Exploring the Non-Human and Religion in Nineteenth-Century Writings

Exploring the Non-Human and Religion in Nineteenth-Century Writings: Colonial Idols in British Curation and Culture examines the curatorial and literary representations of colonial idols in British writings of the long nineteenth century as they emerged in the imperial heartland as alien art, invasive commodities, and vessels of affect.

The book studies the colonial anxieties reflected in the narratives surrounding idol-objects as they shifted both geographically and epistemologically—from being objects of worship to objects of display. It further studies the acquisitory material surrounding idol collections at British museums, focusing on the Victoria and Albert Museum (and its Colonial and Indian Exhibition, 1886) and the London Missionary Society museum (and its Orient in London Exhibition, 1908)—unpacking the narrative variations between a national repository of art/design and another operating within an evangelizing arc. The latter segment shows how the fictional portrayal of idols as insurgent automatons and freak-like vehicles of avarice critiques British exploitative colonial practice.

This study crucially excavates the colonial context of the idol’s cultural emergence, significant today given its renewed potency within contemporary South Asian politico-cultural discourses.