From June 22 to June 24 2022
The Centre for Himalayan Studies is pleased to announce the programme of the conference “Himalayan Journeys : Circulations and Transformations”.The conference will take place in person in the Centre de colloques building on Campus Condorcet in Aubervilliers (north of Paris).
The constraints and limitations imposed by topography, climate and ecology are characteristic of the Himalayan experience, but equally distinctive are the various ways these barriers to social life have been creatively overcome and circumvented. Trade, political, religious or familial connections have allowed for the circulation of people,
goods, skills and ideas.
The intensely historical and changing character of the Himalayan region and of its human settlements exemplifies how movement has been valued differently through time and across cultures. Social and spatial mobilities also result from inequalities and the need to be connected to the pervasive delocalisation of social life.
This conference calls attention to movement as a particular social dynamic and explores how it relates to cultural practices, imaginaries and materialities. Participants consider mobility and circulatory regimes, trails, routes and roads as the “connective tissue” within various historical and political contexts and against the backdrop of rooted
cultures and identities inscribed in particular landscapes. They explore how circulations can be socially transformative.