandPolicyforthePoorbetweentheStateandPrivateActors:EducationPolicyinIndiasincetheNineteenthCentury”hasbeenabusyperiodof intensiveand fruitful academic cooperation and re-search.Intheshortperiodofitsexistencethe‘TRG’hasbecomewellknownbothinIndiaandinternationally amongst academics interestedin thefield of poverty and education in Indiapastandpresent.Itisregardedasanextreme-ly successfulmodel of international academicco-operationinresearchandteaching.

At the centre of the activities of theTRG liesthe research of the doctoral and postdoctoralfellows and the intensive tuition they receivefromthePrincipalInvestigatorsattheirhomeuniversities and in our seminars, which areheldeverysixmonthsatoneofthepartnerin-stitutions. It isapleasuretoseethatthePhDstudentswhostartedinthefirstyearhaveallmadeverygoodprogress in theirwork.TheyconductedintensivearchivalresearchinIndiaandEuropeandstarted towriteup theirfirstchapters. Similarly, the postdoctoral fellowswhose fellowships commenced at the begin-ningofthefundingperiodareintheprocessofproducing the academic articles and chaptersrequiredfromthemaspartoftheirfellowshipcontract.

OfparticularimportancewasalsothefactthatinDecember2014theMaxWeberStiftung,thefundingbodyoftheTRG,wasabletocompletethe process of registration with the ReserveBank of India. This allowed the Max WeberStiftungtoopenitsownBranchOfficeinDelhi

and support and coordinate the work of theTRGinIndiainamoredirectandefficientway.ItalsoopensnewopportunitiesforcontinuingIndo-Germanacademiccooperationinthefieldofthehumanitiesandsocialsciencesinawidercontext.Wearelookingforwardtotheconfer-encemarkingtheofficialopeningoftheDelhiBranchOfficeinFebruary2015.

Allthiswouldnothavebeenpossiblewithouttheextraordinarycommitmentofallmembersofthegroup;PhDstudents,fellows,andPrinci-palInvestigatorsaswellastheadministrativestaff. I would like to thank them all for theirdedicationtowardsmakingthisexperimentintransnationalacademiccooperationasuccess,and for the close personal and academic tiesthathavedevelopedwithinthegroupoverthepasttwoyears.Specialthanks,however,gotoDr Indra Sengupta, our academic coordinator.Asinthefirstyear,itwashercommitmentandexpertisethatensuredthesmoothrunningandsuccessofthegroup.IwouldalsoliketothanktheAmericanInstituteofIndianStudiesinNewDelhianditsDirector-General,PurnimaMehta,for theircontinuingco-operationandsupport.The joint Delhi-Program of AIIS and the Ger-man Historical Institute London provided thenecessaryadministrativebasisfortherunningof thegroup.Finally, the thanksof theentiregroupgototheMaxWeberStiftung,afounda-tion funded by the German Federal Ministryof Education and Research. The Max WeberStiftung initiated the TRG and provides its fi-nancial basis. We are looking forward to con-tinuingandintensifyingthisexcellenttransna-tionalcooperationintheyearstocome.

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The Transnational Research Group(TRG)“PovertyReductionandPolicyfor the Poor between the State andPrivate Actors: Education Policy inIndiasince theNineteenthcentury”at GHI London, which is funded bythe Max Weber Stiftung, has beenactivesince1January2013.TheTRGhas an inter-disciplinary researchagendafocusingon7designatedre-searchareas,tobestudiedbyseniorscholarsandjuniorresearchersfromthedisciplinesofhistory,education,

and educational sociology: 1) Nine-teenth and twentieth-century globaleducational reform movements andtheir impact on universal schoolingin India; 2) The quest for universalelementary/school education, theprivate sector and edu-business; 3)Caste discrimination and educationpolicy; 4) Industrial restructuring,informalization, and their conse-quencesforaccesstoelementaryed-ucation; 5) Adult education and the

1. General ReportTransnational Research Group: “Poverty Reduction and Policy for the Poor between the State and Private Actors: Education Policy in India since the Nineteenth Century”

Indra Sengupta, Academic Coordinator

TRG Workshop and Meeting, London, 7-9 July 2014

Photo by courtesy of German Historical Institute London

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popularisation of practical scientificknowledge;6) Industrialandtechni-cal institutions and the resignifica-tionofmanuallabour;7)Theimpactofschoolingonlifehistories.

Inaddition,inthereportyearitwasdecidedtoshiftthefocusofresearchofthegrouptoalarge-scaleresearchproject,spanningtheareasofinterestofmostoftheprincipalinvestigators,onKeyMomentsofEducationPolicytowards thePoorwhichwillexplorethematic moments in the followingareas: indigenous and rural educa-tion (Neeladri Bhattacharya), gen-der, education, and inequality (JanaTschurenev), caste (Geetha Nambis-san), religion, education and labour(Ravi Ahuja), compulsory education(SaradaBalagopalan),technicalsolu-tionsfortheeducationofthemasses(Jahnavi Phalkey). Jana Tschurenevwas appointed for 2 years as a re-search fellow (Wissenschaftliche Mi-tarbeiterin) at CeMIS Göttingen toact as academic coordinator for thisproject.Theprojectisexpectedtoab-sorbthebulkoftheTRG’stimeandfundingoverthenext3years.

Inthereportyeartheresearchagen-daoftheTRGincreasedinsubstancewiththeadditionofnewfellowshipsas well as a robust programme ofworkshopsandconferencesinwhichtheTRGfellows tookpart.6 furtherfellowshipswereawarded,ofwhich2weregiventoPhDand4topostdoc-toral scholars. One PhD scholar vol-untarily left the TRG. The new PhDfellowshipshavebeenofferedforaninitialperiodof2yearsand, follow-

ingareviewprocedure,theymaybeextended. 2 PhD fellowships whichstarted in early 2013 have been ex-tendedby2yearseach.Postdoctoralgrants have been awarded for oneyear.Of the6newawards, thePhDscholarsareregisteredatJNUDelhiand CeMIS Göttingen respectively;the new postdoctoral scholars arebased at CeMIS Göttingen and JNUDelhi respectively. Almost all theprojectsoftheTRGresearchfellowsrequire lengthy periods of stay inLondon and the UK in order to usethe rich archival holdings on thesubject in this country. During thistime,all research fellowswillbeaf-filiated to the GHI London. A newphaseofresearchcollaborationwiththeKing’sIndiaInstitutebeganwiththeawardofpostdoctoralfellowshipsto twoyoungresearchscholarswhowill be affiliated with that institute.A new short-term fellowship for re-searchstaysofupto3monthsintheUKforPhDscholarswasintroducedandthefirstgrantawarded.

In addition to the PhD and post-doctoral grants the TRG’s visitingfellowship programme at GHI Lon-don also started in the report year.4visitingfellowshipsof1-3monthseachwereawardedtoseniorscholarsworking on the field. The scholarsincludedRaviVasudevanandSaradaBalagopalanfromCSDS,NitaKumarfrom Claremont McKenna CollegeandNeeladriBhattacharyafromJNU.The visiting fellowships provided aremarkable opportunity to link thework of the TRG with those of ex-perts in thefieldbeyondthegroup,

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as thevisiting fellowseithergaveatalkonthesubjectof theirresearchortookpartintheTRGworkshopinLondonascommentators.

The research activities and outputof the TRG expanded substantial-ly in the report year. In addition tothe PhD and postdoctoral researchprojects, the individual researchprojects of the project partners andprincipal investigators took off. Inparticular,thefirstphaseoftheoralhistoryprojecton‘Documentingthelives of the urban poor with a spe-cific reference to the links betweenpovertyandeducation:asetofinter-views’(JanakiNair,JNU)hasalmostreached completion (see separatereport).Furtherprojects: ‘Schooling,DisadvantageandPrivilege:Choices,strategiesandpracticesofpoorandmiddle class families’ (GeethaNam-bissan,JNU),‘Shifting‘aspirations’ina post-RTE landscape’ (Sarada Bala-gopalan, CSDS) and ‘DocumentingAakash – the android-based tabletcomputer project’ (Jahnavi Phalkey)have begun and made considerableprogress.

The TRG’s online Working PaperSeries began in the report year. 7paperswerecommissioned in2013-2014. Most of the contributors aresubjectexpertsandreputedscholarsin the field of research. The first 3paperswerepublishedinthereportyear. A further 3 papers are at thereviewstageandexpectedtobepub-lishedbytheearly2015.Afinalpa-perhasrecentlybeencommissionedanditisexpectedtobeaccessibleto

thepublicbythemiddleof2015.Thepapers are available online on thewebsiteoftheTRG.Withthehelpoftheperspectivia.netteamattheMaxWeberStiftung,wehavebeenabletopublishthepapersonwww.perspec-tivia.netaswell.

http://www.ghil.ac.uk/trg_poverty_and_education/publications.html

http://www.perspectivia.net/con-tent/publikationen/trg-working-pa-pers

Poster for TRG Lecture by Janaki Nair, GHI London, 8 July 2014

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It isexpectedthatthesepaperswillbe finally published in volumes ed-itedbyprincipalinvestigatorsoftheTRG.

ThethirdworkshopofthegrouptookplaceatGHILondonon7-9July2014.The workshops have proved to be agreat success, as they have provid-ed a platform for discussing the re-search of the PhD and postdoctoralfellows.Theopportunityprovidedtothe fellows topresent their ongoingresearchtothewholegroup,aswellasthecommentsandfeedbackfromall have made the workshops verypopular amongst the fellows. Theworkshops have also provided thegroupasawholetheopportunitytomeet,takestockoftheTRG’sresearchand discuss ways to take the workof the group forward. Further, theyhavealsobeenuseful inaddressingand resolving the many complicat-edadministrativequestionsthatarepartandparcelofengagingintrans-nationalresearch.

In addition to the TRG’s internalworkshops, members of the grouphave also organised conferencesandworkshops related to theTRG’stheme.Areviewworkshoptodiscussthe findings of the oral history pro-jecton‘Documentingthelivesoftheurbanpoorwithaspecificreferenceto the links between poverty andeducation’,washeld inDelhi on22February 2014. The workshop wasorganised by Janaki Nair and herresearch assistant Rashmi Singh atJNU.TheTRGencouragesitsfellowsto take part in international confer-encesandworkshopsandshowcasethe researchof theTRGby formingpanels at such events. TRG fellowsat CeMIS Göttingen presented pa-pers at a session on Education atthe 4th Young South Asia ScholarsMeet (Topic: Rethinking Inequalityin South Asia), 21-22 July 2014. Apanel on ‘Making Winners? Trans-forming Individuals through Edu-cation in Colonial and PostcolonialContexts’ (convenor: Valeska Huber,

3rd TRG Workshop, GHI London, 7-9 July 2014

Photo by courtesy of Indra Sengupta

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GHIL)tookpartinthe50thGermanHistorikertagatGöttingen,23-26Sep-tember 2014 (see separate report).TRG postdoctoral fellow Sunandanorganised a ‘National Workshop onCaste,ExperienceandPovertyofEd-ucation:PerspectivesfromSouthIn-dia’incooperationwiththeManipalCentre forPhilosophy&Humanities(MCPH).TheworkshoptookplaceatManipalon8-9December2014(seeseparatereport).

A specialhighlight of theyear’s ac-tivities was the winter school andconferenceon‘Inequality,Educationand Social Power’, which the TRGjointly organised with the ForumTransregionale Studien in Berlin on16-25 November 2014. The winterschool, in particular, gave the doc-toral andpostdoctoral fellowsof theTRGtheopportunitytopresenttheirresearch to and engage with theirpeersfrom-andworkingon-otherregionsoftheworld.

Further events of the TRG includedtalks, a symposium and a book dis-cussion by principal investigatorsandvisitingfellows.RaviVasudevangavea talk/symposiumon ‘Filmbe-tween colony and nation-state: in-formation film in India 1940-1946’,organised jointly by the BirkbeckInstitute for the Humanities, theBirkbeckInstitutefortheMovingIm-ageandtheTRGinLondon,31May2014. Sarada Balagopalan took partinadiscussionofherbookInhabiting ‘Childhood’: Children, Schooling and Labour in Postcolonial India at Birk-beckCollegeon23June2014.

The TRG Lecture Series at the Ger-man Historical Institute London,which started in 2013, continued in2014.JanakiNair(JNUDelhi)gaveapublic lecture on ‘Textbook Contro-versies and the Demand for a Past:The Public Lives of Indian History’atGHILon8July2014;thetalkwasalsoapartoftheTRGworkshop.On11NovemberRaviVasudevan(CSDSDelhi) gave a talk on ‘MakingCine-ma`Useful’:PedagogiesandPublicsinIndia,c1920-1960’.Bothlectureswereextremelywellattendedandfol-lowedbylengthyandlivelydiscuss-ions.

