D Venkat Rao | The English and Foreign Languages University, Hyderabad (original) (raw)

Papers by D Venkat Rao

Anekant: A Journal of Polysemic Thought, 2014

Oxford University Press eBooks, Nov 29, 2023

India Europe and the Question of Cultural Difference The Apeiron of Relations, 2021

This volume critically engages with the question of cultural difference and the idea of living wi... more This volume critically engages with the question of cultural difference and the idea of living with diversity in the context of India and Europe. It looks at certain essential European categories of learning such as art, nature, the human, literature, relation, philosophy, and the humanities and analyses texts from Sanskrit language (through Telugu resources) to argue that categories like prakriti, loka, jati, dharma, karma, sahitya, and kala cannot be conflated with conceptual formations such as nature, world, caste, religion, (sanctioned) action, literature, and art, respectively. The book questions and unravels the efficacy of European concepts, theories, and interpretive frames in understanding Indian reflective traditions and cultural forms. It also lays the groundwork for reorienting teaching and research in universities in the humanities on the basis of key cultural differences. By focusing on major themes in the humanities discourse and their limitations, the work engages with the writings of Heidegger, Derrida, and Agamben, among others, from radically new vantage points of Sanskrit-Indian reflective traditions, and challenges prevailing ideas about Indian art, literature, and culture. Part of the Critical Humanities Across Cultures series, this book will be an essential read for scholars and researchers of Indian languages and literatures, comparative literature, art and aesthetics, postcolonial studies, cultural and heritage studies, philosophy, political philosophy, comparative philosophy, Sanskrit studies, India studies, South Asian studies, Global South studies, and for those working on education in the humanities/human sciences.

Springer eBooks, 2014

Plato’s legacy continues to persist in discussions concerning the relation between art/literature... more Plato’s legacy continues to persist in discussions concerning the relation between art/literature and philosophy. This chapter examines whether such a legacy or the modern rearticulation of it in German thought is of any relevance in the context of centuries long Sanskrit “literary inquiries.” While exploring the mnemotexts of Sanskrit traditions, this chapter focuses on the work of Rajasekhara and other Lakshanikas. Derrida’s historical-theoretical conceptions of the literary are probed further in this context.

Springer eBooks, 2014

This chapter inquires into the epistemic space of narrative in Indic mnemocultures. If narrative ... more This chapter inquires into the epistemic space of narrative in Indic mnemocultures. If narrative is seen to filiate identity and ethics in temporal terms in European tradition, Sanskrit mnemocultures suspend any such status to narrative; they do not sublimate memory in narratives of self-hood. They spread across through non-narrative strands and are oriented to imparting action knowledges. This chapter concentrates on the Panchatantra to explore the relation between narrative and non-narrative strands and their ethical political implications.

Springer eBooks, 2014

Colonialism ruptures mnemocultures through new modes of knowledge production and representation. ... more Colonialism ruptures mnemocultures through new modes of knowledge production and representation. These new modes displace the embodied and performative practices of recitation and privilege archival accumulation of documented pasts. This chapter shows how a 17th century Telugu poet, Vemana, was turned into an archival object and projected as an underclass rebel. How this colonial legacy continues to dominate readings of Vemana is analyzed in this chapter.

Indian traditions do not valorize any particular discipline as providing the master key for compr... more Indian traditions do not valorize any particular discipline as providing the master key for comprehending the culture in its totality (if any). Despite its prominence and prevalence, even language or mathematical sciences lack any epistemic privilege in the Indian traditions. Yet, inquiries flourished and lively learning traditions emerged in countless ways. As can be seen from various disciplines of learning, reflective creative forms such as dance, painting, sculpture, architecture, music, of living and longevity and ethos of living opened up fundamental inquiries. Yet, all these were rendered in a performative milieu aimed at imparting and cultivating a performative ethos. Hence the centrality of the concern for modes of being and the medium of performance among the enduring Indian traditions of reflection. What is the place of literary inquiries in the double strand of such traditions? Were these inquiries ever animated by any kind of agonism or antagonism with regard to some privileged discourse (as was the case in Europe between the privileged discourse of philosophy and the displaced or domesticated discipline of art/literature)? Who advanced such inquiries in the performative traditions of India, who were their addressees, and what was the impact of the performative impulse in these inquiries? Above all, how does the literary domain relate itself to the deeper current of shared reflective pulse of the tradition—a pulse that throbs between the forces of para and apara? This chapter explores this most enduring domain of performative poetic-reflective living.

