In the Spotlight

SAI Education Symposium Video Now Available

Video coverage of the January 23, 2012 "Higher Education in South Asia: Enhancing Quality and Access through Innovative Solutions" is now available.

View the Welcome by Harvard President Drew Faust and coverage of Panel One on the right.

For more details of the event and to watch Panel Two, click here.

Sophia Angelis 1 Sophia Angelis 2 Sophia Angelis 3

Upcoming Events

February
March
April
May
June

South Asia Initiative February 2012 Events

Friday, February 10, 4:30-6:30pm

Thompson Room, Barker Center 110, 12 Quincy Street, Cambridge, MA

SAI Winter Gathering

You're invited! Join SAI at a winter celebration featuring a mandolin performance by Rishav Mukherji, Class of '15

Co-sponsored with the Harvard Sangeet Student Group

Please RSVP to sainit@fas.harvard.edu.
SAI Winter Gathering Invitation

Monday, February 13, 4:15 p.m.

Bell Hall (Fifth Floor), Belfer Building, Harvard Kennedy School, 79 JFK Street Cambridge, MA

US-Pakistan Relations

Cameron Munter, US Ambassador to Pakistan
India-South Asia Program and the Future of Diplomacy Project, co-sponsored by the South Asia Initiative, Harvard University

Wednesday, February 15, 5:00 p.m.

CGIS South, Belfer Conference Room S020, 1730 Cambridge Street, Cambridge, MA

India's Geostrategic Choices

Shyam Saran, Former Foreign Secretary of India
India-South Asia Program and the Future of Diplomacy Project, co-sponsored by the South Asia Initiative, Harvard University

Thursday, February 16, 4:15 p.m.

Weil Town Hall (Ground Floor), Belfer Building, Harvard Kennedy School, 79 JFK Street, Cambridge, MA

Afghanistan: To End A War

Zalmay Khalizad, Former US Ambassador to Afghanistan, Iraq, and the United Nations
India-South Asia Program and the Future of Diplomacy Project, co-sponsored by the South Asia Initiative, Harvard University

Friday, February 17, 10:30 a.m.

CGIS South, Tsai Auditorium, 1730 Cambridge Street, Cambridge, MA

A Public Adress by Ambassador Nirupama Rao, Indian Ambassador to the United States

India-South Asia Program and the Future of Diplomacy Project, co-sponsored by the South Asia Initiative, Harvard University

Wednesday, February 15, 11:00am-6:00pm

Coomarawamy Hall, 159/61 M.G. Road, Mumbai, 400 023, India

The Development Plan Workshop 2 for Greater Mumbai 2014-2034

Event Description

The aim of this workshop is to share the process of the preparation of the Development Plan for Mumbai with the general public. The Urban Design Research Institute, the Graduate School of Design at Harvard University and the Museum will partner in organising the conference which will involve students, professional as well as Government officials and citizens of Mumbai.

Speakers to include Rahul Mehrotra, Shirish Patel, D.M. Sukthankar, Cyrus Guzder, Anirudh Paul, and more.

Sponsored by the Harvard Graduate School of Design

Co-sponsored by the South Asia Initiative; The Museum, Mumbai; and The Urban Design Research Institute

For a full program of the day's events please click here.

Tuesday, February 28 - 5:00pm

CGIS Knafel, Room K262, 1737 Cambridge Street, Cambridge, MA

Pakistan Seminar Series

Seeing the Frontier: Re-visioning Histories of Pakistan

Co-sponsored with the Prince Alwaleed bin Talal Islamic Studies Program at Harvard University

Vazira Zamindar, Associate Professor of History, Brown University
Chaired by Asad Ahmed, Assistant Professor of Anthropology, Harvard University

South Asia Initiative March 2012 Events

Thursday, March 8 - 6:30pm

Urbanization Seminar Series

Co-sponsored with the Harvard Graduate School of Design

A Tale of Three Capitals & Postcolonial Urban India.

Ravi Kalia, Professor of Asian Studies, Division of Humanities and the Arts, City College of New York, CUNY
Chaired by Rahul Mehrotra, Professor and Chair, Department of Urban Planning and Design, Harvard Graduate School of Design

Stubbins Room, Graduate School of Design, 48 Quincy Street, Cambridge, MA

Monday, March 19 - 4:00pm

CGIS Knafel, Room K262, 1737 Cambridge Street, Cambridge, MA

Pakistan Seminar Series

Co-sponsored with the Prince Alwaleed bin Talal Islamic Studies Program at Harvard University

Thinking with the Heart: A Language of Justice after the 1971 war of Bangladesh

Yasmin Saikia, Hardt-Nickachos Chair in Peace Studies, Center for the Study of Religion and Conflict; Professor of History in the School of Historical, Philosophical and Religious Studies, Arizona State University
Chaired by Asad Ahmed, Assistant Professor of Anthropology, Harvard University

Friday, March 23 - 6:00pm

CGIS Knafel Concourse, 1737 Cambridge Street, Cambridge, MA

Co-sponsored with LearnQuest and the Government of Orissa, India

Parallel Connections: Music and Dance in South Asian Art

Welcome remarks: Parimal Patil, Professor, Department of South Asian Studies, Harvard University
Moderated by: Laura Weinstein, Ananda Coomaraswamy Curator of South Asian and Islamic Art at the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston
Panelists and exhibitors:

Visual Arts: Pragati Sharma, Jyoti Joshi, Don Perrault, and Sunanda Sahay
Music: Warren Senders
Dance: Ranjani Saigal

Reception and exhibition viewing from 6:00-7:00pm in the CGIS Knafel Concourse with a live demonstration of Folk art of Orissa State of India-Patchitra by visiting artists.

