News / Events

Continued from Front Page

Professor Ian Barrow's Book:
..."For instance, the Mujibur Rahman museum in Dhaka is the very house where he was killed along with virtually all of his family, including his wife, three sons, two daughters-in-law and a brother. The museum also preserves under glass the bloodied clothing he wore on the night of his death, the bullet holes in the concrete floors and the blood and flesh that were sprayed onto the walls. But beyond displaying the personal tragedy, the exhibits suggest that Mujib’s death was also, in some sense, the death of the new nation of Bangladesh. Indeed, one of the aspects of the museums that interests me the most is how they all conjure up a tension between presenting the leader as the embodiment of the newly independent country (all are presented as ‘men of the people,’ for example) and yet also indicating that the nation can survive without that leader. I argue that the museums’ implicit answer is to suggest that the leaders’ national efforts remain incomplete and that the next generation, often relatives of the murdered individuals, must continue their policies.

While I am undoubtedly interested in what is in the museums – what they say about the life and death of the leaders; why they are often so similarly organized; how they encourage visitors to remember the leaders in certain ways – I am especially fascinated by what is left out. Rarely included are the reasons for the killings, and so I am paying a lot of attention to why they were killed and why the museums might wish to ignore or at least downplay those reasons."

April 2010: Vanita Viswanath, director of Udyogini, visits Middlebury

Vanita Viswanath is Chief Executive Officer of Udyogini, a non-profit organization working in seven states of North and Central India building capacity, enabling market access and undertaking supply chain development for microenterprises for poor women. She has also worked for The World Bank, Washington, D.C. and the Institute for Social and Economic Change, Bangalore, India.


She spoke on her organization, Udyogini, and the challenges and opportunities of working with women in India. Her talk specifically focused on women working with women to alleviate poverty in a market economy. Students engaged with her on a multitude of topics including the role of technology, gender restrictions, cultural aspects of working in India and government-NGO collaboration.