Springer eBooks, 2014

In contrast to the European preference for archivally retained memories, this chapter demonstrate... more In contrast to the European preference for archivally retained memories, this chapter demonstrates how Sanskrit traditions sustained and augmented their inheritances through embodied and performative memories. While examining their cultivated indifference toward literacy, the chapter emphasizes the absence of any significant impact of literacy on Sanskrit traditions for millennia. Contemporary debates regarding the memory and literacy in the Indian context are critically examined in this chapter.

As is well known, the double strand of the ‘heard’ (shruti) and ‘recalled’ (smriti) learning of S... more As is well known, the double strand of the ‘heard’ (shruti) and ‘recalled’ (smriti) learning of Sanskrit traditions excelled in verbal–acoustic performative modes; they flourished in such melopoeiac modes for more than a millennium. Even their spectacular graphic visualization did not take recourse to retaining such imaging in externalized material forms (painting and sculpture and even writing). They have had no use for retaining their learning in externally preserved apparatuses generated by manuscripts, archives, museums and libraries. These strands of performative reflections remained indifferent to such surrogate bodies to transmit their liveable learning for a very long time (almost until the beginning of the Common Era). Yet, these mnemocultural traditions did interface with inscriptional forces (of writing and graphic visualization) when the latter impinged on these traditions. How did the traditions of the double strand respond to inscriptional graphical and pigmental formations? What place do painting, architecture and sculpture acquire in these enduring mnemocultures and how did the ‘iconic’ turn articulate the shared reflective currents of the tradition? This chapter focuses specifically on the question of image making in the mnemocultural milieu of India. For the purpose of demonstration, it engages with one of the most celebrated and perhaps the earliest accounts of painting and sculpture—the Vishnudharmottaramahapurana and the Chitrasutra section of it. This inquiry into the materialization of the visual formations amply evinces how the performative reflective traditions of India assimilate and transform the inscriptional formations (writing, painting, sculpture).

Springer eBooks, 2014

Cultures of memory in India are community specific. Cultural communities spread across over mille... more Cultures of memory in India are community specific. Cultural communities spread across over millennia as heterogeneous biocultural formations (jatis). Each of the jatis has brought forth distinct mnemocultural forms to mark its singularity and distinction from the others. Colonialism disrupts precisely this relation between the jati and culture by stigmatizing jati as a symbol of oppression. Denigration of jati results in the undermining of jati-culture. While analysing the colonial stigmatization of biocultural formations of India, this chapter affirms the need to reexamine jati-culture relation mainly to reconfigure the teaching and research in the humanities in India.

Springer eBooks, 2021

In the Indian traditions one can think of a relational quartet prominently at work in the interfa... more In the Indian traditions one can think of a relational quartet prominently at work in the interface between modes of being and forms of reflection-or reflective practices. The quartet is composed of (i) the formation and (ii) what it articulates, (iii) its consequential effects and (iv) the deserving addressee. If the formation is an embodied being what it articulates is the relation between para and apara (the formational and the non-formational); the consequential effect of this formational articulation is either releasement or machinic repetition of the formation. Finally, the deserving addressee of this reflective play is none other than the formational complex itself: the addressee is the addressor as well. Thus, the two effects of the performative that Bharata shows in the Naatyashaastra-that of the performer-oriented gratification and the other-oriented gratification-converge here in the aadhyaatmic figure where the performer is the spectacular/witness/addressee. Therefore, forms of reflection are also modes of being-they too play out what they address/impart. Perhaps depending on the way the formational articulation of the relation between para and apara, the compositional forms and modes of being can be differentiated. No wonder why the figures of significance in these traditions are aachaarya, guru, bharata (player/composer), suta, yogi, jnaani: reflective performers of mnemocultures. The composers of reflections are also practitioners and performers of it: the suta-bharatasage trio is a performative triad as well in the smriti tradition. The composers of aalamkara/ laakshanika/dhvani shaastras are poets and playwrights primarily.

Springer eBooks, 2014

In exploring cultural difference through cultures of memory, this chapter discusses European conc... more In exploring cultural difference through cultures of memory, this chapter discusses European conceptions of memory and technics. While engaging with the classical debate concerning orality and literacy (from Plato to Stiegler) it points to the historical undermining of embodied mnemocultural traditions in European heritage. The chapter offers a mnemocultural critique of Derrida’s conception of “writing” and Stiegler’s account prosthetics.

