Peasant History and the Accumulation of Difference in Colonial Panjab

Talk by Navyug Gill, History, William Paterson University

One of the most durable figures in modern history, the peasant has long been a site of intense intellectual and political debate. Yet underlying much of this literature is the assumption that the peasantry simply existed everywhere, a general if not generic group, traced backward from the present to antiquity. Within the British empire, Panjab has been regarded as the quintessential agrarian province inhabited by a diligent, prosperous and “martial race” of peasants. Against such essentialist depictions, I explore the landowning peasant and landless laborer as novel political subjects forged in the encounter between colonialism and struggles over culture and capital within Panjabi society. Colonial officials and ascendant Panjabis together disrupted existing forms of identity and activity to generate a new kind of rural hierarchy in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Through an interrogation of a disparate archive – settlement reports and legal judgments to labor contracts, vernacular poetry, and family budgets – I challenge the givenness of the peasant by explicating the ideological and material divisions that transformed the equation of power in the countryside, and thus reconfigured global capitalism. Weaving together economic logic with cultural difference, this presentation offers a way to rethink the itinerary of comparative political economy alongside alternative possibilities for emancipatory futures.

Navyug Gill is a historian of modern South Asia and global history. He is an Associate Professor in the Department of History, Philosophy, and Liberal Studies at William Paterson University. His research explores questions of agrarian change, labor politics, caste hierarchy, postcolonial critique, and histories of capitalism. His first book, Labors of Division: Global Capitalism and the Emergence of the Peasant in Colonial Panjab, was published by Stanford University Press in 2024. A South Asa edition was released by Navayana in 2025. The book won the “Henry A. Wallace Award” for the best book on agricultural history outside the US from the Agricultural History Society. Gill’s scholarly and public writings have appeared in venues such as Past and Present, the Journal of Asian Studies, Economic and Political Weekly, Al Jazeera, the Law and Political Economy Project, and Trolley Times.

Talk by Llerena Guiu Searle (Anthropology, University of Rochester)

In order to build a more just world order, philosopher Olúfémi Táíwo argues that we must contend with the fact that our current social order builds on relations of colonialism that did not end with colonial independence in the 1940s-1960s. Slavery, colonialism, and racial capitalism have created what he calls the “Global Racial Empire” which accumulates advantages and disadvantages, harms and capabilities unevenly (2022). How might we understand “design” as a set of practices that operates within such a world system? Drawing on eight months of ethnographic fieldwork with furniture and interior designers in India, this talk examines the ways in which designers navigate capitalist markets that continue to be haunted by colonialism. On the one hand, creative experts shaping elite Indian homes describe design as an anti-colonial project, poised to free India from tastes, fashions, and products from abroad. On the other, designers navigate hierarchies of values set by global markets, including demand for exotic, uniquely “Indian” products. Furniture and interior production also relies on production methods still defined through neocolonial discourses of “crafts difference” (McGowan 2009) and on caste and class dynamics that legitimize labor exploitation. By investigating how these unseen forces – histories, values, and ideologies – structure design practice in India, this paper contributes to our understanding of the politics of the creative industries and their imbrication in “Global Racial Empire.”

Llerena Guiu Searle is an Associate Professor of Anthropology and of Visual & Cultural Studies at the University of Rochester, where she also co-edits the Lewis Henry Morgan Lecture Series. She is the author of Landscapes of Accumulation: Real Estate and the Neoliberal Imagination in Contemporary India (University of Chicago Press, 2016). Her research examines capitalism and the production of the built environment in urban India.

