Mittwoch
29
MAI

18.00 Uhr

Absent Presences: Death of a Father.

Prof. Dr. Barbara Mittler, Universität Heidelberg, Centre of East Asian Studies
Prof. Dr. Sumathi Ramaswamy, Duke University (USA), History Department

This talk, culmination of the lecture series "No Parallel? The Fatherly Bodies of Gandhi and Mao" — and its pièce-de-resistance — is a comparative exploration of the funerals of Gandhi and Mao and the posthumous fortunes of their fatherly bodies. In the Mahatma’s case, the assassinated body literally vaporizes as it was cremated on January 31, 1948, while the event itself came to be immortalized in stunning photographs. Meanwhile, material remains of his blood-spattered dhoti are enshrined in the National Gandhi Museum in New Delhi, even as countless art works visually transform him into the nation’s paradigmatic martyr. Mao as well desired to be cremated and wished his ashes to “fertilize” the soil of his beloved country. Contrary to these wishes though, his body was embalmed and encased, and since 1976, has been on exhibit in one of the largest memorial halls in Tian’anmen Square in Beijing, the focal point of a personality cult that has all but divinized him. If nationalism is a “somatic” formation, what lessons do we learn from a juxtaposition of the radically divergent posthumous careers of these two fatherly bodies? Is the Mahatma’s symbolic capital decreased because his material body is no longer available for consumption and affirmation, as is Mao’s? Or does the very (ever more deteriorating) materiality of Mao’s ever-present body, as opposed to Gandhi’s vanished torso, in fact produce much greater risk for his posthumous reputation, as iconoclastic pieces of contemporary art suggest?

Adresse

Völkerkundemuseum VPST

Hauptstraße 235

69117 Heidelberg

Homepage Veranstaltung

http://www.asia-europe.uni-heidelberg.de/en/newsevents/events/exhibition-envisioning-asia/program.html

Veranstalter

Centre for Asian and Transcultural Studies (CATS); Völkerkundemuseum VPST

Alle Termine der Veranstaltung '„No Parallel? The Fatherly Bodies of Gandhi and Mao”':

This lecture series "No Parallel? The Fatherly Bodies of Gandhi and Mao" focuses on the two hyper-visible men of the twentieth century, Mahatma Gandhi and Chairman Mao, who had also been the object of Walter Bosshard’s fascination. It considers how these men have been transformed over the course of the last century through the work of visual imagery and image-events into globally recognizable “bio-icons.” Situated at the intersection of the visual politics of masculinity and the cultural politics of fatherhood, the talks seek to illuminate how the corporeal is critical to the affective and ethical reach of such bio-icons within the imagined communities of their respective nations.

Mittwoch, 15. Mai 2019, 18.00 Uhr

Producing Charisma: Clothing and Unclothing the Fatherly Body

Prof. Dr. Barbara Mittler, Universität Heidelberg, Centre of East Asian Studies Prof. Dr. Sumathi Ramaswamy, Duke University (USA), History Department

Donnerstag, 23. Mai 2019, 18.00 Uhr

Sovereign Performance: Toward an Aesthetic of the Ambulatory and the Aquatic.

Prof. Dr. Barbara Mittler, Universität Heidelberg, Centre of East Asian Studies Prof. Dr. Sumathi Ramaswamy, Duke University (USA), History Department

Mittwoch, 29. Mai 2019, 18.00 Uhr

Absent Presences: Death of a Father.

Prof. Dr. Barbara Mittler, Universität Heidelberg, Centre of East Asian Studies Prof. Dr. Sumathi Ramaswamy, Duke University (USA), History Department