Shakta Traditions - Oxford Conference, 10–11 September 2011

A conference on Shakta traditions, organised by the Oxford Centre for Hindu Studies in collaboration with the Section for the Study of Religion at Aarhus University, will take place at Somerville College, Oxford on 10th and 11th September 2011.  Registration costs £15 for the weekend. All are welcome.
See: http://ochs.org.uk/research/sakta-traditions

The conference aims to present an interdisciplinary survey of Śākta history, practice and doctrine in its diversity as well as to convey something of the Śākta religious world view that is distinctive and sets ‘Śāktism’ apart from other South Asian religious traditions.

For a detailed programme of speakers and talks, see: http://ochs.org.uk/research/sakta-traditions

Changes to the British Library's website

Recently we introduced a new home page and search facility on our website. This new home page, which is the result of extensive user testing, has new navigation labels, a rotating carousel of images and dropdown menus to help users find our full range of web content and services much more easily.
While the new home page looks quite different, the rest of the website is unchanged. So there is no need to edit your bookmarks or favourites. Meanwhile, a major project to redevelop a new website from scratch is already underway.
The new search ('Explore the British Library') is a major change, as it now allows users to search much more than our web pages and main catalogue. It retrieves twice as many journal article records as before, as well as sound recordings, 'trade literature', theses, datasets, archived UK websites, maps and music scores - adding up to over 60 million items.
Web page and catalogue results appear in separate tabs, and it is is easier to refine your results than before.
Please let us know what you think webeditor@bl.uk
You can also tweet your comments using #BLnewhomepage

SAALG summer conference

Our 85th conference was held on 1st July in Edinburgh and spread over two days. On day 1, Dr Andrew Grout was our attentive host at the University of Edinburgh Library, and between talks we were given a tour of the refurbished building and got a chance to see some of the South Asian collections.

On Saturday, Dr. Henry Noltie was our guide to the Library of the Royal Botanic Gardens, and we had a behind-the-scenes look at a selection of the Garden's fabulous collections of dried plants and rare books, including items from the collection of Francis Buchanan Hamilton.

The Flight of the Hog Wild

A recent enquiry to the National Library of Scotland about the Indian Medical Service led me into a fascinating World War II journey which began with an American B-29 bomber.
On August 29th 1945 the Hog Wild was on a POW supply mission when it was shot down by Soviet fighters. Its 13-man crew was interned in Konan POW camp (now Hungnam, North Korea) for sixteen days while Soviet and American commanders negotiated for their release.
The camp already held 354 Allied POWs (mostly British) who were captured during the fall of Singapore in 1942. One of the prisoners was Canadian Major Harry V. Morris (pictured below), who had served in the Indian Medical Service.

Born and educated in Newfoundland, Morris graduated with a medical degree (with surgery specialty). He spent several months studying at London's Royal Military College before arriving in India in early 1939. He was stationed at the Indian General Hospital, Lahore and then moved to No. 12 Indian General Hospital in Malaya.

It is thought that he was captured by the Japanese in February 1941, held first in the notorious Changi Prison in Singapore and then in a North-East Korean POW camp. His wife and two children escaped Singapore. Major Morris was transferred to Konan, imprisoned by the Japanese for a further two years; he was one of five Allied officers at the camp. The men laboured long hours under extremely hazardous and strenuous conditions at a nearby carbide factory (pictured below), although the Japanese wouldn't permit an officer from doing any work of the sort. The crew of the Hog Wild were released in mid-September 1945; Major Morris and his fellow POWs were finally freed and repatriated a week later. The aircraft crew talked to the American Press, revealing the people, places and events surrounding the downing of the B-29.

You can read much more about the Hog Wild in a forthcoming book and the book's comprehensive website.

Thanks to Bill Streifer (New York) and Heather Home (Queen's University Archives) for the information. The photo of Major Morris was supplied by John Mill, son of Lieut. Ronald Mill, the sole Australian officer at the camp. Photo of the Hog Wild taken from The Flight of the Hog Wild website.

Arabic manuscripts online

Arabic Manuscripts Online is a digital manuscripts library, accessible for free, based on the Wellcome Library's Asian Collection.  It includes manuscripts in Arabic and Persian which have been photographed in their entirety, and can be viewed in detail alongside comprehensive manuscript descriptions.  Researchers can also compare two manuscripts side-by-side to illuminate the differences.