This presentation is supported by the Central New York Humanities Corridor

Armed militant organizations and affiliated peaceful activist groups often co-exist within dissident movements. Although states tend to identify and repress activists within these movements as fronts for their militant counterparts, there is little research on how activist actions or the repression they face affect support for militant organizations. In this paper, I argue that state repression of peaceful activism boosts support for militant organizations, whilst activist mobilizing propaganda promoting peaceful means diminishes support for them. To test these expectations, I conducted a list experiment in Southeast Turkey, where the militant organization PKK and the activist political party HDP garner significant support. My research design presents sympathizer individuals with treatment videos that vary in the degrees of state repression of activists, and activist mobilizing propaganda. Results demonstrate that the state repression of peaceful activists leads to an immediate increase in support for the militant organization. Conversely, when activists advocate for peaceful mobilization, support for the militant organization diminishes. These findings demonstrate that the immediate attitudinal influence of powerful activist rhetoric is the opposite of what the state justification for its repression rests upon: if activists can convey their calls for peaceful mobilization without state repression, they can diminish support for their militant counterparts.

About the speaker

Ipek Sener studies international relations, conflict and security, great power politics, and quantitative political methodology. Her projects explore the relationship between illegal militant organizations and legal activist organizations within dissident movements, investigating how activist actions influence support for militancy and how militant propaganda can radicalize activists. Another set of projects analyzes how international actors, institutions, and great power competition influence the likelihood and microdynamics of civil war. She uses experimental, quasi-experimental, and observational designs, as well as text-as-data methods in her work. Ipek is a College Fellow at Harvard University, and she earned her Ph.D. in Political Science from Washington University in St. Louis.

Host
Reppy Institute for Peace and Conflict Studies, part of the Einaudi Center for International Studies

Civil wars become international conflicts when outside states provide support to rebel groups. Sometimes, external intervention is driven by affinity for the rebel group and a desire to achieve the rebel group’s goals. Sometimes, however, external intervention is driven by tensions on other issues, for example, international rivalry, territorial disputes, or regional leadership. We develop a game-theoretic model to understand the conditions under which a government may break a rebel-external state coalition through bargaining on an international issue. We provide evidence of the empirical relevance of our theory through statistical analysis of civil conflicts, along with an examination of early Libyan intervention in the Chadian civil war. Our argument provides new insight on the connections between domestic and international conflict and the outcomes of internationalized civil wars

About the speaker

Brett Ashley Leeds is Radoslav Tsanoff Professor of Political Science at Rice University. She is currently co-Editor-in-Chief of International Organization. Leeds’s research focuses on the design and effects of international agreements (particularly military alliances), and also on connections between domestic politics and foreign policy. She is the co-author of Domestic Interests, Democracy, and Foreign Policy Change (with Michaela Mattes, Cambridge Elements in International Relations series, 2022). In 2008, Leeds received the Karl Deutsch Award from the International Studies Association, which is presented annually to a scholar in International Relations within ten years of Ph.D. who is judged to have made the most significant contribution to the study of International Relations and Peace Research. In 2019, Leeds won the Lifetime Achievement Award from the Conflict Processes Section of APSA in recognition of scholarly contributions that have fundamentally improved the study of conflict processes. She served as President of the International Studies Association during 2017-18, President of the Peace Science Society during 2018-19, and as Chair of the Rice University Department of Political Science from 2015-2025.

Host

Reppy Institute for Peace and Conflict Studies, part of the Einaudi Center for International Studies

The Laidlaw Scholars Leadership and Research Program promotes ethical leadership and international research around the world—starting with the passionate leaders and learners found on campuses like Cornell. Open to first- and second-year students, the two-year Laidlaw program provides generous support to carry out internationally focused research, develop leadership skills, engage with community projects overseas, and become part of a global network of like-minded scholars from twenty universities worldwide.

At this session, we'll share more information about the program, including Cornell's cohort-based intercultural community-engaged learning summer experience in Ecuador, and tips for writing a successful application. Applications are due January 12, 2026.

Applicants are also strongly encouraged to attend a Q+A webinar about the summer experience in Ecuador. Q+A webinars are scheduled for November 5 and November 6.

Register here. Can’t attend? Contact programs@einaudi.cornell.edu.

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The Mario Einaudi Center for International Studies hosts info sessions for graduate and for undergraduate students to learn more about funding opportunities, international travel, research, and internships. View the full calendar of fall semester sessions.

