History and Our Present: Some Reflections - Deepa Sreenivas
This lecture was delivered at the 'What is History' regional conference held in Bulandshahr in October 2024. A Personal Journey with History Before I begin, let me briefly refer to the background that animates this paper. Although I am not a historian, in this presentation, I put before you certain concerns relating to history. Currently, I teach Gender Studies and my background is in the field of Cultural Studies. While I am not trained as a historian, I have always been interested in...
History for Peace.
Teaching and Learning History for Peace and Understanding
In her keynote address at the History for Peace conference in 2015 Barbara Christophe from the Georg Eckert Institute said ‘(history) textbooks are probably among the most selective media we have.’ The textbook selects, omits, simplifies and gives shape to the past. Sometimes, those choices are influenced not only by the demands of the classroom, but also by politics, ideology and ideas about what should be remembered. This module looks at the textbook differently. Rather than accepting its...
How does a text transform in its life beyond the printed word? What happens when it is a foundational text like the Constitution of India? The classroom resource probes some of these questions, drawing on the History for Peace Conferences on ‘The Idea of the Indian Constitution’ in Calcutta 2019 and in Pune 2020, along with ‘The Idea of Justice’ annual conference held in Calcutta 2023. It offers teachers an interdisciplinary lens towards reading the Constitution drawing on history, political...
The Historically Tempered Collective––Janaki Nair (historian; former professor, JNU), Meera Iyer (heritage researcher; convenor, INTACH Bengaluru chapter), Saisudha Acharya (children’s & YA nonfiction author, educator), and Ajay Cadambi (educator)––have initiated a project entitled Indian History: Thali by Thali that emphasizes the historical method.
In her keynote address at the History for Peace conference in 2015 Barbara Christophe from the Georg Eckert Institute said ‘(history) textbooks are probably among the most selective media we have.’ The textbook selects, omits, simplifies and gives shape to the past. Sometimes, those choices are influenced not only by the demands of the classroom, but also by politics, ideology and ideas about what should be remembered. This module looks at the textbook differently. Rather than accepting its...
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