Tenth International Conference on Labour History
The Association of Indian Labour Historians
&
V.V. Giri National Labour Institute, host the
Tenth International Conference on Labour
History
Labour
History: A Return to Politics?
Venue: V.V. Giri National Labour Institute, Sector
24, NOIDA
March 22, 23, 24, 2014
Day 1 (22
March, 2014 )
Saturday
9.15 hrs - 10.00 hrs Registration
and Coffee
9.15 hrs - 10.00
hrs Registration
and Coffee
10.00 hrs - 11.00
hrs: Inauguration
by Smt. Gauri Kumar, Secretary, Ministry of Labour and Employment, Government
of India
Book Launch by Shri P.P. Mitra, Director General, VVGNLI
and Prof. S. Bhattacharya, President AILH
Towards a New History of Work edited by
Sabyasachi Bhattacharya,
Working Lives and Worker Militancy:
The Politics
of Labour in Colonial India Ravi Ahuja,
**************************************
SESSION I
11.00 hrs – 1.00 hrs Parallel Sessions
Group 1
Politics of informality and Origins of Formal Labour – I
Suraiya Farooqui, Ottoman artisans and the sultans’ administration before 1850: A survey of debates in historiography
Jan Lucassen, Shifts in labour relations in India 1800-2000
Leon Fink, Labor unionism and the Indian state: or, A funny thing happened on the way to social democracy
Group 2
Politics of Place, Space and Culture - I

Liam Byrne, The culture of political labour
Eric Florence, The cultural politics of labour in post socialist China: The case of subject formation and identity politics of peasant workers
Banajit Hussain, I-Ju Nodongja/migrant workers’ trade union : the making of resistant subjectivities and emergence of the migrants’ trade unionism in South Korea (1994-2004)
1.00 hrs – 2.00 hrs Lunch Break
SESSION II 2.00 hrs – 4.00 hrs
Group 3
Politics of Informality and Origins of Formal Labour - II
Saumyajit Bhattacharya, Comprehending the ‘In-formal’ – An Analysis of the formal/ informal conundrum in labour under capitalism
Marcelo Badaro Mattos, Informalisation, precariousness and regulation of labour in Brazil: an overview
Nithya Joseph, The politics of producing silk, owning gold, and interacting with the state in a south Indian town
Group 4
Politics of Place, Space and Culture – II

Sumeet Mhaskar, Electoral politics and labour in post-industrial Mumbai
Vinay Kumar, The trajectory of labour politics in Jamshedpur
Christian Chevandier, Deciding social movements: subordinate relationship and process of emancipation in French labor movement (1871-2014)

4.00 hrs - 4:15 hrs Tea Break
SESSION III 4:15 hrs - 6:15 hrs

Group 5
Labouring Lives; Building and Transport
Luisa Barbara Pereira And S. Pasha, The history of unionism in shipbuilding and ship repair workers in global context: Employer, employee and production perspective
Stefan Tetzlaff, New conduits of labour, trade and consumption? Motor transport and India's city-village nexus, c. 1920-1939
Shubhankita Ojha, Understanding work: Bombay dock explosion and the regulation of safety and work at the Bombay docks in the 1940s
Group 6
Lives of Labour: Stories of Struggle
Archana Prasad, The politics of the ‘Adivasi’ workers in contemporary history: Narratives of communist led tribal struggles, 1940-1990
Dhiraj K Nite, Consenting to labour appropriation? The mineworker on South African gold and coalmines, 1951-2011
Dharampal Burmi, A railway man’s life
Day 2 (23 March, 2014), Sunday
SESSION IV 9.00 hrs – 11.00 hrs
Group 1 Servants and Slaves
Henrique Espada, Wages of intimacy: Domestic workers disputing wages in Brazilian higher Court in the XIXth century
Lokesh,
Radhika Chopra, Habitus of trust: Servitude in colonial India
Group 2
Disciplining Bodies and Confining Spaces

Breaking the boundaries: the first
domestic workers’ strike in Pune, Maharashtra
Jyoti Bhosale, Convict labour and economy in
British colonial India: Through the lens of
prison management and private industry
Radhika Singha The Great War and the
abolition of flogging in the Indian Army:
1894-1920
Shilpi Rajpal, Routine, labour and madness:
Work-ethic and the economy of colonial
asylums