ThewebsiteoftheTRGwaslaunchedin 2014: http://www.ghil.ac.uk/trg_india.html and the TRG acquired aFacebookpage.

A final piece of good news at theendofaveryproductiveyear:afterawaitofalmostayeartheMaxWeberStiftung has been given permissiontosetupabranchofficefortheTRGin Delhi! The Max Weber Stiftung– Branch Office India thus official-lycameintoexistenceat theendof2014.Adayofpaneldiscussionson‘Education for the poor: the politicsof poverty and social justice’ and akeynote lecture are planned for 14February2015inNewDelhi.

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Project Synopsis

In the proposed work I intend totrack the circulation of printed di-dactic texts in Sylheti-Bangla writ-ten inSylhet script thatwasonce prevalent in the Sylhet-Cacharregion.Fallenintodisuseeventually,the script had an interesting careerinthecolonialworldofprintcapital-ism.Thisscript,originallyprevalentonly in itshandwrittenversion,hascometobeknownasan‘alternativescript’ofBengali.Itsentirepedagog-ic endeavour was to bridge the gapbetweenthewritten(lekhyabhasha)andthespoken(kathyabhasha)andtherebymeetingoneoftheprecondi-tionsofdemocratisationofeducation– the concern for reaching out to alargermass.Throughastudyofthesetexts,Iwouldtrytolookintotheped-agogicpracticesbeyondtheambitofinstitutional and formal education.My project would attempt to gaugethe networks of circulation of thesevernacularsandunderstandthespe-cific form of transmission of know-ledgethatthesetextsfacilitated.

Thescriptwasalreadyinvogueasahandwrittenvariant.ApersonnamedAbdul Karim prepared the font forthisscriptandstartedpublishingthetexts fromaround the1870s.Sylhet

wasinsertedintothelogicofcirculation made available by print

capitalism. This script, which hadbeendevisedinaccordancewiththephoneticsofspokenSylheti,wasre-ferredtoasan‘alternativesimplifiedversionofBengali’.Mostofthecon-temporary accounts recollected thehugecirculationofthetextsprintedinthisscript.Itwouldthusbecrucialtounravel thespecifickindofmasseducationthatwasimpartedthroughthecirculationofthesetextsincon-trasttoorinparallelwiththeformalinstitutionalworldofeducation.Whywas an ‘alternative’ necessary andwho did it cater to? In other words,myworkwilltrytoteaseouttheim-peratives behind the popularisationof an ‘alternative’ script among cer-tainsectionsofthepopulation–gen-erally seen as poor and illiterate –anditsimplications.Inwhatwaydidthe script create thebasis of anewliterarycultureofthepoor–andhowsignificantthatwasinthecultivationofnewsensibilities.

Incontent,mostof thesetextsdealtwith the ethics andvalues associat-edwiththelocal formofIslam.Theprimerofthescriptdifferedfromtheavailableformsandcontentsofprim-ersintheschoolsystemnotonlyinitslackofsecularcontentbutalsoinaddressing the audience. The pur-poseofthisprimerwastoaddressanadultaudiencewhowouldbeabletoread the texts in Sylhet out-

2. Project ReportsI. A Script for the Masses? Pedagogic Practices and Didactic Traditions among Sylhetis

Debarati Bagchi, Postdoctoral Fellow

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sidetheschoolsystem.Weknowthatprimersthatteachthelanguageseektoteachmanyotherthings–theyini-tiatepeopleinparticularwayoflivingandbeing,educatethemaboutwhatis proper and what is inappropri-ate behavior etc. Teaching languagebecomes therefore part of a widereducationalproject–and in theactof learning the languagepeople aremadetolearnotherthings.Thispro-jectasksafewexploratoryquestions.What kind of didactic traditions dothese texts represent?Whatkindofscribalculturewasassociatedinthewriting of these texts? The existingliterature onSylhet doesnotgiveusanideaofthelivedworldofthese texts. We do not have a com-prehensive understanding of thesocialcontentof readershipandthemeaningofthesetextsintheirevery-daylife.Thisprojectisanattempttoformanunderstandingofthepublicsphere that once consumed thesetexts and unravel who constitutedthe ‘public’, it is tounderstandhowthese texts helped constitute a newpublic, creating a new social worldshapedandeducatedbythetexts.

Thechiefclaimaboutthisscriptwasthat one could learn the script one-self,and‘athome’,withoutany‘for-mal institutional training’. The veryfact that was brought out oftheconfinementofthepre-printnet-works of circulation, standardisedandmadesuitableasprintedlettersspeaks of the emerging interest oftheeducated literati inpopularisingthescript from1870sonwards.Andit was marketed solely on the basisofits‘simplicity’anditsexistencebe-yond the ambit of school education.

To perceive the pedagogic practicesembodied in these vernaculars, myprojectwilltrytoidentifytheconsti-tutionoftheplebeiancommunicativenetworksthroughwhichtheseprac-ticesoperated.AndtoachievethisIshalltrytoanalysethecontentofthetexts,thetransmissionofcertainide-as and the receptionof those ideas.Myresearchwill involveacatalogu-ingofthegenres.SongsbyPirsandFakirs, didactic manuals for the fol-lowers of Islam, popular stories viz.the war of Karbala, the life story ofHazratMuhammadorthelovestoryofYusufZuleikha,chroniclesofcon-temporary social events were someof the predominant genres. I willexplore thestories toseewhat theysoughttopropagate,howtheysoughttoeducatethepoor.

Work done in report year

I joinedTRGon10November2014.During the last month, I attendedthe International Winter Academyon“Inequality,EducationandSocialPower: Transnational Perspectives”organized by Forum TransregionaleStudienandtheTRG,inBerlin16-25November 2014. I presented a syn-opsisofmyprojecton21November2014attheAcademy.

I also attended the conference onColonial Northeast India: Local His-tories,RegionalCultures,GlobalCon-nections organized by University ofMelbourne,UniversityofTorontoandUniversityofDelhion1-2December2014.

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Project synopsis

Exploring the various educationalreform programs implemented inprimary schools and high schoolsin Keralam in India in the last twodecades,myprojectseekstoanalysethedichotomousconceptsofmentaland manual labour, theoretical andpractical knowledge, and generaland technical education which con-stitutedthepremiseofthesereforminterventions. The work focuses onthe crucial connection between thereproduction of the above conceptsandcasteasitispracticedincontem-poraryKeralam.


Duringtheyear2014,Istartedana-lysingthematerialsIhavecollectedandwritingtwopublishablepapers.Ihavealreadysubmittedonepaperforpublicationandtheotherwillbesentbytheendofthisyear.

Thefirstpaperistitledas“InhabitingTwo Worlds: Dalits and School Edu-cation in Keralam.” This paper ana-lysedthedeeplyembeddedpracticesofcasteintheschooleducationsys-tem. In this analysis I explored theDalit attempts to inhabit twoworldsof experiencingwhich ismarked asknowing practice and knowledge

production. The paper analysed thevarious aspects of these two worldsand mapped Dalit interactions andnegotiations in these two worlds. Italso inquired how the epistemologi-cal problem of knowledge has beentranslated into a problem of castehierarchy through the daily practic-es in school and in a Dalit colony.School has become a site of casteidentification and discrimination forDalitsevenafter theeducational re-forms which intended to overcomethedichotomyofmentalandmanuallabour.

The second paper is titled “CriticalMind and Labouring Body: CasteandEducationRe-formsinKeralam.”Analysingthedebateoneducationalreform processes in Keralam in the1990sand2000s, thispapersoughttounder-standtheroleofthedichot-omous conceptualisations of mindand body and mental and manuallabourinreproducingthecolonial–Brahmanical notions of knowledge.Thisun-settleddebateregardingtheeducational practices in Keralambringsoutthevariousaspectsofthecontemporary crisis of the coloni-al-Brahmanical model of knowledge

II. Critical Mind and Labouring Body: Caste and Education Reforms in Keralam

Sunandan Kizhakke Nedumpally, Postdoctoral Fellow

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production.Iarguedthatthoughtheproblemof thismodel isrecognizedat various points of the debate, thefundamental of this model is keptintact or even reinforcedbyvariousstake-holders of the educational re-formprocesses.

In this paper I attempted to under-standhowthebinaryofmentalandmanual labourwasdeployed,appro-priated and challenged in the edu-cation reform process started fromthe1990s,inrelationtothecontem-porary caste practices in Keralam.This paper analysed the documentsproduced by State Council for Edu-cation and Training (SCERT) KeralaandKeralaSastraSahithyaParishad(KSSP) a non-governmental organ-ization which played a crucial rolein the reform processes. The papertraced thegenealogyof the conceptofknowledgeandthenexploredtheeducation reform processes in the1990s and the first decade of thetwenty-firstcentury.

I also organized a two day Nationallevel workshop titled Caste, Experi-ence and Poverty of Education: Per-spectives from South India, at theManipal Centre for Philosophy andHumanitiesinManipal.Inthework-shop,ProfessorGopalGurudeliveredkeynoteaddress.Scholarsfromvari-ouspartofIndiawhoareworkingonthe theme presented papers in theworkshop. Eight PhD researchersalsopresentedpapersanda totalof50scholarsattendedtheconference.

Publications, conferences attended, talks relevant to project

PresentedapaperattheTRGWork-shop, at London held from 7-9 July2014

ParticipatedintheWinterAcademy,Berlinfrom16–25November2014,which was organised by the ForumTransregionale Studien Berlin andthe TRG. I presented a paper andorganized a thematic session at theworkshop.

“Inhabiting Two Worlds: Dalits andSchool Education in Keralam,” atNationalWorkshoponCaste,Experi-enceandPovertyofEducation,attheworkshopheldatManipalUniversityfrom8-9December2014.

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Project synopsis

My postdoctoral project ethno-graphically explores how EmployeeTraining Programs (ETPs) are de-ployed by organized retail and ser-vice industries in Kolkata, India aspedagogical sites for fashioning anemergent urban worker-subjectivityamongstunderclassurbanyouthem-ployees.SincethecollapseofKolka-ta’sindustrialbases,entry-leveljobsin the rapidly expanding organizedretailandserviceindustriesofferthebest hopes for formal employmentfor thecity’sunder-privilegedyouthpopulations.Unlike themechanical/cognitiveskillsrequired in industri-al factories, service work in spacessuch as shopping malls, high-endcafesormulti-cuisinerestaurantsto-dayincreasinglyutilizetheworkers’generalizedsocial skills.WhatETPsstriveforisacompletere-makingofthe worker-subjectivity by inculcat-ingtheidealsandpracticesofglobalconsumerism that the workers arethenexpectedtoconveytocustomersin service spaces. Simultaneously,ETPsseektoerasethevisibletracesof the workers’ socio-economic vul-nerabilities from their bodies, de-portments,speechpatternsorformsofsocialinteraction.

Drawingonethnographicresearchinthreeorganizedretail institutionsinKolkata, I suggest that the consum-ercitizenshipnormsemphasizedbyETPsgenerateunanticipatedfrictionsbetweenthesocialrealitiesofurbanyouthlabourandaspirationsforcon-sumerism. For workers, low wages,diminishing employment securitiesorexhaustingworkingconditionsrubuneasilyagainstthe‘dream-world’ofcommoditiesandimagesofthecapi-talistgood-lifethatETPsteachthemtoaspirefor.Thisabidingtensionof-fersmeaproductivelenstoreadtheuneven assimilation of underclassyouth populations in India withinnetworks of global consumerism.Myresearchinvestigateshowcorpo-rateinstitutionslikeETPsmobilizeadisciplined post-industrial labour bymodulating subjective desires andfantasies for consumerist life-stylesamongst India’s urban poor. Moreo-ver, I ask what kinds of urban sub-jectivitiesarebeingproducedatthefault-lines between pervasive globalconsumerist cultures and persistentpost-colonial conditions of social in-equalities in contemporary Indiancities.

III. Transforming Work: Training Programs and Retail Worker-Identity in Contemporary Kolkata

Saikat Maitra, Postdoctoral Fellow

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I began the postdoctoral fellowshipwiththeTRGinSeptember2014.Thefollowingisareportoftheworkdonesincethebeginningofmyfellowship.September - October 2014

Discourse Analysis and Preparationof Research Questions: During thisperiod, I was based in CeMIS, Göt-tingen.Iwasmainlyconcernedwithgoingovertherelevantliterature(in-cluding training manuals, bookletsandteachingaids)relatedtoETPsintheorganizedretailindustriesthatIhadcollectedduringmydoctoralre-search.Usingthisdataset,Itriedtoidentifykeythematicfeaturesaboutimportantpedagogicgoalsthatretailcorporationswantedtheirworkerstoattain.Iclassifiedthesegoalsaccord-ingtospecificnatureofwork,genderidentity of workers and the particu-larobjectivesofretailcorporations.Iaim to use these classifications andthematic concerns in preparing de-tailedquestionnaires for conductinginterviews of workers and trainingmanagersinKolkata.

