|
Amitava Kumar, Associate
Professor, English, Penn. State University, USA Professor Kumar received
his Ph.D. in Cultural Studies and Comparative Literature from the University
of Minnesota in 1993. Currently, he teaches in the English department
at Pennsylvania State University. In addition, he is the editor of Class
Issues (New York University Press, 1997), Poetics/Politics (St Martins
Press, 1999), and World Bank Literature (forthcoming from the University
of Minnesota Press). He serves on the editorial board of Rethinking
Marxism, Minnesota Review, and Cultural Logic; he also co-edits the
online journal, Politics and Culture. Kumars writings have appeared
in several anthologies and the following journals: Critical Inquiry,
Cultural Studies, Critical Quarterly, College Literature, Race and Class,
American Quarterly, Rethinking Marxism, Minnesota Review, Journal of
Advanced
Composition, Amerasia Journal, and Modern Fiction Studies. He has
been awarded fellowships from the NEH, Yale University, SUNY-Stony
Brook, and Dartmouth College.
Kumars non-fiction and poetry have recently appeared in The
Nation, Harpers, The New Statesman, Transition, Toronto Review,
Civil Lines, Biblio, Outlook, Frontline, India Today, The Hindu, Himal,
Herald, The Friday Times, The Times of India, and other publications.
He is the author of a book of poems No Tears for the NRI (Writers
Workshop, Calcutta, 1996). In addition to being a literary columnist
for Tehelka.com, Kumar is also the script-writer and narrator of the
prize-winning documentary, Pure Chutney (1997). He has been awarded
a Barach Fellowship at the Wesleyan Writers Festival, and an award
from the South Asian Journalists Association. His short-story The
Monkeys Suicide was chosen by Khushwant Singh as the best
short-story of the year for the Asian Age Award. His new short-story
Indian Restaurant has been published recently in Civil
Lines 5. Kumar is also the editor of a volume of writing by Indian
expatriate writers, Away (forthcoming from Penguin-India). He is the
author, most recently, of Passport Photos (University of California
Press, 2000) and is currently working on a book project entitled Bombay-London-New
York.
While in residence at the Center, Professor Kumar will focus on a
project that he has been developing. India and Pakistan fought their
last war around the Himalayan region of Kargil. But this war was only
a return to an earlier conflict. The partition of British India in
1947 leading to the creation of independent India and Pakistan
that had led to the largest migration in human history. The exodus
went on for months, even years, across the hastily drawn borders.
At least a million died in riots. In his proposed book-project, Husband
of a Fanatic, the exodus of 1947 serves as the point of departure
for a journey into the written literature as well as the psychology
of relations between the two warring neighbors.
|
|