The series is being supported by the Cambridge-India partnership (http://www.cambridge-india.org) and by the Thriplow Charitable Trust. It acts as a sequel to the ‘Visual Anthropology and Contemporary South Asian History’ Conference (http://www.crassh.cam.ac.uk/events/25024) and will comprise 12 two-hour seminars offered fortnightly, i.e. four seminars per term, during the 2014-15 academic year.

The aims of this seminar series are twofold. First, to introduce Cambridge (under-, postgraduate) students, academic staff, researchers at different career stages and visiting scholars to the ways in which visual research methods support the development of new perspectives on South Asian history and culture. Second, to align the University of Cambridge prospectus to contemporary developments and programs in visual culture and South Asian studies – programmes already offered by all other major international universities.

This seminar series is part of the the ‘Visual Language and South Asian History’ Programme led by Dr Annamaria Motrescu-Mayes. The Programme also includes the annual course on ‘Visual Rhetoric and modern South Asian history’ (University of Cambridge, http://talks.cam.ac.uk/show/index/50672), the annual course and workshop ‘Visual Rhetoric and South Asian gender studies’ (in collaboration with the Centre for Women’s Development Studies and Lady Shri Ram College, Delhi), the annual course and workshop ‘Teaching and learning modern South Asian history with visual research methods’ (in collaboration with the Azim Premji Foundation and University, Bangalore), and the ‘Tamil Societies and (In-)Visibility’ project (in collaboration with La Fondation Maison des sciences de l’homme, Paris).

Each seminar will take place in S2 seminar room, Alison Richard Building, 7 West Road, Cambridge, between 4:00 – 6:00p.m. The seminar dates in Michaelmas term are 13th and 27th October, and 10th and 24th November 2014.

For information about the 2015-16 seminar series see http://talks.cam.ac.uk/show/index/56318