South Asia Center presents: Auritro Majumder

The world’s longest democratically elected Communist government, in the Indian province of West Bengal, was voted out of power in 2011. The present moment, marked by ideological debates among various parliamentary and non-parliamentary Communist groups, is crucial for the Left’s future, both in West Bengal and beyond. This talk explores how Marxism came to occupy the cultural centrality it did in late colonial and post-colonial Bengal, and how the construction of a historically specific social imaginary of egalitarianism and decolonization marked the legacy of the Left. Through an examination of cultural forms, poetry, plays etc, this presentation argues that the Communist Left presented an alternative mode of belonging and sociality from that of dominant nationalism, and that such a vision continues to inflect popular culture and politics in the era of globalization. Speaking: Auritro Majumder Ph.D. Candidate Department of English, Syracuse University Sponsor: Moynihan Institute of Global Affairs, Co-Sponsor South Asia Center, Co-Sponsor