11.00 hrs - 11:15 hrs Tea Break
SESSION V 11:15 hrs - 1:15 hrs
Group 3 Servants and Slaves - II
Sonal Sharma, Reversing the gaze: ‘Pollution/purity’, identity and space- employers’ home from women domestic workers’ lens
Akanksha Narayan Singh, Regulating slavery in colonial India
Cassandra Mark-Thiesen The dual meaning of debt: Political considerations for the mobilisation of mining labour in Southwest Ghana, 1877-1911
Group 4 Disciplining Bodies and Confining Spaces - II
Madhavi Jha, Hospital as a site of contestation:
Regulating the health of the indentured labour in
colonial Mauritius 1842-1910
Arun Kumar, School as ‘Evasive Space’: Worker’s dreams and mill owner’s politics in the cotton mills of colonial India (1870s- 1920s)
Matthias van Rossum,
Radjas, sailors and slaves.
Convict workers and resistance in the maritime empire of the Dutch East India Company in the 18th century
1:15 hrs - 2:15 hrs Lunch Break
SESSION VI 2:15 hrs - 4:14 hrs
Group 5 Law and the Rhetoric of Rights
Larissa Rosa Correa, The role of the labor courts in Brazil: workers and employees at the labor court (1953-1964)
Sarah Kunkel, From ‘Private’ to ‘Public’ recruitment in the Gold Coast/Ghana: Creating and controlling a labour market
Sikandar Kumar,
Imperial power and the law
of vulnerability: Childhood, labour and the
evolution of social legislation in the 19th
century
Group 6 Political Society and the ’Marginals’
Gayatri Nair, “Whose Accumulation, Whose
Dispossession?” Exploring conflicts between
local and migrant labour in Mumbai
J. Devika, Deprivation, abjection, and dispossession: Thinking of marginalization in early 21st Century Kerala
Meera Velayudhan,
Unions, new forms of
collectives in Kuttanad, Alappuzha and diverse
narratives of development in Kerala:
Representation, negotiation and agency
4:15 hrs - 4:30 hrs Tea Break
4:30 hrs - 6:00 hrs A return to the labour question? Historical perspectives on contemporary trends in politics: Sudha Bharadwaj, trade unionist and civil rights activist will lead the discussion.
Day 3 (24 March, 2014), Monday
SESSION VII
9.00 hrs – 11.00 hrs
Group 1 Trade Unions and Labour Politics
David Hyde, East African railways and harbours 1945-60 : labour resistance to a ‘crisis of accumulation’
John Barzman, Collective action and labour politics: examples from France 1913-1923
Robert R Raman, Communal riots of 1929 and the contending political currents in Bombay’s mill district
Group 2 Politics of Caste and Community
Shahana Bhattacharya, “Crafting 'class', Shaping 'caste'”: Identities in the formation of tannery workers' unions, Madras and Calcutta c. 1930-1960
Shivangi Jaiswal, Caste and labour in the official discourse of India, 1942-52: Analysing the grammar of caste in the labour department
Maya John, (De)skilling caste: Exploring the relationship between caste, state regulations and the labour market in late colonial India
11.00 hrs - 11:15 hrs Tea Break
SESSION VIII 11:15 hrs - 1:15 hrs
Group 3 The Global and the Local
Sunanda Sen, Colonialism, indentured labour and the age of empire: Parallels to unfree labour under globalisation
Touraj Atabaki, “Far from Home, But at Home”: Indian migrant labour in Iranian oil industry
Karin Hofmeester, Continuity and change in the Indian Diamond Industry 18th–20th Centuries
Group 4 Politics of Caste and Community - II
Aardra Surendran, Voluntary associations in a public sector industrial undertaking: Civic or political action?
Santosh K Rai, Forms of organization and practices of mobilization: Julaha weavers in early twentieth century Northern India
D.W Karuna, Repertoires of Resistance: the Handloom Weavers of South India c. 1800-1960
1:15 hrs - 2:15 hrs Lunch Break
SESSION IX 2:15 hrs - 4:15 hrs
Group 5 The Global and the Local - II
Bidisha Dhar, Crafting a global network: international organizations and artisans, 1960s-1990s
Madhumita Dutta, Unionizing in Special Economic Zone : a case study of a shop floor employees’ union in an electronics SEZ in Sriperumvadur, Kancheepuram District, Tamil Nadu
Sazzad Parwez, An exploitative evolution of labour welfare measure in India: Reference to Special Economic Zone
Group 6 Everyday Politics of Labour
Amy Chazkel, Rio de Janeiro and the politics of nightfall
Rukmini Barua, Power and politics in a mill neighbourhood in Ahmedabad
Paulo Fontes, Trade unions, neighbourhood associations and working-class Politics in São Paulo, Brazil, (1950s-1960s)
SESSION I
11.00 hrs – 1.00 hrs Parallel Sessions
Group 1
Politics of informality and Origins of Formal Labour – I
Suraiya Farooqui, Ottoman artisans and the sultans’ administration before 1850: A survey of debates in historiography
Jan Lucassen, Shifts in labour relations in India 1800-2000
Leon Fink, Labor unionism and the Indian state: or, A funny thing happened on the way to social democracy
Group 2
Politics of Place, Space and Culture - I