Significant passages in the manuscripts, such as the incipits, basmala, explicits and section headings (for most but not all manuscripts), are fully transcribed, and extensive physical descriptions have been recorded by conservation specialists for most of the manuscript descriptions.

It is also possible to explore the content of the online catalogue more selectively, where manuscripts may be browsed according to their categories or searched via the full text search facility. Users can search using the old Arabic alphabet through a virtual keyboard, matching the original content of the manuscripts. The results of the searched manuscripts may be further narrowed down through the faceted filters, which retrieve more precise results for the researcher's convenience.  There are themed help pages and a useful glossary.

Arabic Manuscripts Online was made possible through the Wellcome Arabic Manuscript Cataloguing Partnership (WAMCP) and combines the efforts of the Wellcome Library, the Bibliotheca Alexandrina and Kings College London Digital Humanities Department.  It is funded by JISC and the Wellcome Trust.

Jubilee Time Capsule

The Royal Commonwealth Society has launched its Jubilee Time Capsule Project to coincide with the Diamond Jubilee of Queen Elizabeth II.  It aims to build a social archive about life in the Commonwealth over the last sixty years. It is now crowd-sourcing for content and hopes to receive stories from across the globe, and from a wide variety of age groups.  Archives, libraries and museums are encouraged to see if they have any material to contribute to the Time Capsule.

Contributions can include interviews, film, verse, photographs, art-work... and they hope to find a story for each of the 21,915 days in the last 60 years, from 6th February 1952 until 5th February 2012.

The best way of keeping updated on the project, and tracking its most interesting stories is via the Jubilee Time Capsule blog .

The Centre of South Asian Studies, University of Cambridge - updated film catalogue

The Centre of South Asian Studies (CSAS), University of Cambridge, has recently made available an updated version of its online film catalogue. It is now possible to research each of the 285 films as part of a cross-archival database that enables the viewer to access in greater detail the CSAS’ photographic, paper and oral history collections. This new and comprehensive online film catalogue, and the current digitization of another 80 films, is part of an on-going educational programme run by Dr Kevin Greenbank and Dr Annamaria Motrescu that uses the Centre’s visual collections in teaching about colonial India.

The Southeast Asia Library Group and early printing in Burma

Street in Wuntho by Felix Beato, 1889-1891.
(Cambridge University Library Y3029A-014)

This is a post to introduce the Southeast Asia Library Group. A  pan-European group, SEALG hosts an annual meeting, publishes an annual newsletter and maintains a JISC mail list  as well as linking to some incredibly useful Southeast Asian digital collections, cataloguing tools and members' initiatives on its website.

In its latest newsletter San San May (Curator for Burmese, British Library) writes about early printing in Burma (see pages 32-40) and includes a list of books held at the British Library which were printed at Maulmain, Tavoy or Rangoon before 1855.

SEALG's next meeting will be held in Cambridge,  9th-10th September, in collaboration with the 26th ASEASUK conference.  For further information, go to SEALG's home page, and look under the Meetings tag.  Alternatively, contact Jana Igunma (Henry Ginsburg Curator for Tai, Lao and Cambodian) at the British Library.

For a British Library resource guide to their Southeast Asian collections, see: http://www.bl.uk/reshelp/findhelpregion/asia/seasia/searesources.html

Burma through the lens of Linnaeus Tripe

Delegates who attended SAALG's Borderlands Conference at the Royal Asiatic Society in January will be delighted to see Andrew Jarvis' article published in Modern Asian Studies (v.45, no.4, July 2011).  Entitled 'The Myriad-Pencil of the Photographer' : seeing, mapping and situating Burma in 1855 (pp. 791-823), it questions how Tripe's photographs should be interpreted today.

Ancient India & Iran Trust: New issue of INDIRAN

A new issue of the Ancient India and Iran Trust's newsletter, INDIRAN, is now available.

