Faculty across the University of British Columbia (UBC) and Simon Fraser University (SFU) invite you to the annual South Asia Conference of the Pacific Northwest (SACPAN), a long-running collaborative venture sponsored by South Asia specialists at the University of Washington, the University of British Columbia, Simon Fraser University, the University of Oregon, and other institutions in the region. We welcome scholars from across the social sciences and humanities disciplines with research interests in South Asia at universities and colleges in the Pacific Northwest.
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List of organizing and supporting partners:
UBC Centre for India and South Asia Research (CISAR)
Department of Gender, Sexuality, and Women’s Studies, SFU
Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences, SFU
David Lam Centre at SFU
UBC Himalaya Program
UBC Department of Anthropology
UBC Department of Asian Studies
SACPAN PROGRAM SCHEDULE
Monday – Tuesday, May 4-5, 2026
xʷθəθiqətəm (Place of Many Trees), UBC – The Liu Institute for Global Issues, 6476 NW Marine Drive, Vancouver
Day 1
Monday, May 4
Full panel: 2 – 3:30 PM: Marginalization and resistance (1hr 30mins)
Manish Kumar, University of British Columbia, Okanagan, Graduate student, Cultural Anthropology
“Beyond Conversion: Shakya Youth and the Reinvention of Buddhist Revival in North India”
Malvya Chintakindi, University of Oregon, PhD Candidate, Anthropology
“Dreams Deferred: The Paradox of Urban Aspirations” (online)
Dr. Seema Mahi, University of British Columbia, Post Doc Fellow, History
“A Social History of Dalit organizations in Canada “
Discussant: Vineeth Srivatsava, PhD student Political Science, Simon Fraser University
Mini panel: 3:35 – 4:15 PM: Gender, representation and mobilisation (40 minutes)
Parboti Roy, University of British Columbia, PhD Candidate, Asian Studies
“Indigenous women in the global rights movements: the experiences of two Chakma Indigenous women from the Chittagong Hill Tracts, Bangladesh”
Sahar Zaman, Simon Fraser University, PhD Candidate, Political Science
“How do citizens norms influence the connection between descriptive and substantive representation of women: A Case Study of India and Pakistan”
Discussant: Dr. Anushay Malik, Simon Fraser University, Senior Lecturer, Department of International Studies and Global Asia
Afternoon break: Chai and Samosas 4:15 – 4:30pm (15 minutes)
Mini panel: 4:30pm – 5.10pm: Regional cooperation (30 minutes with 10 minutes for Q&A)
Sonuj Giri, Bhaanvee Anthraper, Zoha Muhammed, University of British Columbia, Masters Students, Public Policy and Global Affairs
UBC School of Public Policy and Global Affairs “Beyond Political Conflict: Finding Pathways for Regional Cooperation in South Asia”
Keynote: 5:15 – 6:30 PM – Dr. Mona Bhan,Ford-Maxwell Professor of South Asian Studies, Syracuse University (50 minute talk followed by Q&A)
Infrastructural Proxies and India’s Dirty Wars
This talk examines the ways in which India’s 330 MW Kishanganga dam built on a riverine border between India and Pakistan coincided with India’s attempts to recruit renegade militants – former terrorists who were deployed to wage India’s dirty war in Kashmir – into mainstream electoral politics. I explain how dams became infrastructural proxies for India’s counterinsurgency war in Kashmir as engineering the dam relied on reengineering society and politics to curtail people’s capacities to resist. At the same time, the KG dam produced certain geological and physical materials and features in excess, which then shaped and constituted new terrains of political struggle, commentary, and critique in Kashmir revealing the region’s uncertain sociopolitical and ecological futures.
Day 2
Tuesday, May 5
Full panel: 9 – 10:30 AM: Material histories and artefacts (1hr 30mins)
Krishna Kumar, University of British Columbia, PhD student, Department of Asian Studies
“Newsletter Writing and Serving the Emperor: Analysis of Seventeenth-Century Newsletters from Mughal Ajmer”
Karthik Malli, University of Washington, Masters student, South Asia Studies
“Single File: Typewriter Linearization in India”
Mahashewta Bhattacharya, University of British Columbia, PhD Candidate, Sociocultural Anthropology
“God in Small Things: Playing, Praying and Practising Home in Miniatures”
Anu Sugathan, University of Oregon, PhD Candidate and Graduate Teaching Fellow, English
“Crafting Feminist Narratives: Form, Collaboration, and Tara Books’ A Village Is a Busy Place!”
