Gandhi, Non-Violence and Modernity

1–3 September 2004

Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi is one of the most intriguing political figures of modernity. His mode of non-violent resistance against the mightiest of modern empires is the stuff of legends now. Seen alternately as a maverick, though wily, politician and a great visionary with impeccable ethics, Gandhi has continued to inspire, puzzle, exasperate, activate and enlighten countless ordinary and not so ordinary people around the globe. In recent years, his lived philosophy of ahimsa (non-violence, preserving the sanctity of life) has resonated with particular force in the minds and hearts of those who have been aghast at the widespread carnage they have witnessed in the names of God and Nation. Among other things, the present conference is an attempt to explore the viability of a transcultural non-violent ethics of the everyday. It hopes to do so by examining the relevance of Gandhian ahimsa and satyagraha in these violent times when religious fundamentalisms of various kinds are competing with the arrogance and unilateralism of imperial capital to reduce the world to a state of international lawlessness. In order to widen the basis for discussion, we see this conference as focussing not only on the specifics of Gandhian thought, but also on the global impact of Gandhi in the latter half of the twentieth century and into the new millennium. This impact ranges from the activism of Martin Luther King, Bayard Rustin, Nelson Mandela and Aung San Suu Kyi to New Age concerns such as the Green Movement and vegetarianism. In the context of South Asian and postcolonial studies post-1970s, there has been a rejuvenation of Gandhian scholarship with cultural/subaltern historians, political theorists and postcolonial scholars producing important work on Gandhi's critique of high modernity and development-oriented Third World nationalisms. We hope to continue this dialogue between Gandhi and (post)modernity.

Speakers include:

Larissa Behrendt, Rabindranath Bhattacharya, Dipesh Chakrabarty, Ned Curthoys, Charles Di Salvo, Penny Edwards, Michael Allen Fox, Leela Gandhi, Brian Martin, Christine Mason, John Maynard, Satendra Nandan, Makarand Paranjape, Frances Peters Little, Anjali Roy, Sean Scalmer, Tara Sethia, Sandhya Shetty, Ajay Skaria, Tridip Suhrud, Laurence Tamatea, Tom Weber, Rhonda Y. Williams

Conveners

John Docker
John Docker is Visiting Fellow at the Humanities Research Centre, ANU
Email: John.Docker@anu.edu.au

Debjani Ganguly
Debjani Ganguly is Postdoctoral Research Fellow at the Centre for Cross-Cultural Research, ANU
Email: Debjani.Ganguly@anu.edu.au

Enquiries

Leena Messina
Programs Manager, Humanities Research Centre, ANU
Leena.Messina@anu.edu.au