JNU | RTI | Directory | Contact Us | Emergency Services | List of Holidays
-A A +A

Pandukeshwar, Architectural Knowledge, and an Idea of India

Pandukeshwar, Architectural Knowledge, and an Idea of India

Event End Date
Event Title
Pandukeshwar, Architectural Knowledge, and an Idea of India
Event Details
<strong>Centre for Historical Studies School of Social Sciences</strong> a Lecture on <strong>Pandukeshwar, Architectural Knowledge, and an Idea of India</strong> <strong>Nachiket Chanchani</strong> University of Michigan, United States <strong>4th November 2015</strong> This sumptuously illustrated talk probes a temple complex at Pandukeshar––a sacred center near a glacial source of the Ganga River in the Himalayas––where lithic shrines in local, regional, and trans-regional architectural typologies stand side by side. I first descriptively analyze the forms and layouts of these edifices, then connect the archaeological evidence to the epigraphic record to date these shrines to the ninth and tenth-centuries. Thereafter, I show how their design, construction, and use appears to be connected to the emergence, refinement, and dispersion of an India as a geo-cultural landscape extending from the Indian Ocean up to high Himalayas. This conception, I conclude, was transmitted along knowledge corridors, routes that connected institutions of learning. Nachiket Chanchani (PhD, University of Pennsylvania, 2012) is a tenure-track assistant professor jointly appointed in the departments of the History of Art and Asian Languages and Cultures at the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, USA. His writings are appearing in leading journals including Artibus Asiae, Archives of Asian Art, History of Photography, Ars Orientalis, and Arts Asiatiques and on the editorial and opinion pages of The Hindu newspaper. Nachiket has been involved with curatorial projects at the Philadelphia Museum of Art, Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, and the Freer and Sackler Galleries in Washington, DC. He has won fellowships from many bodies including Asian Cultural Council, New York, Nehru Trust at the Victoria and Albert Museum, London and Smithsonian Institution, Washington DC, and the Gonda Foundation at the Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences. Nachiket has been invited to speak at numerous venues including Princeton University, the University of Chicago, and the Centre for Studies in Social Sciences, Calcutta.

A warm welcome to the modified and updated website of the Centre for East Asian Studies. The East Asian region has been at the forefront of several path-breaking changes since 1970s beginning with the redefining the development architecture with its State-led development model besides emerging as a major region in the global politics and a key hub of the sophisticated technologies. The Centre is one of the thirteen Centres of the School of International Studies, Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi that provides a holistic understanding of the region.

Initially, established as a Centre for Chinese and Japanese Studies, it subsequently grew to include Korean Studies as well. At present there are eight faculty members in the Centre. Several distinguished faculty who have now retired include the late Prof. Gargi Dutt, Prof. P.A.N. Murthy, Prof. G.P. Deshpande, Dr. Nranarayan Das, Prof. R.R. Krishnan and Prof. K.V. Kesavan. Besides, Dr. Madhu Bhalla served at the Centre in Chinese Studies Programme during 1994-2006. In addition, Ms. Kamlesh Jain and Dr. M. M. Kunju served the Centre as the Documentation Officers in Chinese and Japanese Studies respectively.

The academic curriculum covers both modern and contemporary facets of East Asia as each scholar specializes in an area of his/her interest in the region. The integrated course involves two semesters of classes at the M. Phil programme and a dissertation for the M. Phil and a thesis for Ph. D programme respectively. The central objective is to impart an interdisciplinary knowledge and understanding of history, foreign policy, government and politics, society and culture and political economy of the respective areas. Students can explore new and emerging themes such as East Asian regionalism, the evolving East Asian Community, the rise of China, resurgence of Japan and the prospects for reunification of the Korean peninsula. Additionally, the Centre lays great emphasis on the building of language skills. The background of scholars includes mostly from the social science disciplines; History, Political Science, Economics, Sociology, International Relations and language.

Several students of the centre have been recipients of prestigious research fellowships awarded by Japan Foundation, Mombusho (Ministry of Education, Government of Japan), Saburo Okita Memorial Fellowship, Nippon Foundation, Korea Foundation, Nehru Memorial Fellowship, and Fellowship from the Chinese and Taiwanese Governments. Besides, students from Japan receive fellowship from the Indian Council of Cultural Relations.