Discussant: Dr. Kiran Sunar, University of British Columbia, Assistant Professor in the Department of Asian Studies
Full panel: 10:35 – 12:05 PM: Imaginations of modernity, nation and belonging (1hr 30mins)
Subhayu Chatterjee, University of Oregon, PhD student, Comparative Literature
“Anticipating Many Modernities: A Take on Ritwik Ghatak’s Amar Lenin (1970)” (online)
Mariam Nadeem, University of Oregon, Doctoral Candidate, Comparative Literature
“Translating Traditions: Benjamin, Iqbal, and the Afterlives of Goethe’s West-östlicher Divan” (online)
Shaila Shams, Simon Fraser University, PhD Candidate, Education
“Linguistic Nationalism, Ethnic Identity, and Solidarity Building among Bangladeshi Migrants and South Asian Diaspora in Canada “
Fahad Naveed, University of British Columbia, PhD Candidate
“Behind the Curtain: Piracy, Memory and the Cross-Border Afterlives of Bollywood Films”
Discussant: Dr. Vaibhav Saria, Simon Fraser University, Associate Professor, Department of Gender, Sexuality, and Women’s Studies.
Lunch: 12:05 – 1:15 PM (1hr 10mins)
Mini panel: 1:15 – 1:55 PM Indigenous articulations of land (40 minutes)
Anudeep Dewan, University of British Columbia, Doctoral Candidate, Anthropology
““We are made of maato”: Indigenous articulations of land in Nepal”
Guntas Kaur, University of British Columbia, PhD student, Sociology
“Learning with Land and Water: Indigenous Pedagogy, Memory, and Diasporic Responsibility Between Punjab and Indigenous Lands” (online)
Discussant: Dr. Pasang Sherpa, University of British Columbia, Assistant Professor in the Department of Asian Studies
Mini panel: 2 – 2:40pm Governance of conflict and disaster (40 minutes)
Dr. Ganesh Dhungana, University of British Columbia, Postdoctoral Research Fellow, UBC Disaster Resilience Research Network
“Role of International Agencies in Disaster Governance and Management in Nepal”
Sima Khanal, University of British Columbia, PhD candidate, Wildlife Conservation and Economics Lab
“Habitat loss, agricultural encroachment, and human-elephant conflict in India: a push-pull analysis”
Discussant: Dr. Rupak Shrestha, Simon Fraser University, Assistant Professor in International Studies and Global Asia
Full panel: 2:45 – 4:15 PM: Health imaginaries and access (1hr 30mins)
Joyeeta Das, University of Washington, Graduate student, Religious Studies
“One [Hu]man’s Meat is Another [Hu]man’s poison”: Comparing the Perception of Menstrual Blood as Doshic Imbalance in Ayurveda and as a divine sign of potency in Kaula Shakta Tantra”
Younus Mushtaq Ahmed, University of British Columbia, PhD Candidate, Medical Anthropology
“Toilet as a workplace: Labour, dignity, and health within the public toilets of Chennai, India”
Mehre Dlir, University of British Columbia, Masters student, Public Policy and Global Affairs
“Public Private Partnerships in Emergency Care: Governance of the 108 Ambulance Program in India”
Imroze Singh Goindval, University of British Columbia, PhD student, Population and Public Health
“The Word No One Wants for Their Own Child: Mandbuddhi and the Relational Politics of Cognitive Difference” (online)
Discussant: Dr. Veena Sriram, University of British Columbia, Assistant Professor and Canada Research Chair Tier 2 in Global Health Policy, and Dr. Helena Zeweri, Assistant Professor in the Department of Anthropology
Afternoon break: Chai and Samosas 4:15pm – 4:30pm
4:30 – 5:45 PM: Keynote by Dr. Svati Shah, Associate Professor, University of Massachusetts, Amherst (50 minute talk followed by Q&A)
Against an Oikos of the Earth
This talk is drawn from a manuscript in progress entitled Dissent in Queer Times. The book is an ethnography of Indian ‘autonomous’ queer and transgender activism and critiques that are imbricated with heterodox left and autonomous feminist movements in India. ‘Autonomous’ references movements that began in the 1970s, and used this term to mean ‘autonomy’ from, but no opposition to, Marxist political parties. Today, autonomous feminism, autonomous queer and trans* organizing, and autonomous ‘people’s movements’ are comprised of loose and overlapping networks of non-funded organizations, campaigns and individuals across India. I draw from these imbrications to focus on anti-fascist visions of householding, kinship and livelihood that appear in autonomous queer and trans* critique. These include the appropriation of utopic concepts like Begumpura, a bhakti movement anti-caste imaginary of a ‘city without sorrow.’ They also include reports and statements that resist the reification of caste capitalism in legal instruments like the Special Intensive Review and the recent Transgender Bill amendment. I suggest that, collectively, these critiques offer a theory of resistance for a fascist vision of householding –an ‘oikos of the earth’ – that resists a concomitant nomos and the exception become the rule.
