Books by Santhi Kavuri-Bauer
South Asian Studies, 2019
In this article, I examine the structures and spatial dynamics of Fatehpur Sikri to show how the ... more In this article, I examine the structures and spatial dynamics of Fatehpur Sikri to show how the overall design of the Mughal capital city was informed by Islamic philosophy and ethical texts known as akhlaq. Both discourses used the concept of the city to theorize how the ideals of justice could be materialized. After creating an interpretative framework based on these texts, I focus on four spaces of interaction at Fatehpur Sikri, the Jami Masjid, Diwan-i Aam, Ibadat Khana, and markets, to show how the phenomenology of Peripatetic Islamic philosophy, later translated for Mongol kings by Nasir al-Din Tusi (1201–74), influenced the meaning of the city. Through this investigation, I argue that Fatehpur Sikri was a means of bringing the ethical concepts of Persianate philosophy to life in sixteenth-century Mughal India and introducing a new set of social and religious norms to the people.
The book is now public access.
Built in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, India’s Mughal ... more The book is now public access.
Built in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, India’s Mughal monuments—including majestic forts, mosques, palaces, and tombs, such as the Taj Mahal—are world renowned for their grandeur and association with the Mughals, the powerful Islamic empire that once ruled most of the subcontinent. In Monumental Matters, Santhi Kavuri-Bauer focuses on the prominent role of Mughal architecture in the construction and contestation of the Indian national landscape. She examines the representation and eventual preservation of the monuments, from their disrepair in the colonial past to their present status as protected heritage sites.
Drawing on theories of power, subjectivity, and space, Kavuri-Bauer’s interdisciplinary analysis encompasses Urdu poetry, British landscape painting, imperial archaeological surveys, Indian Muslim identity, and British tourism, as well as postcolonial nation building, World Heritage designations, and conservation mandates. Since Independence, the state has attempted to construct a narrative of Mughal monuments as symbols of a unified, secular nation. Yet modern-day sectarian violence at these sites continues to suggest that India’s Mughal monuments remain the transformative spaces—of social ordering, identity formation, and national reinvention—that they have been for centuries.
International Journal of Islamic Architecture, 2017
International Journal of Islamic Architecture
Special Issue
Imagining Localities of Antiquity i... more International Journal of Islamic Architecture
Special Issue
Imagining Localities of Antiquity in Islamic Societies
In honor of the life of Dr. Khaled al-Asaad
Guest Editor: Stephennie Mulder
https://www.ingentaconnect.com/content/intellect/ijia/2017/00000006/00000002
The tragically familiar spectacles of cultural heritage destruction performed by the Islamic State group (ISIS) in Syria and Iraq are frequently presented as barbaric, baffling, and far outside the bounds of what are imagined to be normative, “civilized” uses of the past. Often superficially explained as an attempt to stamp out idolatry or as a fundamentalist desire to revive and enforce a return to a purified monotheism, analysis of these spectacles of heritage violence posits two things: that there is, fact, an “Islamic” manner of imagining the past – its architectural manifestations, its traces and localities – and that actions carried out at these localities, whether constructive or destructive, have moral or ethical consequences for Muslims and non-Muslims alike. In this reading, the iconoclastic actions of ISIS and similar groups, for example the Taliban or the Wahhabi monarchy in Saudi Arabia, are represented as one, albeit extreme, manifestation of an assumedly pervasive and historically ongoing Islamic antipathy toward images and pre-contemporary holy localities in particular, and, more broadly, toward the idea of heritage and the uses to which it has been put by modern nationalism.
But long before the emergence of ISIS and other so-called Islamist iconoclasts, and perhaps as early as the rise of Islam itself, Muslims imagined Islamic and pre-Islamic antiquity and its localities in myriad ways: as sites of memory, spaces of healing, or places imbued with didactic, historical, and moral power. Ancient statuary were deployed as talismans, paintings were interpreted to foretell and reify the coming of Islam, and temples of ancient gods and churches devoted to holy saints were converted into mosques in ways that preserved their original meaning and, sometimes, even their architectural ornament and fabric. Often, such localities were valued simply as places that elicited a sense of awe and wonder, or of reflection on the present relevance of history and the greatness of past empires, a theme so prevalent it created distinct genres of Arabic and Persian literature (aja’ib, fada’il). Sites like Ctesiphon, the ancient capital of the Zoroastrian Sasanians, or the Temple Mount, where the Jewish temple had stood, were embraced by early companions of the Prophet Muhammad and incorporated into Islamic notions of the self. Furthermore, various Islamic interpretive communities as well as Jews and Christians often shared holy places and had similar haptic, sensorial, and ritual connections that enabled them to imagine place in similar ways. These engagements were often more dynamic and purposeful than conventional scholarly notions of “influence” and “transmission” can account for. And yet, Muslims also sometimes destroyed ancient places or powerfully reimagined them to serve their own purposes, as for example in the aftermath of the Crusader presence in the Holy Land or in the destruction, reuse and rebuilding of ancient Buddhist and Hindu sites in the Eastern Islamic lands and South Asia.