Liam Byrne, The culture of political labour
Eric Florence, The cultural politics of labour in post socialist China: The case of subject formation and identity politics of peasant workers
Banajit Hussain, I-Ju Nodongja/migrant workers’ trade union : the making of resistant subjectivities and emergence of the migrants’ trade unionism in South Korea (1994-2004)
1.00 hrs – 2.00 hrs Lunch Break
SESSION II 2.00 hrs – 4.00 hrs
Group 3
Politics of Informality and Origins of Formal Labour - II
Saumyajit Bhattacharya, Comprehending the ‘In-formal’ – An Analysis of the formal/ informal conundrum in labour under capitalism
Marcelo Badaro Mattos, Informalisation, precariousness and regulation of labour in Brazil: an overview
Nithya Joseph, The politics of producing silk, owning gold, and interacting with the state in a south Indian town
Group 4
Politics of Place, Space and Culture – II

Sumeet Mhaskar, Electoral politics and labour in post-industrial Mumbai
Vinay Kumar, The trajectory of labour politics in Jamshedpur
Christian Chevandier, Deciding social movements: subordinate relationship and process of emancipation in French labor movement (1871-2014)

4.00 hrs - 4:15 hrs Tea Break
SESSION III 4:15 hrs - 6:15 hrs

Group 5
Labouring Lives; Building and Transport
Luisa Barbara Pereira And S. Pasha, The history of unionism in shipbuilding and ship repair workers in global context: Employer, employee and production perspective
Stefan Tetzlaff, New conduits of labour, trade and consumption? Motor transport and India's city-village nexus, c. 1920-1939
Shubhankita Ojha, Understanding work: Bombay dock explosion and the regulation of safety and work at the Bombay docks in the 1940s
Group 6
Lives of Labour: Stories of Struggle
Archana Prasad, The politics of the ‘Adivasi’ workers in contemporary history: Narratives of communist led tribal struggles, 1940-1990
Dhiraj K Nite, Consenting to labour appropriation? The mineworker on South African gold and coalmines, 1951-2011
Dharampal Burmi, A railway man’s life
Day 2 (23 March, 2014), Sunday
SESSION IV 9.00 hrs – 11.00 hrs
Group 1 Servants and Slaves
Henrique Espada, Wages of intimacy: Domestic workers disputing wages in Brazilian higher Court in the XIXth century
Lokesh,
Radhika Chopra, Habitus of trust: Servitude in colonial India
Group 2
Disciplining Bodies and Confining Spaces

Breaking the boundaries: the first
domestic workers’ strike in Pune, Maharashtra
Jyoti Bhosale, Convict labour and economy in
British colonial India: Through the lens of
prison management and private industry
Radhika Singha The Great War and the
abolition of flogging in the Indian Army:
1894-1920
Shilpi Rajpal, Routine, labour and madness:
Work-ethic and the economy of colonial
asylums

