What the Statues Tell: The Politics of Choosing Symbols in Trivandrum

Jeffrey, Robin

doi:10.2307/2757305

Cited by 11 publications

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“…Temples enshrine not only gods and goddesses but also the names and, possibly, effigies of sponsors. Statues that pay tribute to historical heroes are interspersed throughout Indian cities (Jaoul 2006, 2007; Jeffrey 1980). Voters are familiarized with the images of current political leaders through oversize photographs and cardboard cutouts used in campaigning.…”

Section: The Leader As Newsmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Neoliberalism and the rewriting of the Indian leader

Rao¹

2010

American Ethnologist

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In this article, I discuss recent changes in Indian leadership images. In a commercialized press, political journalists have adopted new writing styles that turn former political heroes into ambiguous human beings. This development is fueled by a neoliberal restructuring that has fundamentally altered journalists’ professional environment. By viewing press activity through the lens of a major ideological shift, I seek to contribute to an emerging debate about neoliberal practices. I contend that current transitions within the Indian press are not a smooth sail into a new ideological realm but a contradictory practice of personal empowerment through selective reflexivity.

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Section: The Leader As Newsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Upper‐caste Hindus, especially, remember him as a person who split the nation and despised Hinduism. The struggle to establish Ambedkar in the gallery of national ancestors is closely tied to the battle for the social recognition of Dalits and the rise of Mayawati and the BSP to power in Uttar Pradesh (Jaoul 2006, 2007; Jeffrey 1980).…”

Section: Notesmentioning

confidence: 99%

Neoliberalism and the rewriting of the Indian leader

Rao¹

2010

American Ethnologist

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“…It can be argued that between those who erected the statue and those who destroyed it there was no disagreement about the importance of the man and the power of the representation that was mounted and destroyed. As Jeffrey (1980: 484) suggests, social scientists can wring a good deal of significance from political statues and the circumstances in which they are raised and destroyed.…”

Section: End Of An Era?mentioning

confidence: 99%

The cult of Awo: the political life of a dead leader

Adebanwi

2008

J. Mod. Afr. Stud.

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This essay examines the ‘posthumous career’ of Chief Obafemi Awolowo, the late leader of the Yoruba of Nigeria. It focuses on why he has been unusually effective as a symbol in the politics of Yorubaland and Nigeria. Regarding Awolowo as a recent ancestor, the essay elaborates why death, burial and statue are useful in the analysis of the social history of, and elite politics in, Africa. The Awolowo case is used to contest secularist and modernist assumptions about ‘modernity’ and ‘rationality’ in a contemporary African society.

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“…For other symbols, of secondary rank, it matters less what they tell, than who is telling something. I will look at these other symbols from the point of view that interest groups create symbols to express their power, or at least their presence, in society (Cohen, 1969;Jeffrey, 1980;Colombijn, 1993;Nas, 1993;De Soto, 1995). For example, ministers in Canberra haggled about who would get the best located sites and the most impressive buildings (Overall, 1995).…”

Section: Other Urban Symbolsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Canberra: a sheep in wolf’s clothing

Colombijn¹

1998

Int J Urban Regional Res

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Canberra, the capital of the Commonwealth of Australia, was built as a symbol of a new nation. The city's symbolism is dominated by an optic axis, provided by the masterplan of Walter Burley Griffin. The dominant message of the objects at the poles of this axis, the Parliament House and the War Memorial, is nationalism. The Parliament House brings the nation together at one point and the War Memorial specifies that the Australian national is tough, resourceful, and comradely. By its reference to heroic deeds in wartime, the War Memorial gives a belligerent message in an otherwise peaceful landscape. Women and spiritual religions are conspicuously absent from Canberra. There is a remarkable tolerance towards other nations leaving their symbolic footprint in Canberra. Copyright Joint Editors and Blackwell Publishers Ltd 1998.

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What the Statues Tell: The Politics of Choosing Symbols in Trivandrum

Cited by 11 publications

References 0 publications

Neoliberalism and the rewriting of the Indian leader

Neoliberalism and the rewriting of the Indian leader

The cult of Awo: the political life of a dead leader

Canberra: a sheep in wolf’s clothing

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