Familiarising with Relevant Liter-ature: I also utilized this period tofamiliarise myself with the relevantliterature pertaining to the litera-tureoneducationandpoverty.Ialsoparticipated in reading groups fordiscussing relevantworksbyPierreBourdieu, Amartya Sen and PauloFreire with other TRG members inGöttingen.

November - December 2014

This period was utilized mainly inwritingthreepapersconnectedtomyon-goingpost-doctoral research.ThefirstofthesepaperstitledTransform-ingWork:TrainingProgramsandRe-tailWorker-IdentityinContemporaryKolkatawaspresentedattheWinterSchool in Berlin on TransregionalPerspectivesonInequality,Educationand Social Power organized by theForum Transregionale Studien, Ber-lin from 16 – 21st November, 2014.Thispaperofferedbroadperspectiveon worker training programs undercontemporary conditions of post-in-dustrial Kolkata. The second paperwas presented at the annual meet-ing of the American Anthropologi-cal Association held in Washington.D.C.from3–7December2014.ThepapertitledTheLandscapesof(Dis)Enchantment: Urbanization and theSpectral Play of Infrastructures inRajarhat dealt with the transforma-tion of former agricultural workersinto low-end service laborers in theRajarhat region near Kolkata, India.I also co-authored (with Dr. SrabaniMaitraofYorkUniversity,Canada)anarticletitled“Tappingintothe‘Stand-ing-Reserve’: A Comparative Analy-sisofWorkers’TrainingProgramsinKolkataandToronto”.ThearticlehasbeensenttotheinternationaljournalStudies in Continuing Education forpeerreview.Thematically,thearticledealswithtrainingofworkersforlowend and precarious service jobs inToronto, Canada and Kolkata, India.

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Inaddition,Ihavestartedtoworkonanewarticletitled“AmbientAtmos-pheres:LaborandtheContingenciesof Development in Kolkata” which Iwill present on 6 January 2015 fortheHistoryResearchGroupSeminarconductedbyProf.RaviAhuja.Basedon the feedback from the presenta-tion,I intendtoreviseandsendthearticle forsubmissionto the journalCulturalAnthropology.


“Transforming Work: Training Pro-grams and Retail Worker-Identityin Contemporary Kolkata”. WinterSchool in Berlin on TransregionalPerspectives on Inequality, Educa-tion and Social Power organized bythe Forum Transregionale StudienandtheTRG,inBerlinfrom16–21November2014.

“The Landscapes of (Dis)Enchant-ment:UrbanizationandtheSpectralPlay of Infrastructures in Rajarhat.”AnnualmeetingoftheAmericanAn-thropological Association, Washing-ton.D.C.from3–7December2014.

“Tappingintothe‘Standing-Reserve’:AComparativeAnalysisofWorkers’TrainingProgramsinKolkataandTo-ronto”.(Co-authoredwithDr.SrabaniMaitra). Submitted for peer reviewto the journalStudies inContinuingEducation.

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Project synopsis

Mumbai city has transformedfromanindustrialtoaservicesectoreconomywhichrequiresaworkforcewith altogether different skills andknowledge. It is against this back-dropthisprojectexploresMumbai’sex-millworkers’ children’s schoolingdecisions since the 1980s and ex-amines various factors that affectededucational attainment of ex-mill-workers’ children. It addresses thefollowing central question: How didthe industrial decline and the even-tualclosuresoftextilemillsinMum-bai influence workers’ householddecision-makingwithregardtotheirchildren’s education?This studybe-gins by analysing the qualitativeandquantitativesurveydataon theeducationalaspectofex-millworkersandtheirchildrenthatwascollectedduringmydoctoralfieldwork.Inmydoctoral thesis titledTheUnmakingof the Worker-Self in Post-IndustrialMumbai:AStudyofEx-Millworkers’Responses to the Closure of TextileMills inGirangaon IhaveexaminedMumbai’s ex-millworkers responsestotheirjoblossasaresultoftextilemills closures since the late 1990s.The issue of children’s educationcameupduringthequalitativeinter-

views conducted formydoctoral re-search.Inaddition,thesurveydataof924 ex-millworkers’ household con-tains information on ex-millworkersandtheirchildren’seducationalandoccupationalattainment.

This study builds upon this alreadycollected information by looking atex-millworkers’ children’s schoolingdecisions since the 1980s. It alsoaims toexamine thesocio-economicconditionsathouseholdlevel,intheneighbourhoodsandtheschoolitselfthat affected children’s educationalattainment.Aspertheplanin-depthinterviews have been conductedamong ex-millworkers’ households,schoolteachers,teachers’unionlead-ers,ex-millworkers’childrenandor-ganisations involved with the issueof education for the poor. The focusonchildren’seducation,particularlyamongthepoorfamilies,isimportantasitdeterminesinasignificantwaytheirfutureoccupationalpreferences.In thecontextofMumbai this issuebecomes particularly significant, asthere are hardly any possibilities ofobtainingbetter-paidemploymentforlesseducatedindividuals.

IV. Effects of Industrial Decline on Education in Urban India: A Study of Mumbai’s Ex-Millworkers’ Household Decisions on Children’s Schooling, 1980s-Present

Sumeet Mhaskar, Postdoctoral Fellow1

1FromSeptember2014onwardsSumeetMhaskarisanAssociateFellowwiththeTRG

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IhavepresentedarevisedversionofEducationalandOccupationalAttain-ment among Working Class Youthsin Post-Industrial Mumbai paper on28 January 2014 at the History Re-searchGroupSeminarconductedbyProf. Ravi Ahuja. A slightly revisedversion of the paper was presentedat the Young South Asia ScholarsMeetinZurichinJuly.Iamnowin-corporating all the comments fromseminars and workshops and I willsoon submit the paper to an inter-nationally recognisedpeer reviewedjournal. I have also conducted field-work for about three weeks in themonth of March in Mumbai. I havemainly conducted interviews withex-millworkers’childrenandofficialsof a primary teachers union. I amcurrently working on a new papertitledEducation andTransformationof Working Class Youths in Post-In-dustrial Mumbai for the 50th Ger-manHistorikertagthatwillbeheldinSeptemberinGöttingen.


“Exploring Educational and Occupa-tional Attainment in Post-IndustrialMumbai”. History Research GroupSeminar, Centre for Modern IndianStudies,28January2014.

“Exploring Educational and Occupa-tional Attainment in Post-IndustrialMumbai”.TRG3rdMeeting,GermanHistoricalInstitute,London7-9July2014.

“Exploring Educational and Occupa-tional Attainment in Post-IndustrialMumbai”.YoungSouthAsiaScholarsMeet,Zurich21-22July2014.

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Conference in cooper-ation with the Forum Transregionale Studien on Inequality, Education and Social Power: Trans-regional Perspectives, Berlin, 25 November 2014

Photos by courtesy of Forum Transregionale Studien

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Project synopsis

I propose to study the role of edu-cationandschool inthe livesof therefugees who settled in and aroundCalcuttaafterthepartitionofBritishIndia in 1947. The refugees, comingfromtheeasternpartoftheerstwhileprovince of Bengal, spread all overWest Bengal and in other parts ofIndia.ButamajorconcentrationwasinthegreaterCalcuttaregion,wheremany‘colonies’cameup.Thesecolo-nieswereanovelanddistinctspatialarrangement in the urban morphol-ogy.Andalmostallthecolonieshadaprimaryschool.Thestudyoftheseschools — where and how did theycome up, who were the teachers,whatwas the curriculum—and thegeneral role of education in thesesettlements will reveal complex so-cio-economic dynamic of a popula-tiontryingtocarveoutanicheonanew terrain. The government, fromtime to time, came up with variouspolicies to meet the pressing de-mandsthatthishugeinfluxofpeopleput on it. I will study the differentprogramme — for general educationaswellasvocationaltraining—thatwereinitiatedbythegovernment.Inthisprocess,therefugeeshadtone-gotiate with the erstwhile residentsof the city. The partition, based onreligion, made the position of theMuslim population in Calcutta vul-

nerable. There was distinct spatialreorganisation of the city which af-fected the Muslims. I want to con-clude my study with an explorationof the relationship between the ref-ugeesand theMuslims,andhow inthe process the Muslim educationalinstitutes in the city got affected.This iscrucial foranunderstandingof the overall situation. Most often,while focusingontherefugeepopu-lation,one tends to forgetabout thehost population, more specifically,the condition of the minority. Theproject,ononehand,triestofocusonlocalissuesandetchoutadensepic-ture of various processes related toeducationalinstitutionsandpolicies,andontheother,wantstoopenupacrucialbutneglectedaspectofparti-tionstudies.Also,itseekstolookintothewaytherefugeestriedtomakeamarkonthemapofthecity,whereatangledwebof land-locality-finance/cultural capital operated in creatingtheeducationalspace.


The project requires both archivaland ethnographic research. In thepast fewmonths, Ihave tried to fol-lowbothofthesemethodstomapthefield of research comprehensively. IwenttothecolonyareassituatedonthesouthernpartofCalcuttatotalktotheresidents.Ivisitedtheschools

V. Refugee Settlement and the Role of Education in Calcutta, 1947-1967

Kaustubh Mani Sengupta, Postdoctoral Fellow

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and interviewedsome retired teach-ers and erstwhile students of thesecolony schools. The importance ofeducation is apparent for these res-idents.The inhabitantsof these col-oniesrememberthepaststruggleasone of triumph, carving out a placeof their own in the city. Educationplayedasignificantroleinestablish-ingthemselves,notonlyineconomicterms but also in the social ladder.The colony residents were mainlyfrom the upper caste, and to themstandard school-college educationwastheonlywaytomoveoutofthesituationwhichtheywerethrustintoafterthepartition.Lackofeducationwas more harmful than the actualmaterial poverty which they facedduring these years. The sense ofnostalgiaforaplacewhichtheyhadto leave always imagined a past ofrespectability associated with one’seducationandpositioninthesociety.Thephysicalfeaturesofthecoloniesalso give a sense of this sentiment.The main structures that came uponce a colony was established werethemarkets, a temple anda school.Thiswasthepatterninalmosteverycolony. I have tried to look into theways the schools were set up, whowere the teachers of these schools,andhowwerethefinancialarrange-mentsmadebytheresidentsfortheschools.Iconsultedthememoirsandautobiographies of the colony resi-dents and the commemorative vol-umesoftheschoolstogetacompre-hensivepictureofthesituation.

Apartfromthese,Ihavealsotriedtoweave together the various strandsof the rehabilitation policies of thecentral and the state government.I consulted the reports of the reha-bilitation department, pamphletspublished by the government, thereports on schools and colleges inWestBengaland theLegislativeAs-semblydebates.Amongnewspapersofthetime,IhavesiftedthroughtheAmritaBazarPatrikaandtheAnand-abazar Patrika. Apart from these, Ihave also consulted the private pa-persofSaibalGupta[administrator],Asoka Gupta [social worker] andRenukaRoy[minister]—allof themwereactively involvedwith thepro-cessofrehabilitationoftherefugeesin various capacities. At the BritishLibrary,Ihavelookedintotheweek-ly/fortnightly reports sent by theDeputy Commissioners of the UKstationed at Calcutta and Dhaka totheHighCommissioneratNewDelhiuptill1950.FromtheseIhavetriedto figure out the ways in which theeducationandvocational trainingofthe refugees were perceived by thegovernment. There were definiteideasregardingthesocialcategoriesoftherefugeeswhichguidedthere-habilitation process. The sudden in-creaseinthepopulationofthestateforced the government to look intoavenuesthroughwhichthesepeoplecanbeharnessedtotheprogrammeofdevelopmentofthestate.Thegov-

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ernmenttriedtodenythescaleoftheexodusatfirst,butby1950itrealisedtheenormityofthesituationandthehitherto policy of relief had to beshifted towards comprehensive pro-grammeofrehabilitation.Keepinginmindtheclassandcastecompositionof the refugees who came to WestBengalafter1950, thestategovern-mentputmuchstressonvocationaltraining. A cornerstone of the reha-bilitationplanwas to categorise therefugeepopulation in termsof theirprevious occupations. Thus, agricul-turalistsweretobesettled in lands,ifnotavailable inWestBengal theninotherstates.Also,thehugeinfluxofpeoplefromnon-agriculturalback-groundflockingtourbanareasneed-edtoberehabilitatedthroughproperemployment.Thevocationaltraininginstitutes were crucial in this re-spect.Theseissuesforcedmetolookinto thewiderquestionsofdevelop-mentandnation-buildingofthepost-colonialIndianstate.Iamlookingattheintertwinedhistoriesofthesetwoconcernsandhowtheyshapedeachother,andintheprocesscreated‘cit-izens’outofthe‘refugees’.Overtheyears, the government through therecommendationsofvariouscommit-teescameupwithmodifiedpoliciesand schemes. But each new phasewas accompanied by further chal-lenges.Iwanttostudythesituationof refugee education and employ-mentinthebackdropofthesewiderpolitical-economic concerns of thenewnation-state.


