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Title:
Articulate Spaces: An Analysis of Urban Landscape in an
Indian city
Where
& When: March 17, 2009
341 Eggers Hall
12.30 pm
Type
of Activity: Speaker
Speaking: Madhura
Lohokare, Graduate Student in Anthropology, Syracuse University.
Summary:
Through an ethnographic analysis of public spaces in a city
in Western India, I aim to decode the multiple layers of
meanings which are inscribed in these spaces. Focusing on
the practice of writing notice boards (vartaphalaks) in public spaces in the city of Pune, I contend that
the physical and social spaces occupied by
vartaphalaks are a
contested terrain, as various groups seek to claim these
spaces through their rhetorical and visual practices.
However, while these spaces function as exclusionary spaces
for certain sections of the society, they simultaneously
constitute a site to stake claim to modernity and
citizenship in the urban context. I elaborate upon the
multivalence of these spaces by locating the
vartaphalak on the
intersection of the spatial, civic and religious axes of
urban life in India.
Sponsorship:
The South Asia Center;
