V. Book Launch of the Volume 1 & 2

Editorial work on the book took place during the months from December 2005 to January 2006. During this period the 40 plus articles identified for inclusion in the book were read and revised 3 times over by Prof. T. Vinoda and the contributors with a view to aligning them to the book's address and documentation style. The forty plus articles were planned for inclusion in the first two volumes, while the third volume was to be devoted to the area studies bibliography. Work on all the three volumes continued through December 2005 and January 2006, and finally the ms of the first two volumes was electronically transferred to Prestige Books, Delhi, in February 2006. The proofs started coming in during March 2006. Meanwhile the preparation of the ms for the 3rd volume continued, but could not be completed by the end of April 2006. It was then decided to have the completed first two volumes launched on April 28, 2006 to coincide with Prof. Vinoda's retirement at the month end. Prof. V. Gopal Reddy the Vice-Chancellor of Kakatiya University released the first two volumes at a colorful function on April 28 at the University Post-Graduate College, while Prof. Vinoda introduced the book and its terms of reference to the audience. The Book Launch was presided over by the Principal of the University P.G. College, Prof. G. Narasimha Murthy, while Prof. Meera Manvi of Osmania University reviewed the book. The Central Sahitya Akademi Award winning Telugu writer, Dr. Naveen spoke on the state of regional writing vis-a-vis expatriate Indian writing in English. The photograph here is a time marker.

IV. Progress in the preparation of the book

After the plan for the book was finalized (see blog entry for Oct 6) to go beyond the address of the Seminar, it was decided that we reach the international community of scholars in the area with a call for papers (CFP). Early October the CFP was posted in the major scholarly (listserv) portals and area-specific journals. The resulting response was encouraging: during the last ten days nearly 14 proposals and abstracts from countries as numerous as USA, Canada, Europe, Africa, South Pacific have been received. During this period we have also been trying to reach select writers of Indian diaspora across the world with request that they offer their reflections on key issues [list given at the end of the Blog entry for Oct 4) in diasporic discourse. If the response from the writers is also as encouraging, we may have to plan for a two volume book. For the record, the CFP is given below.


The Expatriate Indian Writing in English: A Call for Papers


We have just concluded a National Seminar on Expatriate Indian Writing in English (Sep 22-23) at Dept. of English, Kakatiya University, Andhra Pradesh, India. Some of the key participants were Prof. Jasbir Jain (Jaipur), Prof. Manju Jaidka (Chandigarh), Dr. Somdatta Mandal (Shantiniketan), Prof. Veena Noble Dass (Tirupati), Prof. Vijayashree (Hyderabad), Prof. Gopal Rao (Hyderabad), Dr. R.K. Dhawan (Delhi), and Prof. Vinoda (Warangal).

We are now firming up plans for a book on the subject, putting together the papers we have already received at the Seminar, along with the invited ones that fit in. The scope of the book is enlarged to include contributions on writers of Indian origin from the Far East, Africa, Caribbean, and Australia. We are also devoting some space for diasporic theory in the book.

The focus of the book, as in the Seminar, will be on defining (a) the way each of the new writers [of the last quarter century] has come to terms with the diasporic experience, and (b) how he/she relates to India. As with all labels, the “Expatriate Indian Writers” as a broad category subsumes the emigrant first generation as well as the subsequent generations, wherever they are. We welcome submissions on writers of Indian origin not only from USA, Canada and UK, but also from countries like Australia, Far East, Caribbean, and Africa.

Please send abstracts of 500 words by email to Prof. (Mrs) Vinoda at mailto:vinodat@yahoo.co.in by October 31, 2005. On hearing from her the completed articles (not more 3000 words) will be due by November 30, 2005. Queries are welcome by email.
Vinoda
Professor of English
Kakatiya University
Warangal, AP, India

III. Documentation Guidelines for Contributors

Editors’ Note

In days when publishers generally insist on manuscripts being camera-ready to cut down on production costs, it has become imperative that authors/editors prepare their texts in conformity with accepted style norms at the manuscript stage itself. It is, therefore, necessary to ensure that the submissions for inclusion in the book be in a uniform documentation style. In order to help our contributors prepare papers in the accepted style format, we have presented below broad guidelines for the most frequent documentation needs. These guidelines are based on the MLA style. Obviously the guidelines given below are to be used only as a reference tool. For help in regard to specific questions, contributors must consult the guidelines given in

Joseph Gibaldi, ed. MLA Handbook for Writers of Research Papers. 6th ed. New York:
Modern Language Association of America, 2003.
http://www.mla.org/style_faq



Broad Documentation Guidelines

1. Commas and full stops are to be placed inside quotation marks (as in "quotation marks," "quotation marks.").

2. For indented passages guidance could be had from
http://www.aresearchguide.com/5quoting.html

3. We prefer parenthetical documentation to foot-notes or end notes. Please look for examples at http://www.aresearchguide.com/9parenth.html

4. All references originating in the text, be they books or articles, works referred to or those not referred to, are to be arranged in the “Notes” at the end of the paper and the documentation style to be followed is as in the examples to be had at http://www.aresearchguide.com/sampleworks.html

6. Submissions are to be carefully checked for an error-free copy before sending them to the editors.

II. Work on the book

We have a plan in place for this. The key differentiators of the book are:(a) exclusive contributions from select Seminar participants on the most recent works, (b) contributions invited from scholars across the world, (c) responses from select expatriate Indian writers and scholars across the world on the central issues concerning diasporic experience (d) taking stock of the diasporic theory (e)films on Indian diaspora (f)critical discourse not merely on the expatriate Indian writers of the West (Britain, USA, Canada), but also those in the Caribbean, Africa, Far East, Australia, etc. We have enlarged the scope of the book and taken steps to materialise the plan. This might look too ambitious a plan to be actualised within the next two months--the time we have given ourselves. And two months of all-out effort supported by the speed of the internet should make it an entirely possible plan. November end is the time limit by which we expect to crystallise the content and contributors. We have begun work on this plan on September 25, 2005, immediately after the impressive success of the U.G.C. sponsored National Seminar where specialists like Prof. Jasbir Jain, Prof. Manju Jaidka, Dr. Somdatta Mandal, Prof. Vijayashree, Prof. Gopal Rao, Prof. Veena Noble Dass, Dr. R.K. Dhawan, Prof. Vinoda, among others, have taken part. The Seminar put a practical spin on the discourse by including a debate on the book as well as the film text, Anita and Me.