“Education and Vocational Trainingas part of the Regime of Rehabili-tation in West Bengal” at the TRGworkshopheldfrom7-9July2014attheGHIL

Participatedandpresentedapaperatthe Winter Academy on ‘Inequality,Education and Social Power: Trans-regional Perspectives’, organized bythe Forum Transregionale Studienand the TRG, in Berlin from 16-25November2014.

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Project synopsis

This PhD research focuses on theIndian Mid-Day Meal Scheme – thelargest school feeding programmeintheworld.Undertheofficialterm‘National Programme of Nutrition-al Support to Primary Education’,the Mid-Day Meal Scheme (MDMS),as it is commonly referred to, waslaunchedin1995withtheobjectivestoenhanceenrolment,retentionandattendanceinschoolswhilesimulta-neously improvingnutritional levelsamong children and encouragingsocialchange inclassroomsandbe-

yond.Since2001studentsofallIndi-anpublicandaidedprimaryschools(later also upper primary schools)havetobeprovidedwithahot-cookedmeal.

In a qualitative case study basedinDelhi, I aim to examinehowstu-dents, parents, teachers and otherlocal actors understand the MDMSandtowhatextenttheyexertcontroloveritseffects.Myaimistofindouthow this governmental welfare pro-gramme is perceived by those thataremeanttobenefitfromit,howthey

School Lunch

Photo by courtesy of Alva Bonaker

VI. More than Food for Schools? Local Perceptions in Defining and Shaping the Benefits of the Mid-Day Meal Scheme in Delhi

Alva Bonaker, PhD Scholar

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defineitsbenefitsandtowhatextentthey shape the scheme and its out-comesthemselves.


As2014wasthefirstyearofmyre-search, I started by defining my re-searchquestionsandengagingwithliteratureonthebroaderdebatesthatarerelevanttothetopicaswellasontheMDMSitself.

Inhighlycontroversialdebatesaboutthisscheme,littleattentionhasbeenpaidtoin-depthqualitativeresearchon the impact of the programme inurbanareas.Generally,moststudiesfollowaquantitativeapproachandfo-cusonruralareas.ThisPhDresearchintends to fill this gap by conduct-ingacasestudyinDelhitracingthequestion “How do parents, teachersand local communities understandthe MDMS, and to what extend dothey exert control over its effects?”Intryingtoanswerthisquestionthefollowing sub-questionswill be ana-lysed: How is the MDMS perceivedbythepeopleinvolved?Howdotheirunderstandings of the scheme anddefinition of its benefits differ fromthose of policy makers and high-er-level officials? And: What meansare available for them to exert con-trol over the effects of the scheme?Togetadeeperunderstandingofthepeople’sperspectivesandrolesitwillalso be examined: How do parents,teachersandothercommunitymem-bersseetheirroleincontributingtothesuccessoftheMDMS?

InordertogetanideaofthenatureoftheMDMSasasocialwelfareschemeandhowitisunderstoodbytheactorsinvolved, I started examining howtheunderstandingofhunger,pover-tyandeducationhasdevelopedovertimeandhow,againstthisbackdrop,the MDMS came into being. JamesVernon’s comprehensive approachto see the phenomenon of hungerin itswholecomplexityseemstobeinsightful here. He argues that it isaculturalcategoryasmuchasama-terialcondition,whichisnotaresultofpre-set(historic)conditions,butacategory thathasgenerated itsownhistory: the struggle to define andregulate hunger which produced itsownnetworksofpowersandunder-standing of the role of the govern-ment, for instance. Another centralargumentisofferedbyDidierFassinwho’s analysis show how today thehumanitarianreactiontohumansuf-fering has gained most popularityandtendstoobscurethelargerstruc-turalandlegalsystemsanddistribu-tionalpoliticsthatcauseormaintaininequalitiesandsufferinginsociety.Hence,fundamentalquestionsarise,such as: can the Indian MDMS alsobeseenasamerepopulistmeasureof thegovernmentaimingat easingthe hunger of some children whilerefusing to tackle the causes of thesuffering? This is interesting espe-ciallyagainstthebackgroundoftheon-goingdebatesaroundthedemandfora“RighttoFood”whichhavere-sultedinthehighlycriticisedNation-alFoodSecurityAct(2013)inwhichtheterm“RighttoFood”isnotevenmentioned.

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A close link between the massivepromotion of the very popularMDMS, and a language of charityfor the poor, can no doubt be ob-served. Harriss-White, for example,describes how the precedent NoonMeal Scheme in Tamil Nadu wasportrayed as the Chief Minister’spersonalinitiativeoffightinghungeramongstthepoor,tiedtoanarrativeofhispersonalexperiencewithhun-ger.IcameacrossastrikinglysimilarrhetoricwhenItalkedtomembersoftheAkshayaPatrafoundation(oneofthe biggest NGO’s involved in cook-ingmealsincentralisedkitchens)inJaipur.

I have spent June to August of thissummer in Jaipur for improving myHindi skills in an intense languageprogramme of the American Insti-tuteofIndianStudies(AIIS).This,aswell as meeting various people (inJaipurandDelhi)whoareinvolvedininformalandformaleducationactiv-ities, cooking for the MDMSor aca-demic engagement with the MDMSand issues related to education andinequalities, was part of my prepa-ration for the actual field researchata laterstage.Duringthesummersemester, I also attended a courseon methods of interpretative socialsciencefocussingonnarrativeinter-views.Amethod thatmightbeuse-ful for talking to students, teachers,parents, NGO representatives, gov-ernment officials or other relevantpeopleformyfieldresearch.

Moreover,Iintensivelyengagedwiththefieldofeducationingeneral,it’shistorical and international trans-formations and its relation with in-equalities of various forms duringthe Historikertag in Göttingen andthe Winter Academy on education,inequalityandsocialpowerinBerlin.Before and alongside the field re-search I am planning to further en-gage with debates and concepts inthefieldsofsocialwelfare,state,gov-ernment, society, development andethnographyofeducationasanalyti-calframefortheinterpretationofmyempiricalfindings.


Presentationof researchproposalatthe TRG workshop in London, 7-9July2014

Report of GHIL-organised session“Making Winners? TransformingIndividuals through Education inColonialandPost-ColonialContexts”at theHistorikertag inGöttingen,25September2014

ParticipationinWinterAcademy“Ed-ucation,InequalityandSocialPower”inBerlin,16-25November2014

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Project synopsis

My research examines the creationofnarrativesanddiscoursesaroundIndianeducationalpolicies(fromthe1980s onward) and their subjects— primarily women and girls frommarginalised communities. The ob-jectivesoftheresearcharetoexam-inethehistorical,political,andliveddynamics that shape — and compli-cate — the categories, imperativesand assumptions of policy-making.By embedding policy debates andpractices in ethnographic life his-tories, I hope to illuminate the ‘big

picturedata’generatedbytheIndianstate. The research will interrogatethe many binaries — for exampleincluded/excluded, powerful/power-less,andstructure/agency—throughwhichpoliciesandlivesaretypicallyexamined. Some of the questions Iask are: In the context of educationhowis ‘exclusion’actuallylivedandexperienced,andwhatdoesthistellus about how it might be undone?Inwhatwayshaseducationenablednewopportunitiesandsubjectivitiesto evolve? How do ‘target popula-tions’ as both subjects and objectsof policies, shape discourses, poli-

VII. What exclusion leaves out: The “life-worlds” of women in contemporary Indian education policies

Malini Ghose, PhD Scholar

Rule of Thumb: Register of minutes of discussions of a women’s group, Unchadi village, Chitrakoot District, Uttar Pradesh

Photo by courtesy of Malini Ghose

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ciesandprogrammes?Whatinformstheiraspirationsandstrategicchoic-esrelatedtoeducation?

MyresearchworkwillbeconductedinBanda and Chitrakoot districts ofUttar Pradesh, districts marked byextreme poverty. My “subjects” willbe drawn from three “generations”ofpolicieseachwithitsowndistinctcombination of discourses, educa-tionalinitiatives,socio-economicandpoliticalimperatives.Beginningwiththe narratives of individual womenand moving outwards to encompassthe family, community and institu-tions, particularly those related toeducation,Ihopetoachieveaninter-generational perspective on the cir-culationof ideas, language,andpol-itics and touse this tounpackboththecontinuitiesand theruptures ineducationalpolicies.


I joined the TRG programme in Oc-tober2013asaPhDcandidateattheCentre for Modern Indian Studies

(CeMIS), University of Göttingen.During 2014, my first year in theprogramme, the thrust of my workhasbeen in twobroadareas:firstly,to further develop my research pro-posal andexplore the connected lit-erature and secondly to initiate myfieldwork.

Researchmethodologyandliteraturereview: I focused on the first areaduring the twosemesters IspentatCeMIS.While there, Isought inputsand feedback from colleagues andfaculty members in different are-as related to my research project.To strengthen the methodologicalaspects of my research work, I haddiscussions and attended coursesoffered by colleagues at CeMIS onfieldworkandethnography.Iattend-edclassesofferedbyVisitingFacultyon Gender, Education and Legal Re-form inModern India,andhadcon-sultations around sources, archivesandmethodologicalissuesrelatedtooralhistoryresearch.

Class dynamics: Board member of a Dalit-run school in Sarayya village, Chitrakoot District (A dynamic woman with a fraught his-tory of involvement with local women’s NGOs)


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The weekly colloquiums organisedby the CeMIS and talks held at theMaxPlanckInstitute,thatIregularlyattendedhavebeenuseful inbroad-ening the scopeofmy literature re-view.

Fieldwork: Initiating fieldwork hasbeen a critical and exciting part ofmywork thispastyear. Iconductedtwomonthsofpreliminaryfieldworkbetween February and March 2014.Iusedthistimetobegindevelopingone of the oral history narratives. Ipresentedsomeaspectsofthatfield-work at the TRG Workshop held inJuly. The feedback and subsequentdiscussions, triggered off severalnewideasthatIhavetriedtoexploreandintegrateinmywork.

After my return to India, my timein the field has been spent tryingto identify other women, whose lifehistoriesIwilldevelop.Thisentailedinteractingwithseveralwomenandkey informants and the processthrewupseveralpossibledirectionsand themes that I could develop.Onethread,thatIfollowed,hasbeento connect my work of drawing outwomen’soralhistoriestotheinstitu-tionstheyengagewith.Forexample,several of my potential “subjects”,whohaveinthepastparticipatedineducational programmes offered bythe state run Mahila Samakhya orother NGOs, are now working andhave various government jobs — ashelpers with the government runAnganwadi (early childhood carecentres)programme;aspara- teach-

ersorevenascooks intheMid-daymeal (school lunch) programme —which,ledmetoexploringthesein-stitutional spaces as well. Similarly,another group of women who haveaccessed education as adult womenare now working with a women’sorganisations and a rural women’smediaorganisation.Thishasopenedup the possibilities of interrogatingwomen’s engagements with verydifferent institutional spaces and indifferent ways. For the women nowworking as community journalists Iamconsideringdoingananalysisoftheir reporting on education, casteandgenderissues.

Asmyresearchseekstounpacktheinter-generationaldimensionofbothpoliciesandsubjects,oneofthemorerecentprogrammes Ipropose toex-amine is the 2004 government-in-itiated residential educational pro-gramme, Kasturba Gandhi BalikaVidyalaya(KGBV),forgirlsfrompoorand marginalized communities atthe upper-primary level. Here too,whileanalysingthepolicydiscoursesaroundgirls’education,Iwillberead-ingtheseagainstwhattranspiresinthelivesofgirlsandtheirfamilies.Ihavebeguntheprocessofidentifyingfamiliesthathaveaccessedthispro-grammeandwouldbewilling tobepartofmyresearch.

A third area of exploration in linewith the intergenerational approachof my research, has been to initiatea mapping of school provisioning,being accessed the young genera-

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tionwhoarepresentlyinthesystem.Low-costprivateschooling isvisibleand present in the kasbas (peri-ur-banspaces)and there is littledocu-mentation about these institutions.Inthemoreinteriorvillagesonotherhand, it is government school thatarethemaineducationalproviders.Lastly, inorder toanalysepolicyre-gimes, the other dimension of myresearchwork,Ihaveinitiatedapro-cess of identifying critical people Iwillneedtointerview.

