Impasse and Opportunity: Reframing Postcolonial Territory at the India-Bangladesh Border
This essay makes a case for reconceptualizing South Asia by refiguring postcolonial territory. It does this by bringing together the broad political history of a series of enclaves along the India-Bangladesh border with an ethnographic discussion of the contemporary political economy of Dahagram, th...
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| Format: | Article |
| Language: | English |
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Centre d’Etudes de l’Inde et de l’Asie du Sud
2014-12-01
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| Series: | South Asia Multidisciplinary Academic Journal |
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| Online Access: | https://journals.openedition.org/samaj/3791 |
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| author | Jason Cons |
| author_facet | Jason Cons |
| author_sort | Jason Cons |
| collection | DOAJ |
| description | This essay makes a case for reconceptualizing South Asia by refiguring postcolonial territory. It does this by bringing together the broad political history of a series of enclaves along the India-Bangladesh border with an ethnographic discussion of the contemporary political economy of Dahagram, the largest of these enclaves. The essay argues for a need to bring nationalist framings of space and more textured explorations of everyday forms of territory-making into a single analytic frame. Doing so provides a way to understand and think beyond the territorial impasses posed by nationalist framings of space—the inability to disentangle lived realities from affectively charged conceptualizations of the nation and its borders. The essay, instead, reframes territory as the relationality between broad spatial imaginaries and lived realities at the margins. Such a view allows for a conceptualization of the region that builds upwards from quotidian negotiations to challenge nationalist and communal geographies. |
| format | Article |
| id | doaj-art-42af68dc80514e298d75c5ea64c5c607 |
| institution | OA Journals |
| issn | 1960-6060 |
| language | English |
| publishDate | 2014-12-01 |
| publisher | Centre d’Etudes de l’Inde et de l’Asie du Sud |
| record_format | Article |
| series | South Asia Multidisciplinary Academic Journal |
| spelling | doaj-art-42af68dc80514e298d75c5ea64c5c6072025-08-20T02:33:55ZengCentre d’Etudes de l’Inde et de l’Asie du SudSouth Asia Multidisciplinary Academic Journal1960-60602014-12-011010.4000/samaj.3791Impasse and Opportunity: Reframing Postcolonial Territory at the India-Bangladesh BorderJason ConsThis essay makes a case for reconceptualizing South Asia by refiguring postcolonial territory. It does this by bringing together the broad political history of a series of enclaves along the India-Bangladesh border with an ethnographic discussion of the contemporary political economy of Dahagram, the largest of these enclaves. The essay argues for a need to bring nationalist framings of space and more textured explorations of everyday forms of territory-making into a single analytic frame. Doing so provides a way to understand and think beyond the territorial impasses posed by nationalist framings of space—the inability to disentangle lived realities from affectively charged conceptualizations of the nation and its borders. The essay, instead, reframes territory as the relationality between broad spatial imaginaries and lived realities at the margins. Such a view allows for a conceptualization of the region that builds upwards from quotidian negotiations to challenge nationalist and communal geographies.https://journals.openedition.org/samaj/3791BangladeshIndiaborderenclavesterritoryregion |
| spellingShingle | Jason Cons Impasse and Opportunity: Reframing Postcolonial Territory at the India-Bangladesh Border South Asia Multidisciplinary Academic Journal Bangladesh India border enclaves territory region |
| title | Impasse and Opportunity: Reframing Postcolonial Territory at the India-Bangladesh Border |
| title_full | Impasse and Opportunity: Reframing Postcolonial Territory at the India-Bangladesh Border |
| title_fullStr | Impasse and Opportunity: Reframing Postcolonial Territory at the India-Bangladesh Border |
| title_full_unstemmed | Impasse and Opportunity: Reframing Postcolonial Territory at the India-Bangladesh Border |
| title_short | Impasse and Opportunity: Reframing Postcolonial Territory at the India-Bangladesh Border |
| title_sort | impasse and opportunity reframing postcolonial territory at the india bangladesh border |
| topic | Bangladesh India border enclaves territory region |
| url | https://journals.openedition.org/samaj/3791 |
| work_keys_str_mv | AT jasoncons impasseandopportunityreframingpostcolonialterritoryattheindiabangladeshborder |