Search Results (22)

Oral narratives play a crucial role in shaping the historical consciousness of Indigenous communities in Northeast India, where history writing is a relatively recent phenomenon. Among the Mizos, Nagas, Khasis, Kuki-Chins, and other Indigenous tribes of Northeast India, including the Bodos, the Garos, the Dimasas, or the Karbis of Assam, much of what is considered written history emerged during British colonial rule. Native historians later continued it in postcolonial India. However, written history, especially when based on fragmented colonial records, includes interpretive gaps. In such contexts, oral traditions provide complementary, and frequently, more authoritative frameworks rooted in cultural memory and collective transmission. Oral narratives, including ritual poetry, folk songs, myths, and folktales, serve as vital mediums for reconstructing the past. Scholars such as Jan Vansina view oral narratives as essential for understanding the histories of societies without written records, while Paul Thompson sees them as both a discovery and a recovery of cultural memory. Romila Thapar argues that narratives become indicative of perspectives and conditions in societies of the past, functioning as a palimpsest with multiple layers of meaning accruing over generations as they are recreated or reiterated over time. The folk narratives of the Mizos and Angami Nagas not only recount their origins and historical migrations, but also map significant geographical and cultural landmarks, such as Khezakheno and Lungterok in Nagaland, Rounglevaisuo in Manipur, and Chhinlung or Rih Dil on the Mizoram–Myanmar border. These narratives constitute a cultural understanding of the past, aligning with Greg Dening’s concept of “public knowledge of the past,” which is “culturally shared.” Additionally, as Linda Tuhiwai Smith posits, such stories, as embodiments of the past, and of socio-cultural practices of communities, create spaces of resistance and reappropriation of Indigenous identities even as they reiterate the marginalization of these communities. This paper deploys these ideas to examine how oral narratives can be used to decolonize grand narratives of history, enabling Indigenous peoples, such as the Mizos and the Angamis in North East India, to reaffirm their positionalities within the postcolonial nation. Full article

In the 19th century, the British archaeologist Sir Alexander Cunningham identified the remains of an unidentified Buddhist monastery at Jamāl Gaṛhī, an ancient site located approximately 13 km from present-day Mardān, Pakistan. Subsequent excavations by the Archaeological Survey of India between 1920 and 1921 unearthed a schist inscription dated to the year “359”. Heinrich Lüders, the renowned German Indologist and epigraphist, attributed this inscription to the Dharmaguptaka sect/school. Despite this early attribution, the Monastery’s precise sectarian characteristics have remained largely unexplored in later scholarship. This article reevaluates the site’s sectarian identity by employing a “ground-to-text” methodology that integrates archaeological evidence with textual analysis, with a particular focus on the Chinese translation of the Dharmaguptaka Vinaya. Through this comparative framework, this study seeks to elucidate the religious ideas reflected in the site’s material culture and their relationship with Dharmaguptaka disciplinary thought. The analysis encompasses the architectural remnants of the stūpa excavated by Cunningham and the “Fasting Buddha” statuary, now preserved in the National Museum of Pakistan, the British Museum, and other sites, situating these artifacts within the distinctive visual and contemplative traditions linked to the Dharmaguptaka Vinaya. By integrating architectural, sculptural, textual, and epigraphic materials, this article provides a nuanced understanding of sectarian developments at Jamāl Gaṛhī and argues that an explicit emphasis on the ‘Middle Way’ ideology constituted a defining feature of the Dharmaguptaka tradition during this period. Full article

Contrary to popular notions of a perpetual antagonism between ‘Hinduism’ and ‘Islam’, played out on Indian soil over the centuries, this article examines the relatively recent origins of a Hindu–Muslim conflict in South Asia, situating it in the reconfigurations of ‘religion’ and religious identity that occurred under British colonial rule in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. The multivalent and somewhat fluid categories of religious identification found in pre-modern India gave way to much more rigid and oppositional modern and colonial epistemic categories. While much has been written on how colonial policies and incipient Hindu and Muslim nationalisms shaped the contours of modern Hindu–Muslim conflict, little work has been done on the important role religious actors like Muslim and Hindu scholars and reformers played in shaping the discourse around what constituted Hinduism and Islam, and the relationship between the two, in the modern period. This study examines the first-known public theological debates between a Hindu scholar and a Muslim scholar, respectively, Swami Dayānanda Sarasvatī (1824–1883), founder of the reformist Arya Samaj and first exponent of a Hindu polemic against other religions, and Mawlānā Muḥammad Qāsim Nānautvī (1832–1880), co-founder of the seminary at Deoband and an important exponent of Islamic theological apologetics in modern South Asia, and how they helped shape oppositional modern Hindu and Muslim religious theologies. A key argument that Nānautvī contended with was Dayānanda’s claim that Islam is idolatrous, based on the contention that Muslims worship the Ka’ba, and thus, it is not a monotheistic religion, Hinduism alone being so. The terms of this debate show how polemics around subjects like monotheism and idolatry introduced by Christian missionaries under colonial rule were internalized, as were broader colonial epistemic categories, and developed a life of their own amongst Indians themselves, thus resulting in new oppositional religious identities, replacing more complex and nuanced interactions between Muslims and followers of Indian religions in the pre-modern period. Full article