IbelievethattherangeofworkIhavepursuedthisyearwhetherinthefieldoratCeMIShaslaidthegroundforaphaseofmoreintensiveresearchthiscomingyear.


Workshops and colloquiums: I haveattendedtheTRGReviewworkshopsorganised in London in July. I havealso attended the Winter AcademyandConferenceonInequality,Educa-tion and Social Power, organised byForum Transregionale Studien andtheTRG,inBerlinfrom16-25Novem-ber2014.

Picture left:

Inspirational Icons: secular and sacred images mix in the home of a woman leader of a local dalit women's San-gathan, Chowk-ipurva village, Chitrakoot district

Photograph by courtesy of Malini Ghose

Picture right:

Food for thought: the researcher enjoying a quick snack on a busy day in the field


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Project synopsis

DiscoursesofNewPublicManage-ment (NPM) that arose through thelate 1970s in the United States ofAmerica(USA)andtheUnitedKing-dom(UK)ledtoaseriesofconcertedreformsineducation.Thisledtonewforms of partnerships between theState and the private sector. Princi-ples of public management empha-sising performance and outcomespopular in the corporate industrialsector were imported as alleviato-ry measures into the public schoolsystem.Thesenewmodesofreformdrawing fromtheprivatesectorsig-nificantlyalteredstructuresofschoolmanagement, school processes andmost notably teachers’ work as theschool came to be imagined as animportantunitinpreparingstudentsfor labour markets in a competitiveglobaleconomy.

Privateactorshavefacilitatedtechni-cal and managerial changes withinschools through alternative certifi-cationprogrammesanduseof tech-nologicalaidsintheclassroom.Theyhavealsoactivelybeenpushingtheirreformagendainnationalandglobaleducational policy forums throughthe backing of important politicalandcorporatefinancialnetworks.In-creasingly,thesetypologiesofreformare being imported into later devel-

oping countries, including India, aseffective measures of repairing anincreasingly maligned public schoolsystem. The modes through whichthesediscoursesofreformareinter-facing with educational reforms inthecontextofapostcolonialcountrysuchasIndiapresentacomplexpic-turetoday.

Thefocusofthisresearchstudyistoexamine global discourses of publicmanagement reform advocated by arangeofprivateactorsandthecom-plexnatureof its interfacewith theheterogeneous government school-ingsysteminIndia.Theconsequentchanges that these reforms imposeon the school will be examinedthrough the lens of Public-PrivatePartnerships (PPPs) that are one ofthe key modes through which mar-ketsareenteringelementaryeduca-tioninthecountry.Teachertrainingprogrammes are an emerging formof PPPs that are seen as central to-wards improving school outcomes.Apartfromasurveyoftherangeandnatureof teacher trainingPPPs, thestudy will examine the ‘Teach forIndia’ (TFI) intervention, one signif-icant PPP in teacher training thatseekstoaddresseducationalinequi-ty in teaching-learning transactionsintheclassroom.

VIII. Marketisation, Managerialism and School Reforms: A Study of Public Private Partnerships in Elementary Education in Delhi

Vidya K.S., PhD Scholar

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I joined the Transnational ResearchGroup in July 2014. My PhD field-work involved collecting archivalmaterial, mainly policy documents,briefsandotherkindsofreportsdis-cussingPPPsasa formof interven-tion in the education sector. Globalagencies such as the World Bank,IMF and UNESCO archive a rangeof documents pertaining to severalaspects of the subject. Theaimwasto look at documents (from the late1990s to 2014) that provide broadconceptual frameworks and specif-ic models of practice in the Indiancontext.AnumberofdocumentsonPPPs involving local governmentbodiessuchastheMunicipalCorpo-rations,whicharethecentralagencyadministering primary education incities such as Delhi, the site of mystudy,arealsoavailableinthepublicdomain.

Apart from archival research, I wasalsoinvolvedinfieldworkinonegov-ernment school in Munirka, Delhi,where the intervention programmeofmyinterest‘TeachforIndia’(TFI)isfunctioning.Inordertogainaccessinto the site of the study, I enrolledasavolunteerwiththeprogramme,explainingbrieflymyPhDsubjectofinterest to an acquaintance who isworkingasaTFIFellowintheschool.

I managed to do some observationsat thesite foraperiodof twoandahalfmonths– fromend July to endSeptember.

The school site was fraught with anumberofconcernsmainlyhostilitybetweenTFIFellowsandthegovern-mentschoolstaff.MypositionintheschoolasaresearcherwasalsoverytenuousandIcouldnotcontinuemywork as a volunteer in the schoolbeyond end September. Due to thecomplicatednatureofadministrativeengagementbetween theprivate in-tervention programme and the gov-ernmentschool,thenextstageofmyfieldworkwillinvolvefollowinguponthe TFI and its programme largelythroughin-depth,focusedinterviewswiththeTFIFellowsandthemanage-ment.


I presented a part of my PhD workat the Winter Academy, ‘Inequality,Education and Social Power: Trans-regional Perspectives’, organised bythe Forum Transregionale Studienand the TRG in Berlin from 16 - 25November2014.

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Project synopsis

This research is intended at writ-ing a history of education of the la-bouringpoor in latenineteenthandtwentieth century Kerala. It seekstounderstandthevariousnotionsoflabourandpovertythatweresoughttobeimpartedthrougheducationtothe so-called lower anduntouchablecastes in the region. However, thestudy looks beyond the formal defi-nition of schooling and takes intoaccountthelargersocio-politicalpro-cesses that went into the educationof the poor. It will analyse varioussourcesofthoseinvolvedinthepro-cesssuchasProtestantmissionaries,social reformers, political organisa-tionsandotherstateactors.

The objective is also to look at var-ying notions of poverty perpetuatedthrougheducationbybothstateandnon-state actors. Textbooks, agricul-tural and industrial education andtechnicaleducationhavebeensomeof the avenues through which chil-dren of lower castes were broughtface to face with changing societialnotions and power structures. TheEzhavas (currently listed as OtherBackward Classes) unlike the Pu-layas (former untouchable castes)have had a different trajectory vis-

a-vis education. They have beeninvolved in various social reformmovements and educated sectionshave engaged in widespread pub-lic debates to influence provision ofeducation. On the contrary, giventhewidespreadexistenceofpovertyanddeprivationamong thePulayas,educationalprogresshasbeenslow.Theywerenotallowedaccesstogov-ernmentschoolsuntiltheearlydec-ades of the twentieth century andstate apathy combined with feudalforces have laid down far too manyobstacles for them. This study willseek to understand these differenthistories to understand debates onsociety and education. It will alsoexplorethehistoryofeducationanditsintersectionswithclass,raceandgenderinthecolonialperiod.

This study seeks to make use ofthe archives of missionary societieswhich worked in the field of Keralasince the 19th century. Their writ-ings provide varied details aboutthe everyday lives of their labour-ing class converts. Linking this toquestions of identity, communityconsciousness and emergent socialreform, the study shall locate mis-sionary education and its implica-tions in the region’s socio-politicalhistory. Pedagogical techniques, dif-

IX. Recasting the Self: Missionaries and the Education of the Poor in Kerala, 1854-1956

Divya Kannan, PhD Scholar

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ferentiatedcurriculumformalesandfemalesandtheimpactofschoolingon the communities shall be dis-cussed. Missionary education shallbeproblematisedtolinkittothewid-erframeworkofimperialpolitics.


In the current report year, archi-val research was undertaken in theBritishLibrary,SOASinLondonandUniversityofBirminghamLibrarytoaccess various missionary archives.The reading of this material goeshand in hand with the collection ofofficialsourcesonthetopicathand.


“Ora Et Labora: The Basel GermanEvangelical Missionary Society inthe19thand20thCenturyMalabar”,Paper presented at the Conferenceon‘Missionaries,MaterialsandMak-ingoftheModernWorld’,EmmanuelCollege, Cambridge, 15-17 Septem-ber2014.

Participated in the WinterAcademyandConferenceon‘Inequality,Powerand Education: Trans-regional Per-spectives’, organised by the organ-ised by the Forum TransregionaleStudien Berlin and the TRG, 16-25November2014.

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Project synopsis

My thesis is about the poor andtheir education in colonial India. Itenquiresintothenatureofeducationwhichwasimpartedto‘educate’poorchildren, who were deemed unfitfor book-centred, “proper” school-ing, in didactic institutions such asindustrial, reformatory and factoryschools, rural schools, orphanages,children’s homes, workhouses, andrailway workshops set up by Chris-tianmissionaries,‘natives’,andcolo-nialmasters.Thethesisalsoanalysesfacets of failure and success of thestatedobjectivesoftheseinstitutionswhichwastoproduceamodern,dis-ciplined,andsemi-skilledworkforceoutofwhatwas regardedasanun-ruly,indolentclassoflowcastesanduntouchables, artisans and workers,peasants,beggars,vagrants,juvenileoffenders, fakirs, gamblers, thieves,andcriminaltribes.


InthesecondyearofmyD.Phil.,thesearchforarchivalsourcesbeganinthe old repository of world’s knowl-edge – The British Library. I cameacross a whole set of vernaculartextbooksonhistory,arithmetic,ge-ography,language,letter-writing,etc.used inprimaryschools.Thismate-rialallowedme to lookatwhatwashappening inside the classrooms. Ifoundvarioussortsofpamphletsonpoverty and education, records ofvillageschools,annualreportsoftheprovincial education departments,andwritingsandinspectionnotesoftheInspectorofSchools.Ialsolookedat the recordsof theSociety for thePropagation of Gospels in RhodesHouse,Oxford.TheSPG’srecordsal-lowedme to focusonone industrialschoolmaintainedbythemissionar-iesinCawnpore.IalsolookedintothearchiveofSOAS,LondonUniversity.

X. Primed to Labour: ‘Education’ in Industrial and Artisan Schools of Colonial India (1860s-1940s)

Arun Kumar, PhD Scholar

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“School as “Evasive Space”: Work-er’sdreamsandmillowner’spoliticsin the cotton mills of colonial India(1870s- 1920s)” at the Xth Interna-tionalConferenceonLabourHistoryon the theme of “Labour History: AReturntoPolitics?”,V.V.GiriNationalLabour Institute, India,22-24March2014

“Poverty, Crime and Curriculum:Poor in Reformatory Schools” 3rdTRG-GHIL Workshop, London, 7-9July2014

“Histories ofMiscalculation and thePolitics of the Possible: The Repro-ductionandProductionofSubjectsinColonial Industrial Schools”, YoungSouth Asia Scholar’s Meet, Zurich,21-22July2014

“Primed to Labour: Education in In-dustrialandArtisanalSchoolsofCo-lonialIndia”attheGHILColloquium,2September2014

“Localising the Global: IndustrialSchools in the Missionary Discus-sions, 1880s-1940” at the Interna-tional Conference on Missionaries,Materials and the Making of World,Emmanuel College, University ofCambridge,15-17September2014

Presented my D. Phil project at theWinter Academy on ‘Inequality, Ed-ucationandSocialpower’organisedbytheForumTransregionaleStudienBerlinandtheTRG,inBerlinfrom16-25November2014

“Poverty,Crime,andtheSchoolCur-riculum: The Poor in ReformatorySchools”, International ConferenceonModernTransformationsandtheChallengesof Inequalities inEduca-tioninIndia,DepartmentofHistory,Delhi University, 27-29 November2014

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Project synopsis

Theproposed researchprojectwillfocus on the school education ofwomen (especially of poor and theunderprivilegedmembersamongtheHindus,althoughcomparisonwillbemadewithothercommunities)intheUnitedProvincesbetween1854and1920.Itwillexploretheeducationaldevelopmentandthereasonsfortheinterest among people in girls’ edu-cationinparticular,especiallyinthelatterpartofthe19thcentury.Itisanattempttoanswerquestionssuchasthe following:1) inwhatwaysweretheeducationofwomennecessitatedby the altered social and economictransformations in late 19th centu-ry United Provinces? 2) Which spe-cial groups and classes benefittedfromthenewefforts?3)Werethereperceptible differences in the pro-grammesthataimedatreachingthemarginalized among the girls andwomen,and,ifso,why?4)Whatwastheneedoragendatoeducatewom-en felt bymissionaries, the colonialstate or people of the United Prov-inces? 5) Was there any connectionbetween women’s education andreform, or modernity and the eco-nomic, social and cultural uplift ofwomen?6)Whatwerethechallengesand prejudices that came with theprogressoffemaleeducation?

