The 1st International Conference of the Indian Association of Scottish Studies (IASS) supported with grants of Rs. 1,00,000/- (Rupees One Lakh Only) from the Indian Council of Social Science Research, New Delhi on Negotiating Scottish Studies: History, Culture and Identity was held between 06 to 08 January 2016 at Bankura University, Bankura, West , India.

The collaborative partners of the conference were British Council, ; Bankura University, Bankura, WB; Edinburgh Napier University, Edinburgh, , UK; University of , Glasgow, Scotland, UK; Kingston University, London, UK; The University of Edinburgh, Edinburgh, Scotland, UK; Association of Scottish Literary Studies; Cambridge University Press, India; West Bengal State Council of Higher Education, Kolkata, West Bengal &K.N. University, Asansol, WB.

Proceedings of Seminar

The 1st International Conference of the Indian Association of Scottish Studies (IASS) on Negotiating Scottish Studies: History, Culture and Identity was held between 06 to 08 January 2016 at Bankura University, Bankura, West Bengal, India.

Prof Ian Brown, Kingston University, London delivered the Keynote address. His keynote considered the ways in which attitudes to the study of Scottish literature have changed in the decades, and how those changes have interacted with wider contexts of social, cultural and political life. It set those changes in the framework of developing attitudes to the teaching of history in Scotland and the changes that have taken place in the – its politics and self-perception – over that period. It also related the development of the teaching of Scottish literature and history to academic methodologies in many areas of research, learning and teaching given the generic title ‘Studies’: 'American Studies', 'Gender Studies', 'Film Studies’ and so on. It also considered how such interdisciplinary approaches have become important for research into a whole range of aspects of Scottish culture.

Prof Brown observed that Scotland has a multilingual nature and is a political entity that exists within, but is not entirely embedded in, the British state, guaranteed as its autonomy in many respects is by the 1707 Treaty of Union. These and related factors mark out the position of Scotland as a fascinating topic of study, one with implications for studies in other cultures. The very fact of the Independence referendum held in September 2014 marks the extent to which the variety and diversity of Scotland and its identities have highly significant contemporary implications.

Prof Kalyan Ray, Formerly of Queens College, City University of New York & Prof Amrit Sen, VisvaBharati, WB in their Plenary addresses spoke about the changing attitudes of Indian scholars and intelligentsia to Scotland in general and Scottish Studies in particular.

Prof Deb Narayan Bandyopadhyay, VC, Bankura University and Dr. Sarbojit Biswas, Associate Professor, Bankura University in their paper concentrated on the search for the exact location of the Scottish Cemetery in Kolkata and their discovery of the incredible work of Kolkata Scottish Heritage Trust which was established in 2008 with the prime interest in the conservation of Scottish cemetery in Kolkata. While attempting to describe the work of KSHT, they expressed how their interest lay in how the project continues the historical and cultural transactions between Kolkata and Scotland. As such, they identify the Scottish Cemetery as a definitive site for negotiating the nature of an alternative historiography. Their paper builds on Stephen Greenblatt’s concept of visual traces. Greenblatt takes issues with the traditional historiographic assumptions and says: “We think of the way in which our culture presents to itself not the textual traces of the past but the surviving visual traces” which may be taken to explain the dynamics of cultural forces.

JatiSankarMondal in his paper tried to analyse the nature of political intervention by the Scots in colonial expansion in India. To delimit his study he only focused on the letters of Donald Campbell which were published in 1795. Campbell describes how on request of “Sir JOHN MACPHERSON, who was in the Supreme Council…….prefented me (Campbell) to Mr. HASTINGS”and how he “entered into a negotiation on behalf of Hyat Sahib” with him.

Dr. Arindam Das in his paper engaged in a kind of ethnographic investigation to highlight the various Indian Restaurants across Scotland and their varied gastronomic practices. He also focused on how the same site has thereby become a Bhabhaesque “Third Space” to perform and negotiate the cultural identity for the Indian Diasporas of Scotland; and at the same time it is also a location that helps to nourish the Scottish orientalist fetish.

Ritushree Sengupta, in the light of Meeker’s idea of literary ecology, attempted to analyse the stories collected in Andrew Lang’s Red Book of Animal Stories from their tragic and comic perspectives and define the potential tragic and comic elements in the characterization of the animals and their possible effect upon the prospective readers in its course of analysis.

Koyel Banerjee based her contention on Thomas Carlyle’s disguised doppelgӓnger Diogenes Tӫufelsdrockh who rode the wave of Scottish Calvinism which had animated Carlyle’s father. Her paper concludes that the “Rebellious Needleman”, in the backdrop of the Reformation agitation, holds the inner mirror to his creator and hurls Carlyle into self-introspection. Her paper also investigated whether the rhizomatic prose style of Sartor Resartus actually betrays Carlyle’s tendency towards intellectual scepticism and spiritual denial in himself though he championed the cause of “radical inward reform”; a harmonious development of being and spiritual affirmation.

Nargis Tabassum looked at Carol Ann Duffy, the first female Scottish Poet Laureate in the 400 years old history of poet laureateship of United Kingdom. She analyses how by plucking the female counterparts of the famous male characters she turns the table on them and the paper tried to investigate the various tints of heterosexual relationship and the gender issues upheld by the poet in her poems. Prof Bashabi Fraser, Edinburgh Napier University, Edinburgh, Scotland in her plenary address discussed the newly generated interest in Scottish studies of Indian scholars and its scope. She narrated her experiences as an Indian academic and subsequently, poet, writer in Edinburgh and how she was able to negotiate if not renegotiate her identity.

