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SAAM Virtual Saturday University: Creating and Destroying Sacred Spaces in North India
April 3, 2021 @ 10:00 am - 11:30 am PDT
Virtual Saturday University: Creating and Destroying Sacred Spaces in North India
Apr 3 2021
Asian Art Museum
Online
10 AM – 11:30 AM
Monumental structures encapsulate poignant events and memorable moments in history. Their construction, demolition, or remodeling often illustrate larger sociopolitical movements. This lecture series, Sites of Memory in Asia: Remembrance and Redemption, presents four case studies in North India, Japan, West India, and China. Each reveals a highly-charged story behind an iconic site, which embodies significant political or religious changes.
Registration confirmation emails include a link to access Zoom webinars. Use this link to register in advance to receive event reminders. This program is currently offered as a $5 suggested donation, to keep it accessible for all. Normally, tickets are $7 for SAM members, $12 for public. Donate today to support museum programming.
Creating and Destroying Sacred Spaces in North India
Audrey Truschke, Rutgers University
In this talk, Professor Truschke will examine controversial changes to North India’s sacred landscape over the past several decades, highlighting the values and politics at stake in such contestations. Among other examples, she will discuss the 1992 destruction of an early-16th-century mosque in Ayodhya by a Hindu nationalist mob and the ongoing project to build a Ram temple on the mosque’s former site. She will trace some of the repercussions of this set of events in terms of popular memory, religious imagery, and political power.
About the Presenter
Audrey Truschke is Associate Professor of South Asian History at Rutgers University in Newark, New Jersey. She is the author of three books: Culture of Encounters: Sanskrit at the Mughal Court (2016), Aurangzeb (2017), and The Language of History: Sanskrit Narratives of Indo-Muslim Rule (2021). When Audrey isn’t writing about the Mughals, Sanskrit texts, or Hindu-Muslim interactions, she is often calling attention to abuses of history and human rights in contemporary South Asia.
OTHER LECTURES IN THIS SERIES
SAT APR 3
Creating and Destroying Sacred Spaces in North India
SAT APR 10
Building Ancient Memory in Modern Kyoto
SAT APR 17
The Memory of the Ancients in Modern Iranian and Parsi Architecture
SAT APR 24
Mao’s Great Leap Forward in Tian’anmen Square 1958-59
This lecture series is co-sponsored by the Jackson School of International Studies at the University of Washington and the Elliott Bay Book Company.
Presenting Sponsor
Co-Sponsor
Image: Babri Masjid, Faizabad, about 1863–1887, unknown photographer, albumen silver print, 6 × 8 1/4 in., The J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles, digital image courtesy of the Getty’s Open Content Program, 84.XA.417.32.