Comparisons will be made betweenboys’ and girls’ education throughdebates regarding the curriculum,funding,specialschoolsorco-educa-tion, compulsory education and cre-ationofdemandoffemaleeducationthroughthegrantofprivileges.

The connection between women’seducationandchangesinsocietywillbe analysed through exploration ofchangesinthehomeandoutsidethehomeduetotheeducationofwomen.

Theattitudesofthecolonialstate,thepeopleofUnitedProvinces(differentcastes, classes and various reformsassociation), missionaries (differenttypesofmissions)andwomenthem-selvestowardseducationwillbean-alysed.


FromNovember2013toMarch2014,I worked in the Central Secretari-at Library and National Archives ofIndia. In the National Archives ofIndia, I looked mainly at the NativeNewspaper Reports of the UnitedProvinces. From April to October2014,IworkedintheBritishLibrary,Londonandlookedatvariousofficialreports and non-official discourses,suchasHindivernacular tractsandnovelswrittenbylesserknownsocial

XI. Schooling Women: Debates on Education in the United Provinces (1854-1930)

Preeti, PhD Scholar

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reformers-menandwomen-oftheUnitedProvinces.Ilookedatvarioustextbooks and vernacular literaturewritten specifically for the womenof United Provinces. These sourceshaveprovedtobeinformativetogetan idea of the imagination and per-spective of social reformers. Theyalsoshowedhowwomenofthelow-er castes were imagined in societythrough discourses of upper-castewomen. These sources explain ‘dif-ferences’ where upper caste wom-en were advised to be cautious oflower-caste women. I also used thearchivesofSOASanditsspecialcol-lectionofmissionaryrecordsonedu-cationintheU.P.SOAShasrecordsofwomenmissionarieswhowereactiveinvariousmissions suchasLondonMissionarySociety,MethodistSocie-tyetc.Thosearereallyusefultoseedevelopment of education of wom-en among lower castes and classesin rural areas. In July, I visited thearchives of the Church MissionarySociety in Birmingham and lookedattheeffortsmadebythesocietytoeducatewomen.TheChurchMission-arySocietyandtheeffortsitswomenmadetoeducatewomenofIndiaarereallyusefulformywork.Ialsovis-itedthelibraryofOxfordUniversityinAugustandworkedinthearchivesoftheSocietyforthePropagationoftheGospel.TheSocietyfortheProp-agation of the Gospel was active ineducatingwomenoftheUnitedProv-incesduringthelatenineteenthandearlytwentiethcenturies.SinceOcto-

ber,IhavebeenworkingattheCen-treforModernIndianStudies,Göttin-gen.TheCentralLibraryofGöttingenhas good resources related to mywork and is an excellent library forsecondarysources.InGöttngenIamutilisingmytimetowritemythesis.I amalso availingof thebenefits oftheInter-LibraryLoanschemeofGot-tingenlibrarytoconsultbooksfromotherlibrariesofGermany.


“Whattoknow:Schoolingwomeninthe United Provinces (1854-1930)”,at the 3rd TRG workshop, London,7-9July2014

I participated in the GHIL Collo-quium and presented a paper on 2September 2014 and discussed myon-goingresearch.

IparticipatedintheWinterAcademyorganisedbytheForumTransregion-ale Studien Berlin and the TRG, inBerlinfrom16-25November2014.

“Moralizing’ Women: Scholl Educa-tion in the United Provinces (1854-1930)” (Thesis Chapter) at the His-tory Research Group of Centre forModernIndianStudies,Gottingen,9December2014

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The Oral History project, underthedirectionofProf.JanakiNairhascollected 44 oral histories since thework began in October 2013. Theseinterviewsarebased indifferent lo-cations across India and have beenconducted in five languages (Hindi,Bengali, Tamil,MalayalamandKan-nada).

Most of these histories were col-lected in multiple sittings with theinterviewees, who discussed theirexperience of education and school-ing at length.Manyof the respond-entsarefirstgenerationlearnersandtheirrecollectionsareevocativeandtroubled; the recordings seamlesslybring forth the uneasy relationshipbetweentheirschoolingandtheirso-cio-economicbackgrounds.Whattheinterviews bring out most clearly isthehope fromeducation to afford abetterlifeandjobprospects.Insomecases,theresearchassistantsreport-ed that they were mistaken for jobrecruiters, the popular appellation‘sarkar’ came to the mind of manyinterviewees when they were firstapproachedforan‘interview’.

At times, especially in many of theinterviews with women, the narra-tiveisfilledwithpainandregret.Thepainisfortheadversityinvolved,andtheregretisfornotbeingabletocon-

tinuetheireducation–inmostcasesbecauseofnosupportfromtheirfam-ilies.Thereisalsoaconstantelementof secrecy involved – many womeninterviewees have discussed the ef-fortstheytooktocontinuewiththeirschooling without social approval,some of this effort continues in thepresentastheysearchforjoboppor-tunitiesforwhichtheyreceiveamixof encouragement and disapprovalfrom their families. In one particu-larlypainfilledaccount,awomanITItraineetalksaboutherescapefromasituationofdomestic abuseandherenrolment in the institute as a wayforwardforhertorebuildherlife.Alotofresilienceisonrecordinthesefiles,asmanyoftheintervieweesarecontinuingtheireducationandtrain-ing, whether for a job or simply forthepleasuresoflearning.

The recordings of these historiesstarted in October/November 2013after our first workshop on ‘OralHistory’ on October 19-20, 2014.This workshop had enthusiastic at-tendanceandwasorganized in foursessions:‘FormandMeaninginOralHistory’,‘Collective/IndividualMem-ory’,‘Violence,TraumaandtheactofRecall’ and ‘Techniques ofOralHis-tory’. A special concluding sectionwaswiththesixresearchassistantsto discuss their preparation for the

XII. Documenting the lives of the urban poor with a specific reference to the links between poverty and education: a set of interviews

An Oral History Project

Janaki Nair and Rashmi Singh, Centre for Historical Studies, Jawaharlal Nehru University Delhi

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field,possible locationsof interviewand the structure of the question-naire. These researchers wrote toProf. Nair about possibilities in thefield,whothenhelpedthemtoidenti-fyandcontactrespondents.

The first difficulty we encounteredwas that time taken to record andtranscribeinterviewswasfarlength-ier than we had imagined, and weran intoanumberofdelayson thisaccount.Insomecases,theresearchassistants were not very well con-versedwith the techniqueof typingin the interview language, and thisalso pushed us back as we had tospend more time in error checkingandgoingcloselyoveralltranscripts.ThisalsoledtothepostponementoftheAlternativeEducationWorkshop,which was scheduled for early thisyear.Our secondworkshop forOHPtook place in February, 2014. Thiswasheldafter completionof the re-cordings,itwasmeantexclusivelyfortheresearchassistantstosittogetheranddiscusstheirworkandthediffi-cultiesencountered. Itwasanexcit-ing session for them as they spokeaboutthecommonthemesemergingintheirwork.

The transcriptions were completedbyJuly-August,2014.Wehadreamsof material after this exercise. Wehad also managed to set up an effi-cient system of communication forall work purposes by this time, itwas never a problem that some ofthe RA’s were in different cities onoccasions. Meanwhile, to save timewe had simultaneously started thetranslation work. It was very diffi-cult to find the right translators forthe job, who could understand the

different dialects and also keep themeaningof the interviews intact. Inthissearchwealsorealizedthewoe-ful lack of channels to contact goodtranslatorswhowerealsoaffordable!OurfirsttranslationsstartedtocomeinaroundJuneandJuly.Theseweresent to the research assistants tocrosscheckforerrors.

Forsomelanguages,theRA’sfeltthattheearlytranslationsdidnotconveytheir recordeddialogues lucidly.Werealizedthatitwasmoreprudenttosend the second set of translationsbacktothemasfaraspossibleiftheyexpressed interest in taking up thework.Foroursecondandthirdsetoftranslations,weeithergavetheworkto the RA’s or where not possible,to translators from a social sciencebackground who seemed to capturethe nuances of the text better andunderstand its context as well. Thisprovedtobeproductiveandthequal-ityofthetranslationsincreased.

As ofDecember2014, all the trans-lations are complete. We are nowcollecting excerpts from our RA’sthatcancapturesomeoftheinterest-ing exchanges from the recordings.Thesewillbeputuponthewebsitealong with related audio clips fromtheinterviews.Thiswillenableustoshowcase a snippet of the archive’smaterial. One of the RA’s has alsosubmitted a write-up on her expe-rience of undertaking these inter-views,wearefiguringoutthemodal-ity of sharing this work through anappropriate medium. There are alsodiscussionsunderwayaboutthestor-ing arrangement of the material toensurepropersharingofthearchive.

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Winter School in coop-eration with the Forum Transregionale Studien on Inequality, Education and Social Power: Transregional Perspectives, Berlin, 16-21 November 2014

Photos by courtesy of Forum Trans-regionale Studien

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The session “Making Winners?Transforming Individuals throughEducation in Colonial and Post-Co-lonial Contexts”, brought togetherhistorians from Great Britain, thepartner country of this year’s His-torikertag, the German HistoricalInstitute London and the Transna-tionalResearchGroup(TRG)onpov-ertyandeducationinmodernIndia.Thepresentations,however,coveredmany more countries, providing atruly international perspective onhow education has been plannedand experimented with, and how ithasshapedpeople’slivesincolonialandpost-colonial times.Thesessionengaged with educational methodsandtransformativeaspectsofeduca-tion ranging from Indian monitorialschoolstofemaleeducationinSierraLeoneandNigeria,newexperimentsinmasseducationonaninternation-alscale,andtheimportanceofeduca-tion for children fromworking-classhouseholdsinMumbai.

As ANDREAS GESTRICH (London)emphasised in his introduction, ed-ucationisnotonlyamechanismfortransforming individuals, but hasitself always been subject to trans-formation. This happens throughthe introduction of new education-

al concepts and as the result of ex-periments, but also by processes oftransferring these concepts globallyand adapting them (sometimes un-intentionally) in new contexts. Inadditiontotracingtheseprocessesoftransformation,thissessionrevolvedaround the central question of thepurposeofeducation.BeyondtheoldEnlightenmentideaofmakingbetterindividualsthrougheducation,ithasalwaysbeen a tool for certain inter-ests,whetherinfavouroftransform-ingsocietyormaintainingitsorder.

In the first presentation JANATSCHURENEV (Göttingen) lookedatthe monitorial system of educationin early nineteenth-century BritishIndia.. This new form of schoolingfor the poor was marked by an in-herent tension: while schools wereorganised in a highly competitivemeritocraticsystem,theintentionofthemissionarieswastomaintainthehierarchical social order and keeppeople in theirplaces. The teachingmethod was based on the conceptsofJosephLancasterandAndrewBell.Advanced students were asked toteachthelessadvanced,andlessonsfollowedanextremelyrigidplan.Themainobjective of these schoolswas

3. Conference and Workshop reportsI. Making Winners? Transforming Individuals through Education in Colonial and Post-Colonial Contexts2

Alva Bonaker, Centre for Modern Indian Studies (CeMIS), Georg-August-Universität Göttingen

2ThisarticlefirstappearedontheHSozKultwebsite,http://www.hsozkult.de/hfn/conferencereport/id/tagungsberichte-5723

»

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to produce rational subjects withChristian moral values who wouldbe able to make themselves use-ful to society. Among the challeng-es which this educational methodfaced, Tschurenev highlighted thatthemeritocraticsystemwasseenascontaining thedangerof raisingex-pectationsamongstudents,possiblyleading tosocialmobility;henceed-ucationhadtobekeptwithincertainlimits. This demonstrates that edu-cation was seen primarily not as amediumfor individualdevelopment,butasatoolformaintainingacertainorderinsociety.

SILKE STRICKRODT (London), too,assessed educational experimentsby missionaries in the British Em-pire, shifting the focus from Indiato Sierra Leone. Strickrodt analysedthetransformationofthemissionar-ies’educationalidealswhentheysetup the Church Missionary Society’s(CMS) Female Institution in 1849andwereconfrontedwithlocalideasanddemands.Unlike the schools inthe monitorial system, this was anexampleofexclusive,eliteeducationbasedonahighlyselectivesystem.Itintendedtotransformthegirlsmor-ally and spiritually into Christians,housewivesandmothers.Incontrastto this missionary objective, Strick-rodtemphasised,theparentsdidnotwant their girls to be transformedin thisway,butmade theirownde-mands,which were largely orientedbyBritishvalues.Thisexampleclear-ly demonstrates that informationabout ways of life and educationalpatterns circulated in various ways

and were not solely transferred bymissionaries. This story also under-lines that it is not always easy toidentify the “winners” and “losers”of educational experiments. Rather,weareconfrontedwithcomplexen-tanglements, and the outcomes ofeducationarerarely limited towhatwasintended.