I. Seminar on The Expatriate Indian Writing in English

We at the Department of English, Kakatiya University, Warangal, India organised a two-day National Seminar on "The Expatriate Indian Writing in English" during September 22-23, 2005. There was much lively debate. Participants included well known scholars in the field. The key participants, among others, were Prof. Jasbir Jain (Jaipur), Prof. Manju Jaidka (Chandigarh), Dr. Somdatta Mandal (Shantiniketan), Prof. Veena Noble Dass (Tirupati), Prof. Vijayashree (Hyderabad), Prof. Gopal Rao (Hyderabad), Dr. R.K. Dhawan (Delhi), and Prof. Vinoda (Warangal).

We are now firming up plans for a book on the subject, putting together the papers we have already received at the Seminar, along with the invited ones that fit in. The scope of the book is enlarged to include contributions on writers of Indian origin from the Far East, Africa, Caribbean, and Australia. We are also devoting some space for diasporic theory in the book.

The focus of the book, as in the Seminar, will be on defining (a) the way each of the new writers [of the last quarter century] has come to terms with the diasporic experience, and (b) how he/she relates to India. As with all labels, the “Expatriate Indian Writers” as a broad category subsumes the emigrant first generation as well as the subsequent generations, wherever they are. We welcome submissions on writers of Indian origin not only from USA, Canada and UK, but also from countries like Australia, Far East, Caribbean, and Africa.

We are also planning a section in the book to include responses to a set of questions and issues that are central to diasporic experience across the world. Writers and scholars are welcome to use the following list of issues to send in their responses and, unless permission is specifically withheld, they will be included in the forthcoming book.

ISSUES IN DIASPORIC DISCOURSE
(Prepared by Dr. T. Vinoda, Professor of English, Kaktiya University, Warangal, A.P., India)


Note: The issues listed below are meant to be merely triggers and
alerts to help with diasporic discourse. They do not
pretend to be exhaustive.


1. When we talk about the expatriate Indian writing in English we tend to see Indian expatriate individuals everywhere—scattered across several continents—as linked by a common heritage, history and racial descent. Does such a conception homogenize difference and form a kind of “ethnic absolutism.” (Paul Gilroy was critical about such a conception in “The Black Atlantic as a Counter Culture of Modernity” in the context of African diaspora)?

2. The experience of Indian diaspora in the West vis-à-vis that of the expatriate Indians in the Asian, African, and Pacific regions.

3. How does the expatriate experience of the Asians compare with that of the white Europeans in countries like Britain, America, and Canada.

4. How are voluntary diasporic subjects different from those whose lives were mapped by exile, refugee camps, mass migration and economic emigration? How do constructions of nation and diaspora differ in various transmigrational groups like exiles, fugitives, refugees, immigrants and migrants?

5. In the USA even the naturalized ethnic expatriates are officially categorized with hyphenated designation such as African-American, Asian-American, Jewish American, Indian-American, etc. Some writers like Saul Bellow have felt this to be delimiting. Should this hyphenated integration of ethnic identity with national identity be viewed as “empowerment” or “marginalisation”?

6. Expatriation does not transcend differences of race, class, gender, and sexuality, nor can it stand alone as an epistemological or historical category of analysis, separate and distinct from these interrelated categories.

7. i) To what extent does the ‘old country’ function as a framework and regulate the transplanted identities within the diaspora?

ii) Varying degrees of significance of the origin-ary homeland for the second generation and the generations succeeding it, born and brought up as they are in the diasporic context across the globe. How do they differ from the first/immigrant generation in relating to their cultural heritage?

In the gifted writers, the cross-cultural conflicts/dilemmas are generally disrupted and complicated in productive ways, especially in areas where differences in generations, gender and sexuality intersect--as in Meera Syal in Britain, Jhumpa Lahiri in the USA. Does this point to a trend or a pattern in the future of Indian diaspora.

8. A substantial number of Indian expatriates have several homelands since they have changed places from India, Africa, Britain, Far East and so on after long periods of stay in each place. How does critical discourse treat such multiple acts of expatriation?
9. Is it possible to draw a line of distinction between authentic projections of Indian reality and the allegedly exoticised/stereotyped versions of the same?

10. Writers like Ashis Gupta and Michael Ondaatje have written about subjects unrelated to their bicultural/transcultural experience. How do they answer the question of authenticity? Or, is this to be viewed as a deliberate creative evasion of the delimiting hold of hyphenated label?

11. What creative purpose must have been meant to be served with the inclusion of Indian words in expatriate Indian writing when they actually create a barrier in the understanding for the international reader addressed by the expatriate Indian writer?

12. Genres are often said to be culture-specific. For instance the ‘novel’ as epic, as community dominant, is associated with the East, where as the ‘romance’ as novel, as the tale of an individual, is identified with the West. In this light, is it possible to trace the new narrative modes, points of view and new genres adopted by the expatriate Indian writers to their cultural heritage?