In season 3 of the Ala podcast, we hold a series of conversations with educators, academics and activists on Education in Kerala. We begin the season with an exploration of the legacy of Protestant Mission schools in Kerala and how they informed childhood-making in colonial Kerala. Who was the good educated child? What kind of values were refracted through these constructions?
This is the first episode in Season 3 of Ala’s podcast series: Reimagining Education. View all our podcast episodes here.
In this episode, Divya Kannan, author of Contested Childhoods: Caste and Education in Kerala, joins us to narrate a fascinating story of schooling in Kerala. We begin with an exploration of the legacy of Protestant Mission schools in Kerala and how their engagements, undergirded by their interactions with the British State, and with caste and religious communities, informed childhood-making in colonial Kerala. Who was the good educated child? What kind of values were refracted through these constructions?
We discuss:
- 02:00 – Childhood Studies as a discipline
- 05:00 – Shaping the nallakutti [good child]
- 12:00 – Contextualising Missionary schools of early modern Kerala
- 19:00 – Sewing as a practice in early schools
- 30:00 – Regional disparities within Kerala in educational institutions
- 35:00 – ‘Emotional frontiers’ and what they tell us about the institutions of education
- 42:00 – Methodological challenges in studying childhood
- 50:00 – The need to think beyond the Keralan ‘exceptionalism’.
About the Guest: Dr Divya Kannan is Assistant Professor at the Department of History and Archaeology, Shiv Nadar University Delhi-NCR, India. She is also the co-founder and co-convenor of the online Critical Childhoods and Youth Studies Collective (CCYSC).
Interview/Editing: Deepti Sreeram, Harikrishnan Sasikumar, Renu Susan Jacob, Susruthan.