The Laidlaw Scholars Leadership and Research Program promotes ethical leadership and international research around the world—starting with the passionate leaders and learners found on campuses like Cornell. Open to first- and second-year students, the two-year Laidlaw program provides generous support to carry out internationally focused research, develop leadership skills, engage with community projects overseas, and become part of a global network of like-minded scholars from twenty universities worldwide.

At this session, we'll share more information about the program, including Cornell's cohort-based intercultural community-engaged learning summer experience in Ecuador, and tips for writing a successful application. Applications are due January 12, 2026.

Applicants are also strongly encouraged to attend a Q+A webinar about the summer experience in Ecuador. Q+A webinars are scheduled for November 5 and November 6.

Can’t attend? Contact programs@einaudi.cornell.edu.

***

The Mario Einaudi Center for International Studies hosts info sessions for graduate and for undergraduate students to learn more about funding opportunities, international travel, research, and internships. View the full calendar of fall semester sessions.

Talk by Ahona Panda (History, Claremont McKenna College)

The talk explores the entwined political and literary lives of the Bengali politician and writer, Abul Mansur Ahmed (1898-1979), and studies him as a person who lived through the political articulations of three nationalisms: Indian, Pakistani, and Bangladeshi. From his early involvement in the Indian National Congress, to his shift to the Muslim League and formation of Pakistan, and later his role in shaping the Awami League and modern Bangladesh, Ahmed’s life reflects the deep contradictions of his time. In this talk, I explore how, for Ahmed, “Muslim” was not merely a religious category, but a social class formation produced through colonial agrarian structures and shaped by Hindu cultural and linguistic hegemony. Language, then, became both a site of resistance and a battleground for Muslims and Hindus: who controlled Bengali? Who spoke for its future? Ahmed’s suspicion of Hindu-Muslim unity stemmed from a trenchant critique of elite Hindu appropriation of language and culture. And yet, Bengali–– and language itself–– remained a terrain of unresolved tension and closeness between the two communities.

I situate Ahmed alongside literary friends like Kazi Nazrul Islam, political figures like Chittaranjan Das, A.K. Fazlul Huq and H.S. Suhrawardy, as well as humanists like Ahmed Sharif and Anisuzzaman, who held out hope that the Bengali language could transcend nation-state divisions. As India-Bangladesh relations continue to worsen, the talk rethinks whether language is the site of irreconcilable difference, or the elusive site of what binds us beyond the injustices of class, race, and history.

Ahona Panda is a historian of South Asia and Assistant Professor of History at Claremont McKenna College. In 2025-2026, she is a Visiting Scholar of South Asian History at Cornell University. Her research focuses on the intersections of language, land, and politics in Bengal from the colonial period to the postcolonial present. She is currently completing a book titled Language and its Communitas: The Life of Bengali, 1793–1971, which explores the political and emotional life of the Bengali language, and the material, national, and literary histories that shaped it. Her broader scholarly interests include philology, economic and environmental history of the Bengal delta, and the long history of Hindu–Muslim relations in South Asia.

How AI might be used in nuclear command and control is the subject of much discussion in national security circles. But this debate—important though it has been—obscures many other ways that AI could be used or should not be used across the entire nuclear weapons enterprise. (In this talk, the nuclear weapons enterprise also encompasses nuclear weapons, their delivery systems, the associated command and control and the links of these entities to AI in systems not usually associated with nuclear weapons.) Key attributes of AI and the nuclear weapons enterprise will be reviewed, principles for thinking about AI in the nuclear weapons enterprise discussed, and specific guidelines for assessing the wisdom of AI in any given nuclear application proposed.

