TRAVELLING
CULTURES: THE CULTURAL PRODUCTION OF DIASPORA CONFERENCE,
APRIL 21
April
6, 2000 , New York, N.Y. - Barnard College Department
of Anthropology will be hosting a day-long conference
- Travelling Cultures: The Cultural Production of
Diaspora, April 21, 2000, from 10 a.m.-11:30 p.m.
The Travelling Cultures conference consists of two
panels, from 10 a.m. - 4:30 p.m., in Conference
Room 405, Milbank Hall, and a keynote address given
by Professor Paul Gilroy, Goldsmith's College (University
of London) and Yale University, from 4:30 p.m. -
6 p.m, in the James Room of Barnard Hall (117th
& Broadway). The day will culminate with a film
screening of the Bollywood smash-hit Pardes, featuring
Shah Rukh Khan, at 8 p.m., in Room 202 Altschul
Hall.
The
cultural production has become central to the experience
of diaspora for people whose history has been marked
by multiple migrations and displacements. Travelling
Cultures brings together academics, authors, and
filmmakers in an attempt to understand how forms
of cultural production have become mediating sites
for both enacting and representing diasporic identities.
The conference particularly explores how the transnational
circulations of people, ideas, and commodities that
mark our contemporary era have affected the processes
by which migrants become hyphenated citizens. The
conference is based on two panels organized around
the work of filmmaker Mira Nair, and novelist Gish
Jen, both participating as panelists. Mira Nair
is an Indian-born filmmaker, whose works include
Salaam Bombay! (1988), Mississippi Masala (1992),
The Perez Family (1995), and Kama Sutra (1997).
Salaam Bombay! was nominated for an Academy Award.
It also won the Camera d'Or for Best Feature Film,
and the Grand Prix du Public for the most popular
entry at the Cannes Film Festival in 1988. Nair
is also a well-known documentarian, whose films
deal with social/women's issues and class. Nair
is currently an adjunct Assistant Professor in the
Department of the Arts, Columbia University.
Gish Jen, Asian-American author, grew up in Scarsdale,
New York. Her work has appeared in The New Yorker,
The Atlantic Monthly, and The Best American Short
Stories of the Century. She is the author of two
novels, Typical American (1991) and Mona and the
Promised Land (1999).
Keynote
speaker Paul Gilroy, a Senior Lecturer in Sociology
at Goldsmith's College (University of London) and
Visiting Professor in Sociology at Yale University,
is one of the founders of British Cultural Studies
and a leading scholar on the African diaspora. His
works include: There Ain't No Black in the Union
Jack, The Cultural Politics of Race and Nation,
The Black Atlantic: Modernity and Double Consciousness,
and Small Acts: Thoughts on the Politics of Black
Cultures.
Other
panelists include: Jigna Desai, Assistant Professor
of Women's Studies, Minnesota University; Sandhya
Shukla, Assistant Professor, Department of Anthropology
and the Center for the Study of Race and Ethnicity,
Columbia University; Rachel Lee, Assistant Professor
of English and Women's Studies, UCLA; Gary Okihiro,
Professor of International and Public Affairs, Director
of the Center for the Study of Race and Ethnicity,
Columbia University; and Tejaswini Ganti, New York
University.
Conference
Schedule
10:00
a.m. Welcome from the President of Barnard College,
Judith Shapiro
10:15-12:15
Panel I: Mobile Cinema, Mobile Subjects
Panelists: Mira Nair, filmmaker: Mississippi Masala,
The Perez Family Jigna Desai, University of Minnesota
Sandhya Shukla, Columbia University
2:00-4:00
Panel II: Writing the Diaspora
Panelists: Gish Jen, writer/novelist, Typical American,
Mona and the Promised Land, Who's Irish and Other
Stories Rachel C. Lee, UCLA Gary Okihiro, Columbia
University
4:30-6:00
Keynote Address (James Room, Barnard Hall)
Diaspora and the Detours of Identification
Paul Gilroy, Goldsmiths' College (University of
London) and Yale University
8:00-11:30
Film Screening (Altschul 202)
Padres (1997), Bollywood film featuring Shah Rukh
Khan Introduction by Tejaswini Ganti, New York University
This
conference is made possible by the generous support
of the Ford Foundation and the Barnard College Department
of Anthropology. The conference is organized and
directed by Brian Larkin and Paul Silverstein, Department
of Anthropology. For more information about the
Travelling Cultures Conference, please contact Jennie
Pasquarella at jp493@columbia.edu or the Barnard
Department of Anthropology, 212-854-5417.
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