Springer eBooks, 2021

Anaakhyaana-I The Indian vaangmaya (pervasive utterance) has unfolded in two related currents: (i... more Anaakhyaana-I The Indian vaangmaya (pervasive utterance) has unfolded in two related currents: (i) compositions of the heard and (ii) compositions of the recalled. Hearing, recalling and mindful attention are the three essential technics of cultures of memoryof India. The heard compositions are mostly aphoristic, elliptical and allusive without elaborated narrative or descriptive detail with evolving plots or consummated counsels; whereas the recalled compositions, while drawing on the features of the heard, depart from the former in their expansiveness, inventiveness, assembling colossal domain-specific detail (about medicaments, gestures, song, music, stars and their movement, acoustic-syllabic units, images, icons, idioms, temples, idols, etc.); they weave labyrinthine narratives, dialogic strands and non-narrative sonic ciphers and thus proliferate in infinitely divergent ways. Above all, the 'heard' ones project anonymity-not centred on any conception of 'being'/ purusha (apaurusheya), whereas the 'recalled' ones focus on the purusha (as the subtle being) and often indulge in naming, even while erasing the name/form. Yet, these forays are never severed decisively from the intimationsof the heard. If the recalled compositions provide an enhancive detour, as a responsive reception of/to the heard, it should be possible to configure what is shared among these compositions. Here, the guiding thread that weaves across the vaangmaya can be specified as the indeterminable relation between the formational (that which gets formed) and the non-formational [that which cannot be formed]. One can explore the relation, however, only through the weave of the formations. But every strand of the weave is deeply and persistently retouched by the formless. The formational, in other words, cannot come forth without the non-formational 'touch'. Thus, every discretely woven compositional formation emerges with the touching inherence of the formless untouchable.

Springer eBooks, 2014

This work engages with the question of cultural difference: How do cultures differ from each othe... more This work engages with the question of cultural difference: How do cultures differ from each other? This work moves on the hypothesis that the reflective modes of Indian cultural formations preferred embodied and enacted memory over archival accumulations. This chapter outlines the hypothesis by focusing on specific works from Sanskrit and Telugu languages and undertakes a critique of the European discursive and institutional frames deployed to study Indian traditions of thought. In order to overcome the postcolonial impasse this chapter proposes attention to critical humanities.

Research in African Literatures, 1999

... He Page 6. D. Venkat Rao 167 ... I am sure we should be able to find ways we can create inter... more ... He Page 6. D. Venkat Rao 167 ... I am sure we should be able to find ways we can create international forums when prison writers writing in different languages can actually sit down and exchange experiences. I may not be able to read a novel in Telugu [and] Page 7. ...

almost island, 2020

Philosophical anthropology aims at configuring cultural difference. But the reigning model of th... more Philosophical anthropology aims at configuring cultural difference. But the reigning model of this kind of inquiry continues to be determined by European intellectual history (which focuses on sovereignty, agency, history, writing and archive.) Colonialism institutionalizes this model and ruptures prevalent modes of being and going about in the world. It is imperative that cultural difference must be configured now, by cultures that faced colonialism, against the background of the reigning model. This can be achieved by drawing on the surviving cultural resources and their modes of emergence and circulation. Reflective and creative compositions in Indian cultural formations preferred speech and gestural modes, musical-recitational and performative forms over millennia. Oral-gestural compositions over millennia showed indifference to writing even when this technique and technology was available. While outlining the nature and work of the preferred mnemocultural modes of Indian cultures, this paper offers a sketch of the nurtured dispersals through which these modes sustained and flourished historically and the rupture they suffered in European epistemic violence.

LOKARATNA, 2022

universities of Chicago, California (Berkeley), and Washington (Seattle). Over a career spanning ... more universities of Chicago, California (Berkeley), and Washington (Seattle). Over a career spanning 40 years, he pioneered unique courses and research projects interfacing literary and cultural studies with technology, pedagogy, and the Indian traditions. His academic scholarship of the last two decades explores crucial questions in critical humanities, cultural difference (Indian and European) and the Indian oral, performative and reflective traditions: India, Europe and the

Anekant: A Journal of Polysemic Thought, 2014

Oxford University Press eBooks, Nov 29, 2023

India Europe and the Question of Cultural Difference The Apeiron of Relations, 2021