In this article, I argue that Eurafricans’ invisibility in Zambia’s national census, history, and social framework is an echo of colonial whiteness stemming from the destructive legacy of illegitimacy perpetuated by British officials in Northern Rhodesia (present-day Zambia) during the colonial era (1924–64), which continues to the present day. This is evidenced by the absence of Eurafricans in the Zambia national censuses. This contribution calls for the British government to apologise to the Eurafrican community for the legacy of illegitimacy and intergenerational racial trauma it bestowed on the community. Zambia’s tribal ‘ethnic’ and ‘linguistics’ census classification options prevent a comprehensive understanding of Zambia’s multi-racial history and the development of a hybrid space that embraces a ‘mixed-race’ Eurafrican (of European and African heritage) Zambian identity. Through an autoethnographic account of my Eurafrican uncle Aaron Milner, I reflect on Zambian Eurafricans’ historical racial positioning as ‘inferior interlopers’, which has contributed to their obscurity in Zambia’s national history and census. However, my reflection goes beyond Milner’s story in Zambia. It is my entryway to highlight how race and colonial whiteness interconnected and underpinned racial ideology in the wider British Empire, and to draw attention to its echoes in various contemporary sociopolitical contexts, including census terminology in Australia and Zambia and Western nations’ anti-Black immigration policies. Full article

The dyes used to produce two Palestinian garments from the British Museum’s collection attributed to the late 19th–early 20th century were investigated by high pressure liquid chromatography coupled with diode array detector and tandem mass spectrometry (HPLC-DAD-MS/MS). Palestinian embroidery is a symbol of national identity and the topic of scholarly research. However, little attention has been given to the dyes and how these changed with the introduction of new synthetic formulations in the second half of the 19th century. The results revealed the use of natural indigoid blue and red madder (Rubia tinctorum), in combination with tannins. Yellow from buckthorn (probably Rhamnus saxatilis) and red from cochineal (probably Dactylopius coccus) were found mixed with synthetic dyes in green and dark red embroidery threads, respectively. Early synthetic dyes were identified in all the other colours. These include Rhodamine B (C.I. 45170), Orange II (C.I. 15510), Orange IV (C.I. 13080), Metanil Yellow (C.I. 13065), Chrysoidine R (C.I. 11320), Methyl Violet (C.I. 42535), Malachite Green (C.I. 42000), Fuchsin (C.I. 42510), Auramine O (C.I. 41000) and Methyl Blue (C.I. 42780). As the date of the first synthesis of these dyes is known, the production date of the garments was refined, suggesting that these were likely to be produced towards the end of the 1880s/beginning of the 1890s. The continuous use of historical local sources of natural dyes, alongside new synthetic dyes, is of particular interest, adding rightful nuances to the development of textile-making practices in this region. Full article

The architecture of Jerusalem has for centuries been defined by its being a space sacred to Judaism, Christianity, and Islam. The end of World War I marked the beginning of British Mandatory rule, which lasted until 1948. During this period, Jerusalem witnessed a proliferation of architectural projects that repositioned religion within modern typologies representing the city’s communities. This research investigates four such buildings: the British Rockefeller Museum, the Palestinian Palace Hotel, the American YMCA Building, which functioned as a community center and hostel, and the new Zionist Executive Building. The integration of religious elements into these edifices is examined using the concept of inter-religious engagement and by applying the theory of purification and hybridization. The research demonstrates that British and American Christians, Zionist Jews, and Muslim Palestinians, used different strategies to produce inter-religious engagement—either intentionally or because of British-dictated political constructs. British and American Christians embedded religious elements within modern typologies to reflect peaceful co-existence, while Zionist Jews and Muslim Palestinians used them to construct national identity. Although conceived as “purely” secular, these modern typologies were hybridized by the integration of religious spaces or emblems, revealing further dimensions to our understanding and assessment of 20th-century urban secular architecture and its intersection with religions. Full article