The regional focus shifted back toIndia in the following presentation,with education among the elites incolonial times remaining the maintheme.GEORGINABREWIS(London)gave an insight into the Indian stu-dents’ social service leagues in thefirst two decades of the twentiethcentury.Brewisfoundthatthefocuswas on the transformation of moralvalues in those who participated intheservice,withtheaimofmakingthem future leaders of the country,ratherthanontheoutcomeoftheser-vice.Brewisdrewattentiontoakindofeducationthatwas,paradoxically,closely intertwined with the Britishsystemontheonehand,butbecamepart of the Indian nation-buildingmovement on the other. In bothprevious presentations, there wasnodoubtthattheconceptswerede-velopedbyBritishmissionaries andchangedonlyas a result of encoun-teringthedifferentcontextsinwhichtheywereapplied.InthecaseoftheIndian social service, there wereconflicting claims about whethertheseconceptshadindigenousrootsor had been introduced by Britishmissionaries. Brewis emphasisedthatthestudentsocialserviceinIn-diawasahybridmodel, includinga

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setofChristianaswellasHinduin-fluences, and can therefore be seenas reflecting the constant interplayof ideas and practices between Eu-ropeanandIndianeducationalistsinIndia.

CHARLOTTE HASTINGS (Manches-ter) provided another example offemale education in colonial Africa.She traced the struggle to set up aregularsecondaryschoolforgirlsinNigeria, highlighting the ignorancewithwhichthegovernmentrespond-ed to the demand that girls shouldreceive an education beyond beingtaught how to be good housewivesand mothers according to Christianvalues.Onlywith theestablishmentoftheAdvisoryCommitteeonNativeEducation in British Tropical Africa(later renamed Advisory Committeeon Education in the Colonies) andthe first female appointments to it,did education for girls slowly gainmoreattention.Queen’sCollegewasfinally opened ten years after thecampaign began. The way in whichthe school was run by the colonialadministration revealed discrimina-tiononthebasisofrace.Therewasaclearpreference forappointingBrit-ish teachers, and women were paidlessthanmen.TheexampleofFaithWordsworth,anEnglishteacherwhowas the main figure during the ini-tialphaseofQueen’sCollege,revealsa wide gap between her ideals andthoseof thecolonialadministrators.Highlypraisedforherachievementsin girls’ education, she herself wasdeeply disappointed by the meagresupport she received. This demon-

strates not only how educationalconceptsandideasincolonialtimeschanged under the influence of thelocal population, but also that con-flicting ideas and visions existed inparallel and were negotiated amongdifferentcolonialactors.

From the regional examples of thesession VALESKA HUBER (London)turnedtoaneducationalexperimentthatwasintroducedonaglobalscale.In the late colonial period, whenprogrammes of mass education andinformal education became morewidespread, the American mission-ary Frank C. Laubach invented oneof the more successful methods foreducating the ‘masses’. Laubach’smethod was based on simplifyingthe alphabet and making everyoneteach others the lessons that theythemselveshadlearned(atechniquehe took from Bell and Lancaster).Laubach was guided by his visionthateveryoneshouldbeabletoreadandwritesothatthe‘masses’wouldbetransformedintoapopulationabletotakepartinpoliticallife.AsHuberemphasised, he was convinced thatliteracycouldsolveproblemsofpov-erty, overpopulation and ill health.In addition to suggesting that sucha simplified approach to solving allother problems by tackling just oneaspect seems problematic, Huberalso pointed to other shortcomingsof Laubach’s method, including thequestionofhowsustainableitreallywas. Laubach’s method was, how-ever, adopted in many countries towhichhe travelledandbyUNESCO.Itproved tobeapopularattempt to

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transferaspecificeducationalmeth-odtovariousregionalcontexts.

Completing the trajectory from ear-ly colonial to post-colonial times,SUMEET MHASKAR (Göttingen)returned toamicroperspectiveandlooked at the educational attain-ments of ex-mill workers’ childrenin Mumbai, asking what factorsinfluenced the educational attain-mentofworking-classyoungpeople.Overall,hefoundthatthechildren’seducation was only slightly moreadvancedthanthatof theirparents.The factors he identified as impor-tant (beyond, of course, the finan-cial status of their families) were:parental education, neighbourhoodand school peer effect, career guid-ance,part-timeemployment,privatetuition and language of schooling.According toMhaskar, these factorshad thepotential to enable childrento achieve social and economic up-wardmobility.Theywere, therefore,decisive of whether the children ofex-millworkerscouldtakechargeoftheir individual futures,orwere leftbehind. Receiving solid career guid-anceseemedtohaveplayedanespe-cially important role for the educa-tional achievements of the children.Thisshowsthattheaimwithwhicheducationwaspursuedwasextreme-lyrelevant.Inthiscontext,educationwasprimarilyseenasapathtoacer-tain career, rather than as away ofachievingpersonalfulfilment.

The same question – education towhat end? – was also addressed inthe discussion, which recognisedthat the session had shed light onseveral ‘ends’ of education as atransformative mechanism on theindividual leveland farbeyond.Thesession clearly demonstrated thatthe transformative power of educa-tion can be used for very differentpurposes.Thefactthateducationhasitselfalwaysbeensubjecttovarioustransformations, intended or not,makes this field such a fascinatingoneforbothhistoricalandcontempo-raryresearch.Itwaspointedoutthatthere has always been a great dealofexchangeofeducationalideasandconceptsbetweencountriesandcon-tinents,andalthoughLondoncanbeseenasthecentreforthepartsoftheBritishEmpirepresentedhere,infor-mation flows were highly decentral-isedandnot limitedtotheEmpire’sborders. Another aspect discussedwas the interconnection betweeneducation and respectability, mostpowerfullydemonstratedinthecaseof girls’ education among the elitesinSierraLeone,whereacertaintypeofeducationseemstohavebeenveryimportant for achieving the Englishrespectability envisaged. In gener-al, education’s inherent potential tomake people “winners” was agreedupon, even though it became clearthatitwasnotalwayseasytotellwhothe“winners”were.Anothercentralaspectdiscussedwasthetensionbe-

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tweeneducationasatoolforindivid-ualachievement,andformaintainingthesocial orderandkeepingpeoplein their places. The session showedthat analysing this tension betweeneducationasatoolforliberationandforsocialcontrolshouldbeonthere-searchagendainmanydifferentgeo-graphicalandpoliticalsettings.

Session Overview:

Chair:AndreasGestrich(London)

Jana Tschurenev (Göttingen), GoodChristians,GoodMenundGoodSub-jects. School Discipline in Englandand India in the Early NineteenthCentury

Silke Strickrodt (London), MakingWinners? Female Elite Education inNineteenth-CenturySierraLeone

Georgina Brewis (London), Noblerand Higher Selves. TransformingStudents into Servants of India andEmpire

Charlotte Hastings (Manchester), ToTransform Colonial Children? Wom-en Teachers at 1920s Queen’s Col-lege,Lagos(Nigeria)

ValeskaHuber(London),‘Transform-ingtheMasses’?LiteracyCampaignsattheEndofEmpire

Sumeet Mhaskar (Göttingen), Edu-cation and Transformation of Work-ing-Class Youths in Post-IndustrialMumbai

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The national level workshop wasorganizedbySunandanKNaspartof his postdoctoral project, whichwas funded by the TransnationalResearch Group on Poverty and Ed-ucation in India incooperationwiththe Manipal Centre of Philosophy,ManipalUniversity.Theobjectiveoftheworkshopwas todevelopacon-ceptualframeworkforunderstandingthe intersecting domains of castepracticesandpracticesofknowledgeproduction.Theworkshopdealtwiththe different aspects of experienceandknowinginrelationtocaste,bothintheinstitutionalcontextandinthedailylifepracticesfromtheregionofSouthIndia.Theworkshopdiscussedthese issues in relation to variousmodelsofknowledgetransferinclud-ingmodernschooleducationandin-formalmethodsofexchanges.

Experience, Knowledge and Knowledge Transfer

Aseducationisconsideredadomainofknowledgeproductionandknowl-edgetransfer,itisimportanttoinves-tigatethestatusofconceptualcatego-ries likeexperienceandknowledge.Thisshouldbeconnectedtothecur-rent debate among scholars aboutvaried processes of sensing and itsrelationtocastepractices.Thisrais-es several questions around whatmodesofexperiencingareprivileged

II. National Workshop on Caste, Experience and Poverty of Education: Perspective from South India

Sunandan Kizhakke Nedumpally

inthecurrenteducationsystemandhow the cognitive practices outsidethe school affect knowing practicesinschool.Thisalsoleadstotheques-tion of what kinds of protocols pre-vent certain forms of experiencing(such as “Dalit experiencing’) fromentering into the domain of knowl-edge.

Thepapersintheworkshopexploredvaried formsofexperiencesandex-periencingthroughlifehistoriesandother writings related to education-al practices and caste practices inSouthIndia.Theworkshopexploredthequestionofmarginalizationbothin academic and institutional pro-cessesbyanalysingthehierarchyofmethodologies and hierarchy of dif-ferentformsofknowledges.

Gopal Guru’s keynote address ana-lysed various aspects of poverty ofeducationwhichincludedthepover-tyofcontent,povertyofimagination,andpovertyofpractice.Heexplainedhowtheseaspectsproducecastehi-erarchiesinthedomainodeducationbothinschoolandhighereducation.Amman Madan spoke on the ques-tionofthevariousformsofpowerre-lationssuchasclass,casteandgen-der.Heunderscoredthatwhilethereisoverlapsoftheseformsofpoweritis importanttoanalyse itseparatelyforanalyticalpurpose.Healsopoint-

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edtowardstheimportanceofsimul-taneously focusingoneverydayandpracticesandstructuralfactors.

SundarSarukkai’spaperfocusedonthequestionof learningexperience.Analysing the various factors in-volvedintheexperienceoftwokindsoflearningi.e.personallearningandlearninginclassroom,hearguedthatwearestillunabletobringtheethi-calintothepedagogicpracticeaswestillbelieveincertainkindofobjec-tivity.SanilVexploredthisquestionfurther and argued that the forma-tionofexperienceisnotnaturalandthereislearningprocessinvolvedinexperiencing.It isatthisprocessoflearninghowtoexperienceweneedto think about the ethical questionraisedbySundarSarukkai.

SaleenaPrakkananamexplainedherexperienceofrunningahomeschoolin Varkala, in Keralam as part ofthe Dalit Human Rights Movement.The school focuses mainly on twoaspects: thefirst is the issueof lan-guageandsecondisthequestionofmanual labour. In the Home Schoolproject,theyuseEnglishasthemedi-umoflearningwhichtheythinkwillhelp the students’ mobility outsidethe regional casteist surroundings.Theyalsoinsistnotjuststudentsbuteveryindividualwhoarepartofthemovementshouldparticipateinagri-culturalwork.

Muralikrishna’spaperexploredDalitautobiographiesassiteofeducation-alexperienceandpointedoutvariousforms marginalization explained inthese biographies. Ratheesh Kumarargues for a reversal role of ethno-graphic fieldwork. The paper askedthequestionwhathappenswhentheethnographic gaze is inverted andwhat are the possibilities and prob-lems of the inversion. Kavery alsobrought out the problems of ethno-graphic fieldwork and the problemof relating theethnographer’sexpe-rience and the experience narratedtoher.Sunandan’spaperarguedthatit isnot just theexperiencebut themodeofexperienceitselfisasocial-lydeterminedprocessandhencethequestion of marginalization shouldbe analysed at an epistemologicaldomainaswell.8PhDstudentsalsopresented their research projectwhich varied from the question oftraditional knowledge practices tothe contemporary caste practices inuniversities.

Most of the papers conversed witheachotherandtherewasintensede-bate after each presentation. In theconcluding open session the maindiscussion was on the question for-warding this debate in meaningfulways.Manyparticipantsstressedtheneedofpracticalprojectsofinterven-tionalongwithfurtheringtheexist-ingdebate.

