Post-Doc, Estonian Institute of Humanities
Thesis Title: Landscape, Religious Practice and Identity in Shimla
Hannes Palang
About
The project presents a case study for testing a nuanced form of the central hypothesis of the larger Landscape, Heritage and Culture, Project. I have chosen to test this hypothesis in Shimla, which presents an excellent opportunity to explore the way that key complicating factors alter standard explanatory models. Shimla has a rich and unique landscape that highlights issues arising from the interaction between Europe and Asia, the past and the present, the built and the natural, population movement and durability under change; furthermore, it is an area that has been largely neglected in terms of social studies, thus the project will fill a gap in the extant ethnographic data. My nuancing of the research hypothesis causes the relationship between landscape and identity to arise as a key concern and in particular how people become part of the landscape at the same time as the landscape becomes part of their own identity. This leads the project to consider how the landscape becomes a battle ground for competing identities and how concepts of authentic and unauthentic landscapes are bound up with judgements about authentic and unauthentic identities. I have chosen to focus particularly on the landscape and practice of Shimla’s Christian communities, although I intend to spiral out from this centre. This is not an arbitrary starting point but rather reflects the situation that I encountered in the field during preliminary fieldwork. In many ways it is the heart of Shimla’s landscape and it is also the area in which the previously listed concerns are most significantly being felt. The project will result in a major advancement in the anthroplogical theory of the landscape, the filling of a gap in current ethnographic data and conclusions of global significance.
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