Religion can often be very influential in the political system and political actors frequently take advantage of the leverage that it provides. In the Zambian case, Christianity in particular plays a crucial role in politics and policymaking, dating from the pre- to post-colonial era. Around 1880, Zambia, then Northern Rhodesia, became a British colony and, at the same time, Christianity was introduced within the context of the European culture. Later, 27 years after independence, Zambia was declared a Christian nation, and all Zambian political leaders have embraced Christianity as the nation’s identity. Thus, Christianity plays a critical function in Zambia’s political sphere. The main aim of this paper is to critically examine how Christianity seeks to direct the political agenda in Zambia’s national politics. It demonstrates the interplay between church and state relations linked to how the state seeks to govern the nation in a Godly manner and the implications on public policymaking in Zambia. This paper explores a multifaceted analysis of the existing literature and the ideas around the politics of the state and religion. It argues that (i) Christianity in Zambia is often used as a political weapon to gain political mileage and (ii) Christianity as a religion has been traditionalised in Zambia. It serves as a “national moral campus”, which compromises the nation’s position as a so-called “democratic” state and suppresses individual freedoms. Thus, it corrupts the very nature of fundamental practices of the religion itself, as it has simply blossomed into more of a norm than a religion. Understanding these dynamics is very crucial, especially in the context of how religion is perceived, experienced and exercised in the political arena to circumvent limited policy options for broader problem solving. Full article

Israel’s war on Gaza following 7 October 2023 has given birth to several political and social changes in European nations. According to the United Nations Report of the Special Rapporteur, Israel has used this moment to “distort” international humanitarian law principles “in an attempt to legitimize genocidal violence against the Palestinian people.” In the European context, this has led to European Muslims and non-Muslims, including organizations, institutions, as well as individual academics, politicians, and activists mobilizing and voicing their condemnation and demand their governments to do more towards peaceful and equitable solutions. However, this has been met with a strong reaction from European governing bodies. This paper situates this reaction within wider discourses on the European Muslim crisis. It begins with a systematic literature review on the so-called European Muslim crisis, followed by case studies on the United Kingdom and Germany on their respective changes to policies impacting Muslims in the post-October 7 contexa Regarding the literature review, this paper illustrates how this concept has three distinct, yet intersecting meanings: the crisis of European identity; the crisis of foundational ideologies of Europe; and an internal Muslim crisis that often leads to radicalization. Through the British and German case studies, this paper illustrates that October 7 has reinforced and strengthened the shift towards values-based citizenship and integration. This paper argues that through branding pro-Palestine protesters and organizations as extremists in the British context, and adding questions related to antisemitism and Israel in the citizenship tests in the German context, the Israel/Palestine issue has now become yet another yardstick to demarcate the European, civilized “us” vs. the Muslim “other.” In doing so, October 7 has escalated elements already present within the wider discourses of the European Muslim crisis. Full article

The warnings about Turkey’s not-so-near accession to the EU are explored as a strategic tool in the Brexit campaign, linking concerns about sovereignty and immigration compounded with the anxieties surrounding Islam and the threat of terrorism. Drawing on the theoretical framework of Edward Said’s Orientalism and the unique perspectives gathered from British Turks, this paper sheds light on their nuanced responses. It uncovers strategies of disbelief and denial in the face of the constructed narrative that portrayed Turkey as an undesirable ‘Other’ with its predominantly Muslim population. A closer analysis of some British Turks’ narratives is premised not only on the sacralised defence of the principles of Turkish westernisation but also on the socio-political reputation of the Islamic Ottoman past as almighty. The article equally contributes to a deeper understanding of the complex interplay between British national identity and discourses surrounding immigration, sovereignty, and Islamophobia within the context of Brexit, as well as the principles by which the privileges of modern, secular Turkey, as well as the demise of the mighty Ottoman image, are maintained. In a paradoxical manner, the act of denial only serves to affirm the Brexit campaign’s narrative depicting Turkey as an undesirable ‘Other’ with a predominantly Muslim demographic. Full article

In this paper, I discuss the evolution of Buddhist civilisational populism in modern Sri Lankan politics and civil society. I do this by historicising early forms of Buddhist civilisational populism in the country, during its occupation by the British Empire (1815–1945). As I discuss in this paper, some of the key concepts of “civilisationism” central to leading social and political movements in British Ceylon were a result of the disruptions caused by centuries of European colonial rule. Consequently, issues of identity and belonging have carried on to the post-independence context. In this paper, I discuss what these dynamics could possibly mean for the future of Sri Lankan politics and society, in the wake of the nation’s debilitating economic crisis last year. Full article

Critical family history expands the frame of a life story beyond the accumulation of facts and figures to an acknowledgement of context, a deeper understanding of structure, a reckoning of circumstance and response and a comparison across time and space. This article explores the complexity of family history in the context of colonial pasts in British India; the possibilities offered by group analysis of colonial actors; and the moral obligation of the family historian to address difficult pasts in all their complexity. Through the migratory careers and migration stories of colonial actors—the dislocated people, objects and memories that sustain identity—a longitudinal dimension is added to family history. Taken collectively, the family history of a domiciled British community in India reveals not just important blood ties, but critical associational links and shared characteristics that structure experience and enhance power. Colonial power must always be measured by its negative effects, but is also relational, situational, variable, commutable and resisted. The article further reflects on the ways in which critical research into settler-colonial migrations delivers our family histories to the doorstep of the present; their possibilities for informing truth-telling at individual and national levels; and the need for a pedagogy of historical contextualisation and ethical citizenship. Full article