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4. EventsI. TRG Workshops and Conferences

ArunKumar:Poverty,Crime,andtheSchoolCurriculum:PoorinReforma-tory Schools (1880s-1920s) (Primedto Labour: ‘Education’ in IndustrialandArtisanSchoolsofColonialIndia(1860s-1940s)

8 July 2014Kaustubh Mani Sengupta: RefugeeSettlements and the Role of Educa-tion in Post-Partition West Bengal(projecttitle)

SunandanK.N.:Curriculumintheoryand practice: Experiences from theeducationalreformprogramsinKer-ala (project title: Critical Mind andLabouringBody:CasteandEducationReformsinKerala)

Sumeet Mhaskar: Exploring Educa-tional and Occupational AttainmentAmong Working Class Youths inPost-Industrial Mumbai (Project ti-tle: Effects of Industrial Decline onEducation in Urban India: A StudyofMumbai’sEx-Millworkers’House-holdDecisionsonChildren’sSchool-ing,1980s-Present)

9 July 2014PhDandPostdocdiscussionOpen discussion: for all TRG mem-bers

22 February 2014

Oral History Workshop, JNU/CHS,DelhiReview workshop organised by theCentreforHistoricalStudies,Jawaha-rlalNehruUniversityDelhi

7-9 July 2014

3rdTRGWorkshop,GermanHistori-calInstituteLondonPovertyandEducationinIndia

7 July 2014Welcome and introduction: AndreasGestrichandIndraSengupta

Alva Bonaker: More than Food forSchools? Local perceptions in defin-ing and shaping the benefits of theMid-DayMealSchemeinDelhi(Pro-jecttitle)

Malini Ghose: Exploring intersec-tionsbetweeneducation,genderandcaste through life histories: Reflec-tionsfrominitialfieldresearch(Pro-jecttitle:WhatExclusionLeavesOut:The“Life-Worlds”ofEducationalPol-icyMakinginContemporaryIndia)Preeti:SchoolingWomen:DebatesonEducation in the United Provinces(1854-1930)(projecttitle)

Divya Kannan: Teaching the Poor:ElementarySchoolTextbooks in the19thand20thCenturyKerala (Edu-catingtheLabouringPoorinthe19thand20thCenturyKerala)

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23-26 September 2014

Sessionat50thGermanHistori kertag:WinnersandLosers,Göttingen

MakingWinners?TransformingIndi-vidualsthroughEducationinColoni-al andPostcolonialContexts (organ-isedbyValeskaHuber,GHIL)

Chair:AndreasGestrich(GHIL)

Jana Tschurenev (TransnationalResearch Group, Göttingen): ‘GoodChristians,GoodMenandGoodSub-jects’: School Discipline in Englandand India in the Early NineteenthCentury

SilkeStrickrodt(GHIL):PerspectivesonSuccessandFailure:FemaleEliteEducation inNineteenth-CenturySi-erraLeone

Georgina Brewis (Institute of Edu-cation London): ‘Nobler and HigherSelves’: Transforming Students intoServantsofIndiaandEmpire

Charlotte Hastings (University ofManchester): To Transform ColonialChildren?WomenTeachersat1920sQueen’sCollege,Lagos(Nigeria)

ValeskaHuber(GHIL):‘Transformingthe Masses’? Literacy Campaigns attheEndofEmpire

Sumeet Mhaskar (Transnational Re-searchGroup,Göttingen):EducationandTransformationofWorkingClassYouthsinPost-IndustrialMumbaiComments:

AndreasGestrich(GHIL)

16-25 November 2014

Winter School and Conference:Transregional Perspectives on In-equality,EducationandSocialPowerat Wissenschaftszentrum Berlin fürSozialforschung. Jointly organisedbytheTransnationalResearchGroup(TRG) on Poverty and Education inIndiaandtheForumTransregionaleStudien,Berlin

24 November 2014Welcome AddressesHeinz Duchhardt, Max-Weber-Stiftung – Deutsche Geisteswissen-schaftlicheInstituteimAuslandAndreas Eckert, Humboldt-Universi-tätzuBerlin/Forum

Inequality, Education and Social Power: General DiscussionChair: Andreas Eckert, Hum-boldt-UniversitätzuBerlin/Forum

Sarada Balagopalan, Centre for theStudy of Developing Societies, NewDelhi

Klaus Hurrelmann, Hertie School ofGovernance,Berlin

Carlos Costa Ribeiro, UniversidadedoEstadodoRiodeJaneiro

Global Knowledge Asymmetries and EducationChair:BarbaraGöbel,Ibero-Amerika-nischesInstitut,Berlin

Neeladri Bhattacharya, JawaharlalNehruUniversity,NewDelhiPeter Kallaway, University of CapeTown

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David MacDonald, University ofGuelph

Hebe Vessuri, Universidad NacionalAutónomadeMéxico,MexicoCity

Social Diversity and EducationChair: Jana Tschurenev, Georg-Au-gust-UniversitätGöttingen

YusufSayed,CapePeninsulaUniver-sityofTechnology,CapeTown

CélineTeney,UniversitätBremenMarthaZapataGalindo,FreieUniver-sitätBerlin

Keynote AddressJutta Allmendinger, Wissenschafts-zentrumBerlinfürSozialforschungIntroduction: Marianne Braig, FreieUniversitätBerlin/Forum

25 November 2014Private Actors in the Education SystemChair: Andreas Gestrich, GermanHistoricalInstituteLondon

GeethaNambissan,JawaharlalNehruUniversity,NewDelhi

HaniaSobhy,Orient-InstitutBeirut

Silke Strickrodt, German HistoricalInstituteLondon

Inequality, Education and the Labor MarketChair:RaviAhuja,Georg-August-Uni-versitätGöttingen

Augustin Emane, Institut d’EtudesAvancéesdeNantes

PatricioSolís,ElColegiodeMéxico,MexicoCity

AnjaWeiß,UniversitätDuisburg-Es-sen

8-9 December 2014

NationalWorkshoponCaste,Experi-ence and Poverty of Education: Per-spectivesfromSouthIndia,Manipal,India.JointlyorganisedbytheTrans-national Research Group (TRG) onPoverty and Education in India andManipal Centre for Philosophy &Humanities(MCPH).

8 December 2014KeynoteaddressbyGopalGuru,Pro-fessor, Centre for Political Studies,Jawaharlal Nehru University, NewDelhi

Speakers:SundarSarukkai,Professor,ManipalCentre for Philosophy and Humani-ties,ManipalUniversity

Amman Madan, Professor, AzimPremjiUniversity,Bangalore

Seleena Prakkanam Chairperson,Dalit Human Rights Movement andArunV

Girija K.P, Research Scholar, CentrefortheStudyofCultureandSociety,Bangalore

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Shivani Kapoor, Research Scholar,CentreforPoliticalStudies,Jawahar-lalNehruUniversity,NewDelhi

LeyaMathew,ResearchScholar,Uni-versityofPennsylvania

MuraliKrishnaMallepaku,AssistantProfessor, Tata Institute of SocialSciences,Hyderabad

Sunandan K.N, Postdoctoral Fellow,Transnational Research Group, NewDelhi

9 December 2014Speakers:SanilV,Professor,IndianInstituteoftechnology,NewDelhi

Ratheesh Kumar P.K, Assistant Pro-fessor, Centre For Political Studies,Jawaharlal Nehru University, NewDelhi

Kaveri Haritas, Assistant Professor,Manipal Center for Philosophy andHumanities

WilliamRobertDaSilva,SeniorPro-fessor, Academy of Design, Coim-batore.

Roshni Padmanabhan, ResearchScholar, Centre for DevelopmentStudies,Thiruvananthapuram

P.V. Swati, Research Scholar, Inde-pendentResearcher,NewDelhi

Manojan K.P, Research Scholar,CentreforHumanRights,UniversityofHyderabad

Arun Asokan, Phd. scholar, CentreforRegionalStudies,SchoolofSocialSciences,UniversityofHyderabad.Aivinor Ams, PhD student, ManipalCentre for Philosophy and Humani-ties,Manipal

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II. TRG Lectures

8 July 2014

Textbook Controversies and the De-mand for a Past: The Public Lives of Indian History

Janaki Nair, Jawaharlal Nehru Uni-versity,Delhi

Thethrivingpublic lifeofhistoryinIndia is in inverseproportion to thedwindling interest in and develop-ment of academichistoryacross In-diatoday.Recentdebatesanddiscus-sionsaboutschooltextbooksallowustoreturntothetroubledrelationshipbetweentheseworldsofhistorywrit-ing,whichwillbecriticaltoamean-ingful response to the challengesfacedbyacademichistory,inschoolsandbeyond.

Venue: German Historical InstituteLondon

11 November 2014

Making Cinema `Useful’: Pedagogies and Publics in India, c 1920- 1960

RaviVasudevan,CentrefortheStudyofDevelopingSocieties,Delhi

How did colonial and early post-co-lonial governments and film entre-preneurs use film to circulate infor-mation and engage different typesof publics? This lecture reviews thevariety of pedagogical projects andaudiencecategorieswhichwentintomaking cinema a ‘useful’ vehicle ofinformation. The talk will also ex-plore how ‘useful’ cinema in SouthAsiawasembeddedinatransnation-alnetworkofdiscussionabouthowtosolicitandshapeaudiences.

Venue: German Historical InstituteLondon

Janaki Nair at her talk, GHI London

Photo by courtesy of Mrinal Rammohan

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III. Other events

ArunKumar,CentreforModernIndi-anStudies(UniversityofGöttingen):Histories of Miscalculation and thePolitics of the Possible: The Repro-ductionandProductionofSubjectsinColonialIndustrialSchools

JanaTschurenev,Centre forModernIndian Studies (University of Göt-tingen): Mothers, Wives, Teachers:AgendasofFemaleEducationinCo-lonialIndia

Simone Holzwarth, Humboldt Uni-versity Berlin: A Postcolonial SocialOrderthroughTeachingRuralCrafts?The Debates about Basic Educationbetween1937and1949

LeaGriebel,CentreforModernIndi-anStudies(UniversityofGottingen):Alternative Education for the RuralPoor: Inherent Social Good versusReproductionofSocialInequalitySumeetMhaskar,CentreforModernIndian Studies (University of Got-tingen): Schooling in the Times ofIndustrialDecline:AStudyofMum-bai’s Mill Workers’ Household Deci-sionsonChildrenSchooling

31 May 2014

Film between colony and nation-state: information film in India 1940-1946

RaviVasudevan,Delhi

Talk organised by visiting fellow,RaviVasudevan,ProfessorofFilmattheCentrefortheStudyofDevelop-ingSocietiesandSARAI,NewDelhi,incooperationwithTheBirkbeckIn-stitutefortheHumanities,TheBirk-beck Institute for theMoving Imageand the German Historical Institute(TRGPovertyandEducation)

Venue: Gordon Square Cinema,SchoolofArts,BirkbeckCollege

21-22 July 2014

Y-SASM Workshop, ETH Zurich

PanelonEducationandthe(Re)Pro-ductionofSocial Inequality inColo-nialandPostcolonial India. Interdis-ciplinaryPerspectives, organisedbyTRG doctoral and postdoctoral fel-lowsatCeMIS,Göttingen

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Principal InvestigatorsRaviAhuja CeMIS,UniversityofGöttingenSaradaBalagopalan CentreforStudiesinDevelopingSocietiesDelhiNeeladriBhattacharya CHS,JawaharlalNehruUniversityDelhiAndreasGestrich GermanHistoricalInstituteLondonValeskaHuber GermanHistoricalInstituteLondonSunilKhilnani King’sIndiaInstitute,KingsCollegeLondonJanakiNair CHS,JawaharlalNehruUniversityDelhiGeethaB.Nambissan ZHCES,JawaharlalNehruUniversityDelhiJahnaviPhalkey King’sIndiaInstitute,KingsCollegeLondonIndraSengupta GermanHistoricalInstituteLondonSilkeStrickrodt GermanHistoricalInstituteLondonJanaTschurenev CeMIS,UniversityofGöttingenRupaViswanath CeMIS,UniversityofGöttingen

Postdoctoral Research FellowsDebaratiBagchi UniversityofGöttingenSmitaGandotra TRG/DelhiSaikatMaitra UniversityofGöttingenKaustubhManiSengupta JawaharlalNehruUniversityDelhiSunandanK.N. TRG/CSDSDelhi

PhD Research FellowsAlvaBonaker UniversityofGöttingenMaliniGhose UniversityofGöttingenDivyaKannan JawaharlalNehruUniversityDelhiArunKumar UniversityofGöttingenPreeti JawaharlalNehruUniversityDelhiVidyaK.S. JawaharlalNehruUniversityDelhi

Associate FellowSumeetMhaskar UniversityofGöttingen

SupportIndraSengupta AcademicCoordinatorSueEvans Administrativesupport,LondonRohanSeth Administrativesupport,DelhiSukantiEkka Administrativesupport,Delhi

5. People

General Report 2014

Editorialassistance:MrinalRammohan

Designedandtypsetbywww.mees-zacke.de

CoverphotobycourtesyofNeelambariPhalkey

PosterfortalkbyJanakiNaironpage7designedbyMrinalRammohan

2014

ContactGerman Historical Institute London17 Bloomsbury SquareLondon WC1A 2NJ

Tel. +44-(0)20-7309 2050FAX +44-(0)20-7309 2055Email: [email protected]

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