Workshop: "Rituals of Community and Political Ritual: The Making and Remaking of a Tamil People" (June 7&8, 2013)


The workshop, co-organised by Dr. Torsten Tschacher and Prof. Rupa Viswanath of CeMIS, as well as Prof. Michael Bergunder of the University of Heidelberg and Dr. Gabriele Alex of the University of Tübingen, marked the inauguration of a new Tamil Studies Network in Germany. It examined some of the practices and strategies used to create Tamil subjects, to make what in modern democratic jargon is called “a people.” We focused on the moral, ethical and pedagogical routines and rituals that have helped to produce a Tamil people - and to define non-Tamils - under the many diverse regimes that have held sway over Tamil society's long history.