“A Literature of Frustration and Failure”: The Anxiety of Indianness in the Making of Sindhi Literature as an Indian Literature
In: Journal of Sindhi StudiesSearch for other papers by Soni Wadhwa in
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Abstract
Studies of Partition frequently turn to literature to understand how displacement processes, among other things, impact aesthetics and representation. This article takes a broader view of aesthetics as representation: it demonstrates how turning to the literary archive of a moment and a community gives rise to questions about the politics of individual texts and literary historiography. Centered on Sindhi literature produced in India after Partition, it shows that examining the literary productivity of the community needs to involve questions of literature as political survival. It focuses on the earliest essays from the Sindhi literary scene in India (published in the Sahitya Akademi journal Indian Literature). The article argues that these essays register anxiety about the survival of a language trying to come into being in an already existing and complicated language-nation relationship. It unpacks three registers of anxiety visible in the literary archive to broaden the scope of the conversations around the Sindhi language and its literature.
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| All Time | Past 365 days | Past 30 Days | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Abstract Views | 346 | 346 | 102 |
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“A Literature of Frustration and Failure”: The Anxiety of Indianness in the Making of Sindhi Literature as an Indian Literature
In: Journal of Sindhi StudiesSearch for other papers by Soni Wadhwa in
Current site
Google Scholar
PubMed
Abstract
Studies of Partition frequently turn to literature to understand how displacement processes, among other things, impact aesthetics and representation. This article takes a broader view of aesthetics as representation: it demonstrates how turning to the literary archive of a moment and a community gives rise to questions about the politics of individual texts and literary historiography. Centered on Sindhi literature produced in India after Partition, it shows that examining the literary productivity of the community needs to involve questions of literature as political survival. It focuses on the earliest essays from the Sindhi literary scene in India (published in the Sahitya Akademi journal Indian Literature). The article argues that these essays register anxiety about the survival of a language trying to come into being in an already existing and complicated language-nation relationship. It unpacks three registers of anxiety visible in the literary archive to broaden the scope of the conversations around the Sindhi language and its literature.
| All Time | Past 365 days | Past 30 Days | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Abstract Views | 346 | 346 | 102 |
| Full Text Views | 4 | 4 | 1 |
| PDF Views & Downloads | 9 | 9 | 0 |