11.00 hrs - 11:15 hrs Tea Break
SESSION V 11:15 hrs - 1:15 hrs
Group 3 Servants and Slaves - II
Sonal Sharma, Reversing the gaze: ‘Pollution/purity’, identity and space- employers’ home from women domestic workers’ lens
Akanksha Narayan Singh, Regulating slavery in colonial India
Cassandra Mark-Thiesen The dual meaning of debt: Political considerations for the mobilisation of mining labour in Southwest Ghana, 1877-1911
Group 4 Disciplining Bodies and Confining Spaces - II
Madhavi Jha, Hospital as a site of contestation:
Regulating the health of the indentured labour in
colonial Mauritius 1842-1910
Arun Kumar, School as ‘Evasive Space’: Worker’s dreams and mill owner’s politics in the cotton mills of colonial India (1870s- 1920s)
Matthias van Rossum,
Radjas, sailors and slaves.
Convict workers and resistance in the maritime empire of the Dutch East India Company in the 18th century
1:15 hrs - 2:15 hrs Lunch Break
SESSION VI 2:15 hrs - 4:14 hrs
Group 5 Law and the Rhetoric of Rights
Larissa Rosa Correa, The role of the labor courts in Brazil: workers and employees at the labor court (1953-1964)
Sarah Kunkel, From ‘Private’ to ‘Public’ recruitment in the Gold Coast/Ghana: Creating and controlling a labour market
Sikandar Kumar,
Imperial power and the law
of vulnerability: Childhood, labour and the
evolution of social legislation in the 19th
century
Group 6 Political Society and the ’Marginals’
Gayatri Nair, “Whose Accumulation, Whose
Dispossession?” Exploring conflicts between
local and migrant labour in Mumbai
J. Devika, Deprivation, abjection, and dispossession: Thinking of marginalization in early 21st Century Kerala
Meera Velayudhan,
Unions, new forms of
collectives in Kuttanad, Alappuzha and diverse
narratives of development in Kerala:
Representation, negotiation and agency
4:15 hrs - 4:30 hrs Tea Break
4:30 hrs - 6:00 hrs A return to the labour question? Historical perspectives on contemporary trends in politics: Sudha Bharadwaj, trade unionist and civil rights activist will lead the discussion.
Day 3 (24 March, 2014), Monday
SESSION VII
9.00 hrs – 11.00 hrs
Group 1 Trade Unions and Labour Politics
David Hyde, East African railways and harbours 1945-60 : labour resistance to a ‘crisis of accumulation’
John Barzman, Collective action and labour politics: examples from France 1913-1923
Robert R Raman, Communal riots of 1929 and the contending political currents in Bombay’s mill district
Group 2 Politics of Caste and Community
Shahana Bhattacharya, “Crafting 'class', Shaping 'caste'”: Identities in the formation of tannery workers' unions, Madras and Calcutta c. 1930-1960
Shivangi Jaiswal, Caste and labour in the official discourse of India, 1942-52: Analysing the grammar of caste in the labour department
Maya John, (De)skilling caste: Exploring the relationship between caste, state regulations and the labour market in late colonial India
11.00 hrs - 11:15 hrs Tea Break
SESSION VIII 11:15 hrs - 1:15 hrs
Group 3 The Global and the Local
Sunanda Sen, Colonialism, indentured labour and the age of empire: Parallels to unfree labour under globalisation
Touraj Atabaki, “Far from Home, But at Home”: Indian migrant labour in Iranian oil industry
Karin Hofmeester, Continuity and change in the Indian Diamond Industry 18th–20th Centuries
Group 4 Politics of Caste and Community - II
Aardra Surendran, Voluntary associations in a public sector industrial undertaking: Civic or political action?
Santosh K Rai, Forms of organization and practices of mobilization: Julaha weavers in early twentieth century Northern India
D.W Karuna, Repertoires of Resistance: the Handloom Weavers of South India c. 1800-1960
1:15 hrs - 2:15 hrs Lunch Break
SESSION IX 2:15 hrs - 4:15 hrs
Group 5 The Global and the Local - II
Bidisha Dhar, Crafting a global network: international organizations and artisans, 1960s-1990s
Madhumita Dutta, Unionizing in Special Economic Zone : a case study of a shop floor employees’ union in an electronics SEZ in Sriperumvadur, Kancheepuram District, Tamil Nadu
Sazzad Parwez, An exploitative evolution of labour welfare measure in India: Reference to Special Economic Zone
Group 6 Everyday Politics of Labour
Amy Chazkel, Rio de Janeiro and the politics of nightfall
Rukmini Barua, Power and politics in a mill neighbourhood in Ahmedabad
Paulo Fontes, Trade unions, neighbourhood associations and working-class Politics in São Paulo, Brazil, (1950s-1960s)
Plenary
Session: Summing Up and the Way forward: Marcel van der Linden
