The Partition of Bengal: Fragile Borders and New IdentitiesThis study looks at the rich literature that has been spawned through the historical imagination of Bengali-speaking writers in West Bengal and Bangladesh through issues of homelessness, migration and exile to see how the Partition of Bengal in 1947 has thrown a long shadow over memories and cultural practices. Through a rich trove of literary and other materials, the book lays bare how the Partition has been remembered or how it has been forgotten. For the first time, hitherto untranslated archival materials and texts in Bangla have been put together to assess the impact of 1947 on the cultural memory of Bangla-speaking peoples and communities. This study contends that there is not one but many smaller partitions that women and men suffered, each with its own textures of pain, guilt and affirmation. |
Contents
Introduction | 1 |
1 The Calcutta Riots in Representations and Testimonies | 36 |
History Memory and Representations | 68 |
Displacement and Belonging in PostPartition Bangla Fiction | 117 |
Refugee Rehabilitation in Bangla Partition Fictions | 157 |
Nation and Narration from the Northeast of India and Bangladesh | 188 |
Politics and Identity in GeoNarratives of the Partition 200510 | 220 |
251 | |
267 | |
Other editions - View all
The Partition of Bengal: Fragile Borders and New Identities Debjani Sengupta No preview available - 2015 |
Common terms and phrases
abducted affected areas Bandopadhyay Bangla Bangladesh becomes belonging body border bring Calcutta camp caste changes characters colony comes communal Communist constructed continued create cultural Dandakaranya discussion displacement districts dreams East East Pakistan economic especially experiences explore face fiction freedom Gandhi gender give Gupta Hindu Hindus and Muslims human identity imagination important Independence India journey land landscape language leave literary literature lives look marginal marked meaning memoir memory movement Muslim narrative narrator never Noakhali novel Pakistan partition past play political postcolonial present questions reality refugees region rehabilitation relations relationship relief remain reported representations responses riots seen sense short social space story struggle symbolic texts transformation Translation turn understand village violence West Bengal woman women workers writers written