Beyond the Frame: Indian British Connections

About this project

Beyond the Frame: Indian British Connections follows on from the major 3-year AHRC-funded cross-institutional interdisciplinary research project ‘Making Britain: South Asian Visions of Home and Abroad’ (2007-2010). For further information see the archived website.

Beyond the Frame extends the public reach and international impact of ‘Making Britain’. Drawing on the proven success of the UK exhibition (touring 2010-12), this follow-on project proposes a diverse range of new activities to generate further dissemination of Making Britain’s findings in India and Britain.

Central will be a revised and expanded ‘India’ exhibition, swiveling the lens to focus on India in Britain, supported by a dedicated online learning web-space, developed concurrently on the award-winning British Library Learning website. Both features will focus on significant sites of Asian-British engagement including literature, arts and culture, intellectual life, sports and leisure, the World Wars, politics and activism. This collaborative follow-on project seeks to further highlight South Asian participation in intellectual and literary networks, art movements, and activist groupings during this under-explored period of Britain’s multicultural history. The profiling of this layered history, spanning almost ten decades from Queen Victoria’s 1858 Proclamation to the better-known era of migration post-World War II, will make clear the lateral, transverse and often hidden traces of encounter which took place on British soil and their wider relevance in India.

Featuring rich visual evidence as a powerful conduit to provoke dialogue on a history that has largely existed outside orthodox frames, it will swivel the perspective to examine India’s role within Britain (rather than Britain’s well documented imperial influence in India). This expanded exhibition for audiences in India will trace a transverse lineage of Indian-British interactions across the race, class, gender divide and draw public attention to the complex realities of both countries’ intertwined histories. The impact of the 12-panel display will be enhanced by a catalogue, talks, workshops and learning materials. These activities will direct attention to the depth of research underpinning the project and the many stories of political, social and cultural consequence that Making Britain uncovered.

The research team has established professional affiliations with the British Council (India), British Museum, National Archives of India, RCUK (India), Southbank Centre (London) and Victoria and Albert Museum. The project also links a large network of internationally distinguished scholars, educationalists and curators, bringing new perspectives and insights to this material. By its focus on specific Indian-British interactions which illustrate how these early South Asians shaped Britain’s cultural, political and economic life, Beyond the Frame complicates and adds graphic depth to contemporary understandings of ‘diaspora’ and ‘migration’. This will fill a major gap in public knowledge of the significant contribution this population made to the formation of the UK’s long multicultural history and the makings of present-day post-colonial India and Britain.

Key Objectives

• To maximise public impact and legacy through a 7-city tour of a reconceived and expanded collaborative British Library/British Museum/Victoria and Albert Museum exhibition to India, enhancing outreach and Knowledge Transfer/international partnerships.
• Over the next 12 months, Beyond the Frame will add value by widening public access to the cultural history of South Asian Britain, 1858-1950.
• Develop strategic and innovative knowledge exchange partnerships in India (Research Council UK (India Office), British Council in India, National Archives of India) and Britain (OU, British Library, British Museum, Victoria &Albert Museum, Southbank Centre, Asia House).
• Through creative development of learning materials in print (teacher’s packs/worksheets) and online (existing award-winning BL Learning ‘Timelines’ website & ‘Asians in Britain’ micro-site), it will respond to education sector demand for accessible teaching aids, potentially influencing the future direction of the history curriculum in Britain and India.
• The impact will be further extended among non-academic audiences through the compilation of a photographic history of South Asian Britain linking visual sources from Indian and British archives.
• The project intends to open up new interpretative frames and generate ongoing international platforms for interdisciplinary dialogue between Britain and India across academic/non-academic audiences. Through a wide variety of public engagement activities designed to enhance access to South Asian cultural, intellectual and political history in Britain, the project will highlight vital historic antecedents which remain crucially relevant to present-day relations between and within both countries.