Springer eBooks, 2014

Springer eBooks, 2021

Springer eBooks, 2014

Springer eBooks, 2021

Springer eBooks, 2014

Research in African Literatures, 1999

almost island, 2020

LOKARATNA, 2022

What follows is a draft piece on one of the installations which Sudarshan Reddy exhibited at Gala... more What follows is a draft piece on one of the installations which Sudarshan Reddy exhibited at Galarie Krinzinger, Vienna, in October 2012. The piece is not based on viewing the installation when it was in exhibition. The exhibition-catalogue itself offers certain perspectives through the apparatus of the camera and the viewing thus executed. The limitations of the piece are partly due to its ‘third-remove’ from the installation. The draft presents a response that is not of someone trained in art history or art-journalism. Shetty’s work challenges one to respond, and I sense that there is a certain kind of calmness in the seemingly violent wrenching and ruptures his work involves. His work impels one to meditate on the materiality of formations and the churn of their trans-formations.

The sign forces divide the sense(s); they bind and unbind the senses. They create an abyss betwee... more The sign forces divide the sense(s); they bind and unbind the senses. They create an abyss between the two senses of the word/concept of the sense. The force could be of the limb and of the face-it is of the senses. Art could be an attempt to grapple with that which exceeds the sign and the sense-the beyond or before of the sense/signs. But the struggle of art can only be through the sign systems and sense nets. This article is an attempt to meditate on the "silent" work of Tyeb Mehta. The sign forces divide the sense(s); they bind and unbind the senses. They create an abyss between the two senses of the word/concept of the sense. The force could be of the limb and of the face-it is of the senses. Art could be an attempt to grapple with that which exceeds the sign and the sense-the beyond or before of the sense/signs. But the struggle of art can only be through the sign systems and sense nets. Archives are constituted by these sign systems and sense relays. But the ends of art are not tied to what is already there, but they drift adestinally to figure the unavailable, the not yet or the yet to come. Invisibility, abocularity and blindness or suspension of the sense could be the condition of art. As a longing for the unavailable, art can only be an interminable mourning, a mourning which can also morph itself into a yearning, a promise and an affirmation of the yet to come. Therefore tears could be the most appropriate sign force of art; for tears suspend the division between the sign and sense, joy and lamentation, pain and pleasure, religion and its banal opposite-in short nature and culture. Above all the force of tears is irrepressible. Memories are residual marks or inscriptions of irretrievable events. They are the interminable traces of the unavailable. Although memories are non-phenomenal in their form, they emerge cocooned in the material biological body. As marks and traces,

మ ుందుగా ... గతాన్ని కాని గత రచయితల్ని కాని పునర్మూల్యాంకనం చేయాలి అనేది వివాదాస్పదమైన ప్రతిపాదన... more మ ుందుగా ...

