Forgetfulness without memory: Reconstruction, Landscape and the Politics of Everyday in Post-Earthquake Gujarat, India

Simpson, Edward

Abstract

For many good reasons, after natural disasters it is common to work with ‘memory’ as part of a collective catharsis and a globalized humanitarian logic. Long‐term anthropological research on the aftermath of the 2001 earthquake in Gujarat, however, also demonstrates the significance of forgetting in local practice. Immediately after the disaster, people vowed to abandon the sites of their loss, leave the ruins as monuments, and rebuild anew on safer ground. In time, though, life returned to the ruins as the terrible proximity of death receded, as memories and new salience were shaped by acts of reconstruction. The article explores some of the political and social factors that make this form of forgetting possible – or even necessary. Evidence of earlier earthquakes in the same region indicates that such ‘forgetting’ has an established history. Together, ethnographic and archival materials combine to cast doubt over the emphasis on ‘remembering’ as the only ‘memory solution’ to suffering.

Citation

Simpson, E. (2020). Forgetfulness without memory: Reconstruction, Landscape and the Politics of Everyday in Post-Earthquake Gujarat, India. Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute, 26(4), 786-804. https://doi.org/10.1111/1467-9655.13416

• Journal Article Type: Article
• Acceptance Date: Nov 26, 2019
• Online Publication Date: Oct 10, 2020
• Publication Date: Dec 1, 2020
• Deposit Date: Jan 7, 2020
• Publicly Available Date: Oct 19, 2020
• Journal: Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute
• Print ISSN: 1359-0987
• Electronic ISSN: 1467-9655
• Publisher: Wiley
• Peer Reviewed: Peer Reviewed
• Volume: 26
• Issue: 4
• Pages: 786-804
• DOI: https://doi.org/10.1111/1467-9655.13416