Embodied Histories, Dislocated Objects: Creative Practice and the Legacies of Empire in South Asia and its Diasporas

This session invites contributions that critically engage the enduring impacts of British colonialism on cultural heritage in South Asia and its diasporas, with a specific focus on how creative practice – particularly performance and other embodied or participatory forms – can function as a method of historical investigation and decolonial critique.

Grounded in postcolonial and decolonial thought (Spivak 1988; Bhabha 1994; Azouley 2019; Mignolo & Walsh 2018; Vázquez 2020) and informed by performance and archival theory (Bhattacharya 2001; Taylor 2003), the session foregrounds subaltern voices and vernacular epistemologies to explore how artists and researchers contest the erasures, silences, and imperial logics that persist in UK public collections. It seeks to surface how embodied creative practices can interrogate colonial-era museum holdings, propose new paradigms for cultural interpretation, and reimagine diasporic collective memory.

We welcome contributions responding to questions such as: How can creative embodied practices be used to decolonize marginalized historical narratives and cultural collections? What roles do vernacular or performance traditions play in challenging colonial frameworks and fostering alternate ways of knowing? How might lived experience and diasporic memory intersect with the colonial residues embedded in art objects and institutional collections?

Contributions may engage the work of artists whose practices model innovative engagements with history, memory, and the afterlives of empire, and submissions from scholars, artists, curators, and practice-based researchers working with South Asian material in UK museum collections are particularly encouraged.

The session will begin with a brief 5-minute introduction by the convenor. This will be followed by 3 to 6 presentations, which may include research papers, short films, and/or performance pieces. Each presentation will last up to 25 minutes, followed by a 5-minute Q&A session.

Submit your Paper via this form. Please download, complete and send it directly to the Session Convenor(s) below by Sunday 2 November 2025:

Dr Anjalie Dalal-Clayton, Decolonising Arts Institute, University of the Arts London, a.dalalclayton@arts.ac.uk