This issue includes an account by Bi Bo, visiting scholar from Renmin University of China, Beijing, of her work on Sogdian manuscripts from Khotan, Xinjiang. Ian Proudfoot, Australian National University, describes exciting finds of unique Malay printed books. Deborah Sutton, University of Lancaster, examines the Hindu temple in terms of political and cultural encounter during the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. The newsletter also includes reports of a joint presentation by Annabel Gallop and Venetia Porter which accompanied their travelling exhibition 'Lasting impressions: the world of Islamic seals', Frantz Grenet's Bailey memorial lecture 'The rediscovery of the court culture of the Qarakhanids', and events held in Cambridge to celebrate 1000 years of Firdawsi's epic poem the Shahnama.

Download a digital version of INDIRAN from: http://www.indiran.org/Indiranapril2011.pdf

Lions and dragons: the new RAS blog

Copyright RAS MS Malay Maxwell 15

Readers are encouraged to take a look at the Royal Asiatic Society's new blog which provides timely information about forthcoming lectures and events at the Society, plus podcasts for those unable to attend them.

Regular posts also feature items from the Society's art collections, library and archives.  I particularly enjoyed the rich illustrations in the guest post Malay Magic and Divination Manuscripts, including the dragon illustrated above.

Another relatively new blog which deserves an RSS feed or bookmark is that of the Ancient India and Iran Trust, launched in October 2010. The Society, an independent charity concerned with the study of early India, Iran & Central Asia, promoting both scholarly research & popular interest in the area, uses its blog to post information about grants and scholarships, conferences, seminars and lectures, library acquisitions and exhibitions.  As with the Royal Asiatic Society's blog, there are quick links to the Society's specialist library and archive resources.

SAALG 85th Conference, Edinburgh, July 1st and 2nd

The upcoming SAALG conference is fast approaching and we are still welcoming participants. Edinburgh University Library will be hosting the conference on Friday 1st July and the theme will be Scottish connections with South Asia. In addition to our Friday programme we are also delighted to offer a behind the scenes tour of the South Asian collections of the Royal Botanic Garden Edinburgh on Saturday morning, 2nd July.

For full details of the conference please visit our earlier post here or contact:

Helen Porter, SAALG Secretary, Assistant Librarian, Royal Asiatic Society.

Email: hp@royalasiaticsociety.org Tel: 020 7391 9424

The Center for Studies in India and South Asia (CEIAS)

The Center for Studies in India and South Asia (CEIAS) is the largest French laboratory of social science research on the Indian subcontinent. The CEIAS is a joint research unit (UMR 8564) of the Ecole des Hautes Etudes en Sciences Sociales ( EHESS ) and the Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique ( CNRS ).

They publish a newsletter three times a year to keep you informed of various activities of the CEIAS- fieldwork, publications, PhD seminars, visiting scholars and new fellows etc.

The URL link is:

http://ceias.ehess.fr/

Colonial Film: Moving Images of the British Empire

The completed Colonial Film catalogue brings together films from three collections - the British Film Institute (BFI), the Imperial War Museum (IWM), and the British Empire & Commonwealth Museum (BECM). The catalogue uses various tools to enhance the apparatus for researchers consulting these collections. Most important of these are two extra fields of context and analysis, which position and examine a selection of the films in relation to the history of the British Empire. There are approximately seventy-five countries within the Empire represented within this collection.

The BFI collection contains approximately 1,200 films relating to Colonial Africa. There are over 1,100 titles covering India, South East Asia and the Middle East, with approximately 500 of these titles relating to India. The earliest titles within this collection include 70 from the turn of the century concerning the Boer War, as well as footage from India – for example Panorama of Calcutta – from 1899. There are films from local production units - for example, the Malayan Film Unit, the Jamaican Film Unit, and the Gold Coast Film Unit – and from established British producers, such as the Colonial Film Unit, and British Instructional Film - which produced the Empire Series between 1925 and 1928. These films were exhibited and distributed in a variety of contexts. There are instructional films made for African audiences – for example, Anti-Plague Operations in Lagos (1937) and the three BEKE films made in the 1930s; films intended for prospective British immigrants – for example Southern Rhodesia: is this Your Country? (1948); sponsored films for British schools - for example From Cane to Cube (1950); fundraising films for missionary work – for example Salvation Army Work in India, Burma and Ceylon (1925); films for children’s cinema clubs – for example Basuto Boy (1947) and Trek to Mashomba (1950) as well a large number intended for cinemas and non-theatrical sites at home and abroad. The collection includes documentary films, amateur footage, newsreels, actualities, travelogues, and missionary films, as well as over 200 fiction films.