This special issue presents scholars from across disciplines who engage with a critical reassessment of imaginings of the ancient past in Islamic societies.
Papers by Santhi Kavuri-Bauer
How Secular Is Art?, Mar 31, 2023
Intellect Books, Jun 13, 2022
International Journal of Islamic Architecture, 2017
International Journal of Islamic Architecture, 2017
This article proposes that Indian Islamic architectural practices of the Sultanate period (thirte... more This article proposes that Indian Islamic architectural practices of the Sultanate period (thirteenth to sixteenth century) were in keeping with centuries-old philosophical principles of reverence for ancient wonders. Guiding Indian Islamic rulers toward this disposition were Neoplatonic philosophies and texts organized around the structuring principle of wonders or ‘aja’ib. I argue that the discourses on the ‘aja’ib had a significant twofold impact on Islamic architectural practices in India. First,they influenced Islamic rulers of India to interpret and appreciate the non-Islamic ancient monuments not as traces of idolatrous worship that warranted destruction,but as wonders of God’s creation. Second, the preservation of such wonders or their partial incorporation into new buildings made their cosmological properties available to rulers desiring to project themselves as rational, divinely ordained sovereigns.This investigation will be focused on two ancient Indian pillars found in Delhi: the iron pillar in the Quwwat al-Islam Mosque and the Ashokan pillar found in Firuz Shah Kotla Fort. Through the lens of ‘aja’ib it may be proposed that early Muslim rulers were drawing on Hindu and Buddhist architecture to create mystical spaces with the aim of ordering new relationships between the conquering power and the new topography over which they ruled
Asian Diasporic Visual Cultures and the Americas
South Asia: Journal of South Asian Studies, 2016
The Power, Subjectivity, and Space of India’s Mughal Architecture, 2011
The Power, Subjectivity, and Space of India’s Mughal Architecture, 2011
The Power, Subjectivity, and Space of India’s Mughal Architecture, 2011
The Power, Subjectivity, and Space of India’s Mughal Architecture, 2011
The Power, Subjectivity, and Space of India’s Mughal Architecture, 2011
The Power, Subjectivity, and Space of India’s Mughal Architecture, 2011
Uploads
Books by Santhi Kavuri-Bauer
Built in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, India’s Mughal monuments—including majestic forts, mosques, palaces, and tombs, such as the Taj Mahal—are world renowned for their grandeur and association with the Mughals, the powerful Islamic empire that once ruled most of the subcontinent. In Monumental Matters, Santhi Kavuri-Bauer focuses on the prominent role of Mughal architecture in the construction and contestation of the Indian national landscape. She examines the representation and eventual preservation of the monuments, from their disrepair in the colonial past to their present status as protected heritage sites.
Drawing on theories of power, subjectivity, and space, Kavuri-Bauer’s interdisciplinary analysis encompasses Urdu poetry, British landscape painting, imperial archaeological surveys, Indian Muslim identity, and British tourism, as well as postcolonial nation building, World Heritage designations, and conservation mandates. Since Independence, the state has attempted to construct a narrative of Mughal monuments as symbols of a unified, secular nation. Yet modern-day sectarian violence at these sites continues to suggest that India’s Mughal monuments remain the transformative spaces—of social ordering, identity formation, and national reinvention—that they have been for centuries.
Special Issue
Imagining Localities of Antiquity in Islamic Societies
In honor of the life of Dr. Khaled al-Asaad
Guest Editor: Stephennie Mulder
https://www.ingentaconnect.com/content/intellect/ijia/2017/00000006/00000002
The tragically familiar spectacles of cultural heritage destruction performed by the Islamic State group (ISIS) in Syria and Iraq are frequently presented as barbaric, baffling, and far outside the bounds of what are imagined to be normative, “civilized” uses of the past. Often superficially explained as an attempt to stamp out idolatry or as a fundamentalist desire to revive and enforce a return to a purified monotheism, analysis of these spectacles of heritage violence posits two things: that there is, fact, an “Islamic” manner of imagining the past – its architectural manifestations, its traces and localities – and that actions carried out at these localities, whether constructive or destructive, have moral or ethical consequences for Muslims and non-Muslims alike. In this reading, the iconoclastic actions of ISIS and similar groups, for example the Taliban or the Wahhabi monarchy in Saudi Arabia, are represented as one, albeit extreme, manifestation of an assumedly pervasive and historically ongoing Islamic antipathy toward images and pre-contemporary holy localities in particular, and, more broadly, toward the idea of heritage and the uses to which it has been put by modern nationalism.
