Workshop on ‘Environments and Histories’ at NMML

The Nehru Memorial Museum and Library (NMML) cordially invite all interested to a Workshop on Environment and Histories! The linkages between environments and histories may seem self-evident but require careful thought and rigour. How human actions do or do not transform environments for better or for worse is a central issue of our times. Yet, the past is critical not only to understand the changing nature of contending visions of the future but to assess how, why and where specific choices are made about interventions.

A discussion of the relations between ecology and history can help do much more than shed light on nature’s pasts. The papers to be presented will help highlight different facets and issues.  For instance, a dialogue across what are often sharp dividing lines of ancient/medieval and modern eras of history can help illumine the distinctions between long term patterns and short term or immediate shifts. Further, there is scope for a discussion across the even more common divide of the social and natural sciences.

This is especially important in landscape such as India’s where millennia of human presence has to be taken into account. Further, familiar issues like the history of icons or of warfare can be enriched by studying the place of large prominent animals. The routines of work and life of central Indian Adivasis require re-examination at a time when their fate is bound up with that of the forest landscape.

Date: 5 May, 2012
Time: 9.00 am to 5.00 pm
Venue: Seminar Room, First Floor, Library Building

Stratification and marginality in early modern north-west India can be viewed in a complex prism when related to access to natural resources. There are also papers on conflict and conservation in today’s India, whether in a high altitude conflict zone or vis a vis devolution in the Western Himalaya. It is hoped that the papers and the discussions that follow will help in evolving a more nuanced understanding of the processes and patterns that link histories and environments.

Interested individuals should urgently confirm their participation at the following email address: nmmldirector@gmail.com

Image of baoli at Red Fort by Govind Singh.

Aastha Kukreti

Aastha Kukreti holds a Master’s degree in Environment Management and her areas of expertise range from waste management, pollution ecology, green audits, ecofeminism, environmental equity and social justice.

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