Seminar to follow with Laura Weinstein, moderating in CGIS South, Tsai Auditorium, 1730 Cambridge Street, Cambridge, MA at 7:00pm.

South Asia Initiative April 2012 Events

Wednesday, April 4 - 6:00pm

CGIS South, Belfer Case Study Room S020, 1730 Cambridge Street, Cambridge, MA

Co-sponsored with LearnQuest and the Government of Orissa, India

Parallel Connections: The Healing Touch of South Asian Visual Art

Moderated by: Dr. Bruce Chabner, Professor, Department of Medicine, Harvard Medical School; Director of Clinical Research, MGH Cancer Center, Massachusetts General Hospital
Panelists: Dr. Elizabeth Gaufberg, Assistant Professor of Medicine; Assistant Professor of Psychiatry, Harvard Medical School
Dr. Joel Katz, Associate Professor of Medicine, Harvard Medical School

Exhibiting artists and panelists include: Kyle Lindholm, Vandana Sharma, Dr. George Taylor, and Rachna Tiwari.

Wednesday, April 18 - 6:30pm

Piper Auditorium, Graduate School of Design, 48 Quincy Street, Cambridge, MA

Urbanization Seminar Series

Co-sponsored with the Harvard Graduate School of Design

Mega-cities, the Urban Poor and the Place of Planning: The Case of Slum Upgrading in Indian Cities

Janice Perlman, Founder & President of the Mega-Cities Project
Chaired by Rahul Mehrotra, Professor and Chair, Department of Urban Planning and Design, Harvard Graduate School of Design

Thursday, April 26 and Friday, April 27

Annual SAI Symposium

Save the Date! Additional details coming soon.

Friday, April 27, 9:00am-3:00pm

Co-sponsored event with Educators for Teaching India (EFTI)

Holy India: Religion in the Modern Subcontinent

Keynote Speaker: Diana Eck, Professor of Comparative Religion and Indian Studies and Frederic Wertham Professor of Law and Psychiatry in Society, Harvard University

South Asia Initiative May 2012 Events

Coming Soon.

South Asia Initiative June 2012 Events

Coming Soon.

Click here for more events information

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Announcements

'Innovative Solutions' Grant Group Funding

Funded by the Omidyar Network Fund, Inc., for groups of three or more Harvard students. This group project grant is available to undergraduates and graduates, with applications due February 17, 2012..

Details for applying for the Omidyar Innovative Solutions Grant can be found here.

Cambridge, MA Internship Opportunity with Nanobiosym

Nanobiosym, an emerging global nano-biotech company, is commercializing cutting-edge nano-bio based technologies that address global healthcare needs in both developed and developing world markets. They are looking for interns in their Cambridge office.

Click here for details.

SAARC Regional Conference:

"Circulation of Cultures and Culture of Circulation: Diasporic Cultures of South Asia during 18th to 20th Centuries"

Held in: Galle, Sri Lanka, March 15-17, 2012

A brainstorming session to discuss the key issues and moot research questions, the conference will identify themes and subthemes of diasporic cultures of South Asia that merit
independent and in-depth research.

Visit saarculture.org for more info or here for the brochure.

FALAK SUFI MEMORIAL PRIZE
Given with the aim of contributing to the vibrancy of the study of humanities and social sciences in Pakistan.
(Only Pakistani nationals who are graduate or undergraduate students at a Pakistani college or university may apply.)
Submission Deadline: 31 March 2012

For more details please visit the AIPS web site: www.pakistanstudies-aips.org

SAI Summer Reading Recommendations

Beginning in the Fall 2011, SAI is excited to offer a series of book events featuring authors and their work relating to the South Asia region. Continue to check this space as we introduce authors and their books throughout the summer.

In September, we will welcome Deborah Baker, a biographer and essayist. Her recent book, The Convert: A Tale of Exile and Extremism, chronicles the life of Maryam Jameelah, a New York Jewish convert to Islam who condemned the life she left behind in the West.
Lorraine Adams of the New York Times recently praised the book writing, “Baker not only makes us care about this disturbed woman and her hectoring prose, she has succeeded in composing a memerizing book on one of the more curious East-West encounters. She proves once again how a marginal case can be an illuminating way into vast and much disputed subjects, in this instance the meeting of West and East and the role of women under orthodox Islam.”

Read more of The Convert review here.

In October, SAI will feature author Patrick French and his book India: A Portrait . Anchored in human stories, French explores India's momentous transformations.

"French's portrait is confusing for the reader in a hurry who wants a primer on India for his first flight to Delhi," writes Salil Tripathi, in his review in The Independent. " But accept India's confusing complexities, and it is stirringly accurate. India is the place where all generalisations are true, but so are the exceptions; and those exceptions matter - they present the vital alternative that bucks the prevailing narrative. Each thesis has an antithesis, but India is the land of synthesis."

In late October, SAI will feature Sarmila Bose and her new book Dead Reckoning: Memories of the 1971 Bangladesh War.

In an Op-Ed for Aljazeera, published in May, Sarmila writes: 'As soon as I started to do systematic research on the 1971 war, I found that there was a problem with the story which I had grown up believing: from the evidence that emanated from the memories of all sides at the ground level, significant parts of the "dominant narrative" seem not to have been true.

Many "facts" had been exaggerated, fabricated, distorted or concealed. Many people in responsible positions had repeated unsupported assertions without a thought; some people seemed to know that the nationalist mythologies were false and yet had done nothing to inform the public. I had thought I would be chronicling the details of the story of 1971 with which I had been brought up, but I found instead that there was a different story to be told.'

Read her full article here.