But long before the emergence of ISIS and other so-called Islamist iconoclasts, and perhaps as early as the rise of Islam itself, Muslims imagined Islamic and pre-Islamic antiquity and its localities in myriad ways: as sites of memory, spaces of healing, or places imbued with didactic, historical, and moral power. Ancient statuary were deployed as talismans, paintings were interpreted to foretell and reify the coming of Islam, and temples of ancient gods and churches devoted to holy saints were converted into mosques in ways that preserved their original meaning and, sometimes, even their architectural ornament and fabric. Often, such localities were valued simply as places that elicited a sense of awe and wonder, or of reflection on the present relevance of history and the greatness of past empires, a theme so prevalent it created distinct genres of Arabic and Persian literature (aja’ib, fada’il). Sites like Ctesiphon, the ancient capital of the Zoroastrian Sasanians, or the Temple Mount, where the Jewish temple had stood, were embraced by early companions of the Prophet Muhammad and incorporated into Islamic notions of the self. Furthermore, various Islamic interpretive communities as well as Jews and Christians often shared holy places and had similar haptic, sensorial, and ritual connections that enabled them to imagine place in similar ways. These engagements were often more dynamic and purposeful than conventional scholarly notions of “influence” and “transmission” can account for. And yet, Muslims also sometimes destroyed ancient places or powerfully reimagined them to serve their own purposes, as for example in the aftermath of the Crusader presence in the Holy Land or in the destruction, reuse and rebuilding of ancient Buddhist and Hindu sites in the Eastern Islamic lands and South Asia.
This special issue presents scholars from across disciplines who engage with a critical reassessment of imaginings of the ancient past in Islamic societies.
Papers by Santhi Kavuri-Bauer
Built in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, India’s Mughal monuments—including majestic forts, mosques, palaces, and tombs, such as the Taj Mahal—are world renowned for their grandeur and association with the Mughals, the powerful Islamic empire that once ruled most of the subcontinent. In Monumental Matters, Santhi Kavuri-Bauer focuses on the prominent role of Mughal architecture in the construction and contestation of the Indian national landscape. She examines the representation and eventual preservation of the monuments, from their disrepair in the colonial past to their present status as protected heritage sites.
Drawing on theories of power, subjectivity, and space, Kavuri-Bauer’s interdisciplinary analysis encompasses Urdu poetry, British landscape painting, imperial archaeological surveys, Indian Muslim identity, and British tourism, as well as postcolonial nation building, World Heritage designations, and conservation mandates. Since Independence, the state has attempted to construct a narrative of Mughal monuments as symbols of a unified, secular nation. Yet modern-day sectarian violence at these sites continues to suggest that India’s Mughal monuments remain the transformative spaces—of social ordering, identity formation, and national reinvention—that they have been for centuries.
Special Issue
Imagining Localities of Antiquity in Islamic Societies
In honor of the life of Dr. Khaled al-Asaad
Guest Editor: Stephennie Mulder
https://www.ingentaconnect.com/content/intellect/ijia/2017/00000006/00000002
The tragically familiar spectacles of cultural heritage destruction performed by the Islamic State group (ISIS) in Syria and Iraq are frequently presented as barbaric, baffling, and far outside the bounds of what are imagined to be normative, “civilized” uses of the past. Often superficially explained as an attempt to stamp out idolatry or as a fundamentalist desire to revive and enforce a return to a purified monotheism, analysis of these spectacles of heritage violence posits two things: that there is, fact, an “Islamic” manner of imagining the past – its architectural manifestations, its traces and localities – and that actions carried out at these localities, whether constructive or destructive, have moral or ethical consequences for Muslims and non-Muslims alike. In this reading, the iconoclastic actions of ISIS and similar groups, for example the Taliban or the Wahhabi monarchy in Saudi Arabia, are represented as one, albeit extreme, manifestation of an assumedly pervasive and historically ongoing Islamic antipathy toward images and pre-contemporary holy localities in particular, and, more broadly, toward the idea of heritage and the uses to which it has been put by modern nationalism.
But long before the emergence of ISIS and other so-called Islamist iconoclasts, and perhaps as early as the rise of Islam itself, Muslims imagined Islamic and pre-Islamic antiquity and its localities in myriad ways: as sites of memory, spaces of healing, or places imbued with didactic, historical, and moral power. Ancient statuary were deployed as talismans, paintings were interpreted to foretell and reify the coming of Islam, and temples of ancient gods and churches devoted to holy saints were converted into mosques in ways that preserved their original meaning and, sometimes, even their architectural ornament and fabric. Often, such localities were valued simply as places that elicited a sense of awe and wonder, or of reflection on the present relevance of history and the greatness of past empires, a theme so prevalent it created distinct genres of Arabic and Persian literature (aja’ib, fada’il). Sites like Ctesiphon, the ancient capital of the Zoroastrian Sasanians, or the Temple Mount, where the Jewish temple had stood, were embraced by early companions of the Prophet Muhammad and incorporated into Islamic notions of the self. Furthermore, various Islamic interpretive communities as well as Jews and Christians often shared holy places and had similar haptic, sensorial, and ritual connections that enabled them to imagine place in similar ways. These engagements were often more dynamic and purposeful than conventional scholarly notions of “influence” and “transmission” can account for. And yet, Muslims also sometimes destroyed ancient places or powerfully reimagined them to serve their own purposes, as for example in the aftermath of the Crusader presence in the Holy Land or in the destruction, reuse and rebuilding of ancient Buddhist and Hindu sites in the Eastern Islamic lands and South Asia.
This special issue presents scholars from across disciplines who engage with a critical reassessment of imaginings of the ancient past in Islamic societies.