About the speaker

Herbert Lin is a senior research scholar at Stanford University's Center for International Security and Cooperation and a research fellow at the Hoover Institution. His work focuses on the national security impact of emerging technologies, especially digital technologies such as cyber, artificial intelligence, and influence operations. He directs and serves as editor-in-chief of the Stanford Emerging Technology Review (setr.stanford.edu). Lin is Chief Scientist, Emeritus for the Computer Science and Telecommunications Board of the National Research Council, leading key studies on public policy and information technology from 1990 to 2014. He served on President Obama’s Commission on Enhancing National Cybersecurity in 2016, was named a fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science in 2019, participated in the Aspen Commission on Information Disorder in 2020, and was on the Bulletin of Atomic Scientists’ Science and Security Board from 2016 to 2025. Previously, he was a professional staff member for the House Armed Services Committee, focusing on defense policy and arms control. Lin holds a doctorate in physics from MIT.

Avocationally, he is a longtime folk and swing dancer (and sometimes dance teacher), a very mediocre magician (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zqgpaiK1xh8), and a connoisseur of dim sum.

Host

Reppy Institute for Peace and Conflict Studies, part of the Eianudi Center for International Studies

Co-host

Cornell Brooks School Tech Policy Institute

Since the inception of Hollywood, U.S. media has often and continues to reduce Africa to singular stories about poverty, conflict, crisis, death, famine etc. overlooking the complexities that shape the continent and its people. What these media stereotypes fail to foreground are the complexities of the continent and how these harmful representations of the continent date back to colonial times. This colloquium presents a keynote presentation and panel that problematizes these harmful tropes about the continent while presenting alternative frames that complicate the reality of the 50+ countries in Africa. Key among topics to be explored in the keynote are the way that narratives around war and genocide in Africa are framed in news media. The panel will bring attention to the potential of African pop culture such as music, film and television to not only challenge stereotypes about the continent but also present the rich tapestry of African cultures. The colloquium will demonstrate how presenting nuanced and dignified narratives about the continent can connect Africa’s diaspora to their roots and ancestry. https://new.express.adobe.com/webpage/85MY9tr1q2KcU

Register

Talk by Ann Gold (Religion, Syracuse University)

On March 1, 1968 my first husband and I, both college drop-outs, set forth on the now stereotypical overland journey from Europe to South Asia. We reached Pakistan in mid-April at the peak of the hot season, and walked across the border into India about three weeks later. Well into August we literally circled the subcontinent: from Lahore to Kashmir, gradually southward all the way to Rameshwaram, north again briefly visiting Nepal. We moved constantly -- riding ordinary buses and 3rd-class trains, rarely stopping anywhere more than 2-3 nights, rarely spending more than 5-10 rupees for a night’s lodging. In letters home I repeatedly lament my ignorance and express my yearning to remain in one place, even as I rush to the next destination. While observant, I never contemplate how privileged are my hardships and the mobility I take for granted. I learn to love South Asian culture, meals, and people. Numerous strangers exert themselves to welcome, teach and feed us. Today’s presentation draws on Chapter 6 of a memoir manuscript describing my seven years as a college dropout. Chronologically it falls about two years into that chaotic period of my life. When I resumed my education in 1973 I chose to study anthropology and eventually to focus on India. My memoir wonders how I found my way into a fulfilling career without any prior plan through a fortuitous combination of aptitude, affinity, ancestry and dumb luck. Emerging retrospective anthropological themes in the South Asia chapter are the privilege of mobility and the “banquet of hospitality.”

Ann Grodzins Gold is emerita Thomas J. Watson Professor of Religion and Professor of Anthropology at Syracuse University. Her research in North India focused on pilgrimage, gender, expressive traditions, environmental history, and most recently landscape and identity in a small market town. She has authored or co-authored numerous articles and five books all based on fieldwork in provincial Rajasthan, including Shiptown: Between Rural and Urban North India (University of Pennsylvania Press, 2017). Her book, In the Time of Trees and Sorrows: Nature, Power and Memory in Rajasthan (Duke University Press, 2002, co-authored with Bhoju Ram Gujar) was awarded the Ananda Kentish Coomaraswamy Book Prize from the Association for Asian Studies. During her career as an anthropologist of religion, Gold has held awards from the Fulbright Foundation, Guggenheim Foundation, National Endowment for the Humanities, and National Humanities Center, among others. In 2025 she was elected to membership in the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.