The Imperial War Museum collection contains footage relating to pivotal moments in colonial history; for example the Malayan Emergency - Proudly presenting Yong Peng (1955); Voices of Malaya (1948); The Knife (1955); the British mandate in Palestine - Jewish Colonies in Palestine (1917); Allenby meets Weizmann (1918); Palestine Police (1946); and most notably the experiences of colonial troops in two World Wars. This footage includes extensive material filmed by Army and RAF photographic units during the Second World War, particularly in India, Burma and the Far East, much of which is still to be catalogued. The collection also includes newsreels from the War – most notably 138 editions of Indian News Parade, which ran weekly from 1943 to 1946 – as well as fiction titles, documentaries and unique amateur collections.

The British Empire and Commonwealth’s Film Archive contains approximately 1,700 films dating from the 1920s onwards which were shot mainly by British people living and working within the Empire. In addition, the archive contains government produced information and travel films, commercial documentary and news films, and television material.

Other similar projects include the Centre of South Asian Studies, University of Cambridge, online archive http://www.s-asian.cam.ac.uk/films.html, and Images of Empire http://www.imagesofempire.com 

Annamaria Motrescu, Centre of South Asian Studies, University of Cambridge.

SAALG 85th Conference, Edinburgh, July 2011



© Edinburgh University Library

The next SAALG conference will take place at Edinburgh University Library on Friday 1st July (10.30-17.15). The theme will be Scottish connections and our speakers will explore various links between South Asia and Scotland. During the day there will also be an opportunity to take a tour of Edinburgh University Library and to view a selection of South Asian materials in the Centre for Research Collections.

In addition to our Friday programme we are also delighted to be able to offer a behind the scenes tour of the South Asian collections of the Royal Botanic Garden Edinburgh with Dr Henry Noltie on Saturday morning 2nd July from 10.30-12.00.

Speakers for Friday 1st July include:



Ragamala (Hyderabad, c.1770), Or Ms 114,

© Edinburgh University Library

Professor David Finkelstein (Research Professor of Media and Print Culture, Queen Margaret University, Edinburgh) whose talk 'There and back: a book's voyage through colonial India' will use the circulation of an 1870s novel, originally published in Edinburgh, from Scotland to India and back again, to look at how nineteenth century texts were circulated, received and read in the South Asian colonial world.

Inbal Livne (University of Stirling) who will talk about the Tibetan collection of Lt. Colonel F.M. Bailey now held by the National Museums Scotland. Inbal will look at the nature of Bailey's collecting activities, his life as a Trade Agent for the British government in Tibet and his relationship with his home support network in Edinburgh.

Dr Avril Powell (Emeritus Reader, History Department, School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London) whose talk 'Scottish Orientalists and India: a family case study' will examine the 'distinctiveness' of the Scottish participation Empire by focusing on two brothers from Kilmarnock who both became 'scholar-administrators' in India's North-West Provinces in the nineteenth century. 

Dr Margaret Mackay (former Director of the School of Scottish Studies Archives, University of Edinburgh) will introduce us to the work and South Asian collections of John Levy (1910-1976) in the School of Scottish Studies Archives. Levy was an independent ethnomusicologist who made over 700 field recordings in Asia and gathered associated visual material in the 1950s and 1960s. Dr Mackay's talk will include extracts of some of the recordings he made in North and South India and also material from Sri Lanka and Bhutan.  

The price of the conference will be £20 payable on the day and this will include a buffet lunch. If you are interested in coming please contact Rachel Rowe or Helen Porter for the full programme or to book a place. If you need to book accommodation we can also provide a list of recommended places on request.

Rachel Rowe, SAALG Chair, Smuts Librarian for South Asian and Commonwealth Studies, University of Cambridge.

Email: rmr29@cam.ac.uk

Helen Porter, SAALG Secretary, Assistant Librarian, Royal Asiatic Society.

Email: hp@royalasiaticsociety.org Tel: 020 7391 9424