Convenor
Sudheer Chandra Hajela
University of Lucknow
Suchitra Awasthi
Uttarakhand Open University
Abstract
While Anthropology studies the culture of the folk more scientifically through field researches and case studies, literary studies of folk artifacts incorporate to the results of scientific researches by providing the emotional framework, thus supplementing the Anthropological research to be more authentic and inclusive.
We hope that the discussion under this panel would take into account the blurring boundaries of Literature and Anthropology and the papers of the panel would seek to examine and re-examine the literary forms of various folk communities in India and other parts of the world with the perspective to understand subtle nuances of folk life and culture. It would also aim to investigate how the tools to study folk culture, employed by literature and anthropology may be different, the object is the same, and the divergence of methods is not so important as is the convergence of the motive – to assess not only the outward persona of the folk but also to understand the co-relation of the outer life/culture with the inner being best expressed in literary forms.