Saturday, April 9, 2022 | 9 a.m. – 6 p.m.
Friday—Saturday, April 8–9, 9 a.m. – 6 p.m. in Hahn Hall 101, Pomona College
A workshop sponsored by the Department of History, Department of Art History, Pacific Basin Institute, Middle Eastern Studies/Asian Studies, Benton Museum of Art at Pomona College, and Environmental Analysis.
With its volcanic mountain passes and monsoonal seaports, monumental Indian and Islamic imperial architecture, vibrant arts and world-famous diamonds, the Deccan region of southern India has long been known for its spectacular landscapes and associated artistic production. The lands of the Deccan plateau have been mapped as a zone of encounter and exchange between Sanskritic and Persianate cultures, the edge of the Islamic world, and a global region at the heart of Indian Ocean maritime routes that connected histories between Europe, the Middle East, and Southeast Asia. This workshop explores the construction of a sense of place in the Deccan. It asks, in what ways was the Deccan written, collected, and built? Through the analysis of material culture, built environments, and texts, the workshop examines how the Deccan was made as a space and how space in turn shaped society. The papers presented in the workshop consider how the physical worlds of the Deccan were culturally produced and transformed through architecture, travel, science, language, and poetry.
Friday, 8 April 2022
Hahn Hall 101, Pomona College
9:00 – 9:15 am
Welcome & Introduction to the workshop: Arash Khazeni
9:15 am – 12:30 pm
Glimpses from the Field: Part One
*Please note that all presentations in this panel will be delivered by ZOOM
Chair: Keelan Overton
Pushkar Sohoni (9:15 AM PST = 9:45 PM Pune): Creating an Ecumene: Cultural Boundaries of the Deccan
Helen Philon (10:00 AM PST = 8:00 PM Athens): Restoration and Preservation of Cultural Heritage and its Social and Economic Impact in the Deccan
John Fritz (10:45 AM PST = 6:45 PM London): Discovering Vijayanagara
George Michell (11:30AM PST = 7:30 PM London): Courtly Architecture at Vijayanagara
1:30 pm – 5:00 pm
Placing the Text and Image
Chair: Arash Khazeni
Sunil Sharma: Architectural poetry in Dakhni and Persian: Three case studies
Subah Dayal: From Bandar Abbas to Palikol: Persian-Dutch Translation and Documentary Culture in the Indian Ocean
Keelan Overton: The Deccani trails of a Safavid Qur’an Manuscript
Marika Sardar: Recovering Khanzah Humayun in the Ta’rif-i Husain Shahi
Navina Najat Haidar: Deccani Rocks and Landscapes in Painting
5:00 pm – 6:00 pm: Keynote Lecture, Hahn Hall 101
Sanjay Subrahmanyam: The Deccan as an ‘open’ society in the 15th and 16th centuries: Myths and realities
Saturday, 9 April 2022
Hahn Hall 101, Pomona College
9:00 am – 12:15 pm
Glimpses from the Field, Part Two
*Please note that all presentations in this panel will be delivered by ZOOM
Chair: Keelan Overton
Kavita Singh (9:00 AM PST = 9:30 PM New Delhi): Nine Rasas at the National Museum: The Nauras Exhibition, New Delhi, 2015
Ameen Hullur (9:45 AM PST = 10:15 PM Bijapur): Bijapur Karez: The Water Generator of Medieval Times
Ratish Nanda (10:30 AM PST = 11:00 PM Hyderabad): Conserving the Qutb Shahi necropolis
Uma Magal (11:15 AM PST = 7:15 PM Dublin): Other Kohinoors, The Rocks of Hyderabad
1:30 pm – 5:00 pm
Landscapes of Golconda-Hyderabad
Chair: Nile Green
Karen Ruffle: Scent, Ritual, and Urban Space in Qutb Shahi Hyderabad
Sana Khan: Gulzar-e-Mah Laqa: Cultivating Shi‘a Space in the Deccan
Robert Simpkins: The Ghosts Towns of Hyderabad: Explaining Isolated Golconda-era Structures within the Modern Metropolis
Sylvia Houghteling (ZOOM, 6:30 PM EST): The Qalamkari Textiles of Machilipatnam: The Ecology of Dyeing and the Fame of a Place
Karen Leonard: Gardens as Political Sites in Hyderabad State