గతాన్ని కాని గత రచయితల్ని కాని పునర్మూల్యాంకనం చేయాలి అనేది వివాదాస్పదమైన ప్రతిపాదన కాదు. కాని గతంలోని ఏ పార్శ్వాన్ని ఏ రచయితని అనేది, పోతే పునర్మూల్యాంకనం ఎలా చేయాలి అనేవి ప్రశ్నార్థకమౌతాయి, వివాదానికి దారితీస్తాయి. తెలుగులో గతాల గురించి సుదీర్ఘ చర్చలు లేవనే చెప్పవచ్చు. సమకాలీనానికి గతానికి ఒక దాటరాని అగాధం కనబడుతుంది తెలుగులో. సమకాలీనం అంటే ఎదో కేలండర్ చూపే కాలక్రమం – కాబట్టి latest is the best or correct అనే ధోరణి కనబడుతుంది. సమకాలీనం అంటే కాలక్రమ విరుద్ధంగా (anachronistically) వర్తమానంలోంచి సుదూరమనుకున్న గతంలోకి దారులు వెదుకుతూ వర్తమాన సత్త్వాన్ని బేరీజు వేయగలగడం. తెలుగులో అట్లాంటి సాహసిక వివేచన చాల తక్కువగా జరిగిందనే చెప్పాలి. కారణం వలస సంస్కృతి (గత-వర్తమానాల మధ్య) నిలిపిన అగాధాన్ని ప్రౌఢంగా పరిశీలించలేకపోవడం. ఈ అగాధం వలస సంస్కృతే గొప్ప అనే వర్గాన్ని ఒకవైపు నిలిపితే గతమే గొప్ప అనే వర్గాన్ని ఇంకొకవైపు నిలిపింది. ఈ విభజన వలస మేధ పర్యవసానమే. ఈ మేధ తెలుగులోనే కాక భారత ఆలోచనా స్రవంతులని ఇంకా కంట్రోల్ చేస్తూనే ఉంది ఇవ్వాళకూడ.
తెలుగులో పునర్మూల్యాంకనం చేయాల్సిన రచయితల్లో విశ్వనాథ సత్యనారాయణని అగ్రస్థానంలో ఉంచాలి అనేది ఈ వ్యాసo ప్రతిపాదిస్తుంది. వలస మేధ నిర్మించిన విభజన ద్వారానే విశ్వనాథని అర్థం చేసుకోలేము. విశ్వనాథ వలస ఆలోచనలు నిలిపిన కాలక్రమచట్ర విరుద్ధంగా గతాన్ని సమకాలీనం చేయగలిగిన ఒకగొప్ప కవితాత్త్వికుడు. వలస ఆలోచనా విధానాలు పాశ్చాత్యాన్ని మానవ అస్తిత్వానికి మానవ గమ్యానికి ఏకైక ప్రతీకగా నిలుపుతాయి. ఈ మూస ఆలోచనా విధానానికి బాహ్యంగా వివేచించడానికి మన గత సంస్కృతులు వాటి “వైభవం” తెలిస్తే చాలదు. పాశ్చాత్యం గురించి తెలియాలి. పాశ్చాత్య ఆలోచనా విధానాలు ఎలా మనని గురించి మనమే ఆలోచించేవిగా చేస్తాయో తెలుసుకోగలగాలి. అంటే సంస్కృతుల వైవిధ్యాలు తెలియాలి. కవితాత్త్వికుడిగా ఈ లోతుల్ని గ్రహించి తన సారస్వతాన్ని మలువగలిగాడు కాబట్టి విశ్వనాథ రచనల్ని పునర్మూల్యాంకనం చెయ్యాలి. పాశ్చాత్య ఆలోచన సంస్కృతులని సత్తువతో ప్రత్యామ్నాయాన్ని సూచించగలిగే ప్రజ్ఞ విశ్వనాథ సాహిత్యంలో ఉందని ఈ వ్యాసo ప్రతిపాదిస్తుంది. పాశ్చాత్య హేత్వ సిద్ధాంతాలకి భారత తత్త్వ చింతనలకి మధ్య ఉండే భేదాన్ని విశ్వనాథ రచనల ద్వారా చూపే ప్రయత్నం చేస్తుంది ఈ వ్యాసం. ఆంగ్లంలో కొనసాగుతున్న ఇవాల్టి సాహిత్య – తాత్త్విక ఆలోచనా స్రవంతుల్లో కూడా విశ్వనాథ సాధించిన దానికి దగ్గరగా వచ్చేవి లేవనే చెప్పాలి. ఇతర భారత భాషల్లో ఇలాంటి ప్రయోగ ప్రయత్నాలు జరిగాయా అనేది పరిశీలించాలి. కవితాత్త్వికుల ద్వారానే వలస అగథాన్ని దాటే అవకాశం ఉందని చెప్పొచ్చు. ఈ ఆలోచనకి విశ్వనాథ పై సాహసిoచిన ఈ వ్యాసం ఒక modest effort గా మీతో పంచుకోవడం జరుగుతుంది ఈ మాధ్యమo ద్వారా.

Sophia Studies in Cross-cultural Philosophy of Traditions and Cultures 6 Cultures of Memory in South Asia Orality, Literacy and the Problem of Inheritance, 2014

Cultures of Memory in South Asia reconfigures European representations of India as a paradigmatic... more Cultures of Memory in South Asia reconfigures European representations of India as a paradigmatic extension of a classical reading, which posits the relation between text and context in a determined way. It explores the South Asian cultural response to European “textual” inheritances. The main argument of this work is that the reflective and generative nodes of Indian cultural formations are located in the configurations of memory, the body and idiom (verbal and visual), where the body or the body complex becomes the performative effect and medium of articulated memories. This work advances its arguments by engaging with mnemocultures—cultures of memory—that survive and proliferate in speech and gesture. Drawing on Sanskrit and Telugu reflective sources, this work emphasizes the need to engage with cultural memory and the compositional modes of Indian reflective traditions. This important and original work focuses on the ruptured and stigmatised resources of heterogeneous Indian traditions and calls for critical humanities that move beyond the colonially configured received traditions. Cultures of Memory suggests the possibilities of transcultural critical humanities research and teaching initiatives from the Indian context in today’s academy.