The controversial events of 2001 (9/11) and 2005 (7/7) have led Britain’s media and policy makers to view the proliferation of orthodox Islamic seminaries, Dar-ul-Ulooms (DUs), and their graduates (Ulamaa) with suspicion, further exacerbating the marginalisation of an already marginalised Muslim minority within mainstream British society. Due to ethnic, sociocultural, and religious differences, the identity of Ulamaa in modern-day Britain has become increasingly complex and supposedly contradictory due to the perceived differences between orthodox Islamic values proselytised in DUs and ‘liberal’ British values. Using an interpretive phenomenological analysis, this paper reports on data collected in 2020 through three in-depth interviews with an Aalim who graduated from a DU in England after 2005. It explores how he constructs and negotiates his religious and national identities. The interviews were undertaken by one of the authors, himself an Aalim, and the paper also provides reflection on the barriers of access to this under-researched group. Data suggest that although DU identity might not contradict British identity, and Islam is not seen as incompatible with British values, the perceived contradictions between DU orthodoxy and British values appear to be conflated with cultural resistances emanating from Britain’s colonial legacy in India; the birthplace of DUs. Thus, analysis of the data reveals, through an Aalim’s personal voice, issues of identity involving culture, religion, and community. Full article

Britain’s withdrawal of its EU membership has a number of political and economic implications for UK–EU relations. In seeking to understand the 2016 EU referendum outcome, it is insightful to study the historical development of discourses representing the UK–EU relationship. Doing so reveals the trends of British exceptionalism and British Euroscepticism as integral to these discourses. Applying a diachronic approach, this paper examines ten speeches by nine Conservative Prime Ministers (PMs) held at the annual Conservative Party Conferences from 1945 to 2020. The speeches include, among others, those by Winston Churchill, Margaret Thatcher, David Cameron and Boris Johnson. The qualitative analysis traces the discursive strategies employed by PMs in their construction of the Conservative narrative of national myth, focusing especially on the issues of British national identity in relation to Europe. Methods of Discourse Historical Analysis (DHA) and Critical Metaphor Analysis (CMA) are applied in order to identify strategies employed by PMs as tools of persuasion for the purpose of consolidating political power and promoting their policies. This study has identified three major interrelated strategies—myth, ally and enemy creation—which are used to narrate the story of Britain’s relationship with Europe as a potential member of the Union, as a member, and up to its efforts to leave the EU. Full article

Religion can determine how people perceive socio-political reality, especially in a cultural context in which religious affiliation is an important part of national identity. This has a special significance in the Polish cultural context, in which Catholicism is considered the national religion, and its institutional dimension plays an important role in the Polish socio-political domain. The purpose of this study is to analyse how religion affects the socio-political attitudes of Poles abroad. This analysis focuses directly on evaluating the influence of the spiritual leaders of Polish community organisations in the UK on the knowledge and opinions of Brexit among Polish post-accession emigrants to the UK. The study was conducted on a sample of 620 Poles living in the UK (62.6% male) using a group-administered questionnaire. The study found that the Polish Catholic clergy did not play an important role in opinion-forming, i.e., in shaping what Polish emigrants to the UK know and think about Brexit. What proved to be the most powerful factor in terms of opinion-making was the British mass media. The influence of the Catholic clergy on the knowledge of—and opinions on—Brexit among Polish emigrants was only evident among elderly people who did not know English very well, and who regularly participated in religious activities. Full article

Amongst the various factors that managers need to consider when designing a CRM campaign is the cause’s geographic scope, i.e., should the CRM campaign benefit local, national, or international communities? Although previous research has examined the importance of geographic scope in the effectiveness of the CRM campaigns, it has largely ignored consumer reactions to CRM campaigns from a local cultural identity perspective, such as ethnocentric identity. This study brings together these two important factors to examine (through the lens of Social Identity Theory) how consumer ethnocentrism affects CRM effectiveness in campaigns varying in geographic scope. We test our hypotheses through an experimental study of 322 British consumers and three different geographic scopes (UK, Greece, and Ethiopia). Our results show that ethnocentric consumers show a positive bias towards products advertised through national CRM campaigns; however, there is a diversity of reactions towards different international geographic scopes, based on the levels of ‘perceived economic threat’. Ethnocentric consumers prefer international CRM campaigns that benefit people located in a country posing a lower vs. a higher economic threat to the domestic economy and the self. Our study contributes to a broader understanding of factors affecting the effectiveness of CRM campaigns and help managers design better CRM campaigns by carefully selecting the geographic scope, after considering a rising consumer segment: the ethnocentric consumer. Full article