Events

TAPSA Talk: Neither ‘Slaves’ nor ‘Unfree Labor:’ The Hari Movement and the Failure of Language and Analogy

Thursday, October 24, 2019 - 5:00pm

Foster 103

Mishal Khan, doctoral candidate in Department of Sociology, University of Chicago

How was the metaphor of “slavery” deployed by movements struggling against oppression in early twentieth-century India? In this presentation I explore this question by examining the hari movement, which emerged in the 1920s and 30s in pre-partition Sindh. The haris were a category of landless agricultural laborers who made up the majority of the agricultural work force in colonial Sindh. I first reconstruct the demands and grievances of the movement by examining pamphlets, activist writings, and official publications by leading members of the movement. Examining these sources enables us to determine how “freedom” was defined from the perspective of the haris themselves, against definitions of freedom/unfreedom imposed by colonial state actors, and landed elites. Looking at the imagery and arguments used to ground their claims, I examine several key reasons for the movement’s ultimate failure. I show why the analogy with “slavery” failed, how the haris struggled to even be considered “unfree”, and finally I demonstrate how their exploitation was denied as a labor issue at all.

Dates:
Thursday, October 24, 2019 – 5:00pm
Foster 103