Anira Phipon Lepcha presented the noteworthy work of the Scottish Mission among the Lepchas of Sikkim and Darjeeling. It may be noted that education became the most effective means of evangelizing people and the Scottish Mission was the pioneering institution to ‘devise a broad scheme of education’ for these hill regions. Within the span of a few years the mission started 17 schools in Kalimpong area and a few in Sikkim with majority students coming from the Lepcha community. Although a few scholars have blamed/branded missionary education as a ‘cognitive imperialism’ yet modern western education started by the mission brought the rationality in the Lepcha society. But whether the religious conversion and modern education initiated by missionaries in general and Scottish mission in particular had a role to play in the social transformation of the Lepchas is a question to be attended to. Her paper discussed the transformation in material culture of the Lepchas of Sikkim and Darjeeling hills in the light of various activities carried out by the Scottish mission since 1870.

Pritam Mukherjee presented distinguished Scotsman William Wilson Hunter’s continuing influence in the sphere of Bangla (Bengali) social science even today as a classic example of negotiations during the colonial time between India and Scotland. Hunter was an eminent member of Indian Civil Service, historian, statistician and imperial publicist. He played a crucial role in the creation of an effective and all pervasive imperial information network in late-nineteenth-century Bangla. The ultimate objective of his epistemic endeavour was to develop an insight into the minds of the Indians. History of Scotland’s engagement in India would remain incomplete without a proper attention to the life and works of William Wilson Hunter (1840 – 1900). His paper analysed his continuing influence in modern Bangla with a number of extracts from Bangla literary sources to show how Hunter and his works were received here. However, the reception was not plain and simple. In fact, it saw in its wake an intense intellectual battle of negotiations, mediations, rejections and acceptance. Thus his paper made an attempt to understand, reflect upon and qualify our knowledge on these issues.

Sibendu Chakraborty presented his paper on R.L. Stevenson’s magnum opus, The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde and opined that apart from being an object of psychological curiosity, the work also situates the struggle of the individual / national self masquerading between the real and the symbolic. He spoke about how the novella seeks to address this splitting of the native / national self with a motive to create its ‘double’ along the appropriation of the ‘uncanny’. In other words Stevenson’s novella problemetises the inner / outer selves in a bid to map the Victorian mind struggling to cope with the opposites of self-fructification and traditionalism. The joint paper of Dr. Jayanta Kumar Saha, Associate Professor, Bankura University and Dr. Subir Kumar Roy, Assistant Professor, Bankura University discussed at length the objectives of right to information, its genesis and the outlook of world polity towards freedom of information, the legal framework of both the India and Scotland concerning freedom of information and their comparative analysis. It also pointed out the lacunae and offered suggestions so as to strengthen the scheme of creating informed citizenry and upholding the democratic fabric of the society.

Dr. Subhadeep Paul, Assistant Professor, Bankura University in his paper highlighted the work, achievements and legacy of a unique human being who came from Scotland and responded to the call of the Missions in a small hill-station in North Bengal called Kalimpong. The institution that he founded in 1900 is today known and revered as Dr. Graham’s Homes (previously known as St. Andrew’s Colonial Homes) and is one of the most esteemed educational institutions in Eastern India.

The conference also had a session titled Meet the Poets: Poetry Reading Session where eminent Scottish poets Ian Brown and Bashabi Fraser read out poems from their books to the audience. The poetry reading was followed by an interactive session where the audience comprising of academic and scholars and students got to interact with the two poets.

A Note on the contribution of the seminar to the existing body of research Professor Deb Narayan Bandyopadhyay, Vice Chancellor, Bankura University, West Bengal, India along with Dr. Sarbojit Biswas, Associate Professor, Dept of English, Bankura University, West Bengal, India & Dr. Jayanta Kumar Saha, Associate professor, Dept of Law, Bankura University, West Bengal, India set up IASS (Indian Association of Scottish Studies) in Edinburgh, Scotland, UK in April 2015 with Prof Ian Brown, Edinburgh University, Edinburgh, Scotland & Emeritus Professor, Kingston University, London; Prof Alan Riach, Glasgow University, Glasgow, Scotland; Prof Neil Fraser, Edinburgh University, Edinburgh, Scotland and Prof Bashabi Fraser, Director, Scottish Centre of Tagore Studies, Edinburgh Napier University, Edinburgh, Scotland as advisors.

Hence for new studies and research and to generate interest in Scottish Studies among Indian scholars, it was proposed that IASS would host its 1st International Conference in India in 2016 in collaboration with Edinburgh Napier University, Edinburgh, Scotland, UK; , Glasgow, Scotland, UK; Kingston University, London, UK; The University of Edinburgh, Edinburgh, Scotland, UK; and the Association of Scottish Literary Studies.

The Department of English, Bankura University, West Bengal in the meantime has also incorporated a Full Paper (Optional) of 100 marks in its syllabus on Scottish Studies / Literature and notably, it is the first university in India to be doing this. As such, the conference has been very successful because it tried to provide exposure to students and faculty members alike on the emerging field of Scottish Studies through interactions with both Scottish and Indian scholars. It has been able to bring together researchers from both India and Scotland to plan for future collaborations while Bankura University is poised to sign MOUs with Edinburgh Napier University and Glasgow University enabling both faculty and student exchange in the future.

Dr. Sarbojit Biswas Convenor, International Conference & Associate Professor of English Department of Literature, Language and Culture Studies Bankura University, Bankura, West Bengal.