Related to Goa? If so, some pointers please. FN On Tue, 27 Jan 2026 at 13:02, sandra lobo <[email protected]> wrote:
> There are many multidisciplinary studies in English and Portuguese being > published that express such pluralistic complexifying perspectives. > > > > > > ------------------------------ > *De:* 'Shubha Chaudhuri' via Goa-Research-Net < > [email protected]> > *Enviado:* 27 de janeiro de 2026 04:59 > *Para:* [email protected] < > [email protected]> > *Assunto:* Re: [GRN] Read: Deconstructing Nationalist Historiography of > Goa > > Are there any such works ? A pluralistic view ? It would be so welcome. > > Yahoo Mail: Search, organise, conquer > <https://mail.onelink.me/107872968?pid=nativeplacement&c=US_Acquisition_YMktg_315_SearchOrgConquer_EmailSignature&af_sub1=Acquisition&af_sub2=US_YMktg&af_sub3=&af_sub4=100002039&af_sub5=C01_Email_Static_&af_ios_store_cpp=0c38e4b0-a27e-40f9-a211-f4e2de32ab91&af_android_url=https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.yahoo.mobile.client.android.mail&listing=search_organize_conquer> > > On Mon, 26 Jan 2026 at 7:30 pm, Vivek Pinto > <[email protected]> wrote: > > > By: Rev. Fr. (Dr.) Victor Ferrao [ Rev. (Dr.) Victor Ferrao holds a > Doctorate in Philosophy of Science with specialization in Science Religion > Dialogue from the Philosophy Department of Jnana-Deepa Vidyapeeth, Pune] > Published in: *Think Goa, Goans, Goaness* > Date: January 25, 2026 > Source: > https://www.jnanamrit.com/2026/01/25/deconstructing-nationalist-historiography-of-goa/ > > Goa’s history is frequently told through a dramatic arc: Portuguese > conquest in 1510 followed by four and a half centuries of colonial rule, > ending with integration into India in 1961. This dominant nationalist > narrative casts Goa as a long-suffering territory that was finally > “liberated” and returned to its rightful place within the Indian nation. > Yet this telling often resembles a spiritualist biography, an idealized, > almost hagiographic account that elevates heroic figures, celebrates a > supposed pre-colonial golden age, and frames the entire colonial period as > an unnatural interruption of an authentic Indian destiny. > > Such accounts reduce Goans to passive objects caught in a “dark history” > of foreign domination. They present the people of Goa less as historical > agents and more as victims caught in the waiting room of history awaiting > national redemption. This article argues for moving beyond these > nationalist meta-narratives—narratives heavily inflected with religious > meaning—and toward histories that recognize distributed agency: Goans as > active participants who made choices, collaborated, resisted, adapted, and > sometimes profited within the structures they inhabited. Victimhood > stories, while emotionally powerful, must be replaced by accounts that > accept collective responsibility for both the bright and shadowed aspects > of the past. > > The Nationalist Meta-Narrative as Spiritual Biography > > In many nationalist retellings, Goa itself becomes a spiritual entity—an > ancient land with deep civilizational roots that was temporarily alienated > from Bharat by an alien power. The Portuguese era is portrayed as a long > night of denationalization, cultural suppression, and religious coercion > from which Goa was ultimately rescued in 1961. Figures who advocated for > integration are frequently canonized as founding fathers of Goan > nationalism, their lives narrated almost as journeys of awakening and > sacrifice. > > This framing serves a clear teleological purpose: it makes the post-1961 > present appear as the natural and morally correct outcome of history. The > pre-Portuguese past is romanticized, often with strong Hindu civilizational > overtones, while the Indo-Portuguese centuries are flattened into a single > story of oppression and resistance. The result is a highly selective > biography of the territory rather than a social history of its people. > > This spiritualized narrative tends to erase the profound hybridity that > actually characterized Goan society. Over generations, Goans created > distinctive forms of language, architecture, cuisine, music, dress, and > religious practice that cannot be reduced to either “Indian” or > “Portuguese” labels. Yet nationalist historiography frequently downplays or > delegitimizes these syncretic realities in favor of an imagined purer > origin. > > Religion as the Hidden Engine of Nationalist History-writing > > A second major distortion arises from the entanglement of nationalist > history with religious identity politics—particularly the project of > constructing a continuity Hindu civilizational. In this lens, the > Portuguese period is remembered almost exclusively for conversions, the > destruction of temples, and the activities of the Inquisition. These were > undoubtedly violent and coercive episodes. However, the selective emphasis > on them often serves a contemporary political purpose: to position Goan > Catholics as people who must be “re-Hinduized” or at least reminded of > their supposed original civilizational belonging. > > This religious framing produces a stark binary: indigenous Hindu culture > versus alien Christian imposition. It marginalizes the lived experience of > Goan Catholics, who developed their own distinctive forms of Christianity > deeply rooted in local language, landscape, and social structures. It also > obscures the fact that caste hierarchies, landlordism, and exclusionary > practices persisted strongly across religious lines throughout the colonial > centuries and beyond. > > When history is written primarily to serve religious-nationalist > mobilization, it becomes difficult to acknowledge complexity: moments of > collaboration between Goan elites and colonial authorities, periods of > mutual cultural influence, or the active role played by some Goans in > sustaining colonial institutions for reasons of social mobility, economic > advantage, or simple survival. > > Distributed Agency: Goans as Historical Actors, Not Objects > > A more honest historiography begins by distributing historical agency > across Goan society rather than concentrating it in the hands of either > Portuguese rulers or later nationalist heroes. > > Goans were never merely passive recipients of colonial policy. Some > resisted openly through rebellions, petitions, and intellectual critique. > Others negotiated within the system—gaining education, entering the > professions, acquiring land titles, or rising within the church hierarchy. > Still others collaborated for reasons of pragmatism, ambition, or belief. > Lower-caste and Indigenous communities often developed their own survival > strategies, forms of everyday resistance, and alternative religious > expressions that official chronicles rarely recorded. > > Women, too, were historical actors whether as maintainers of household > economies, participants in market networks, quiet dissenters within > families, or, in later periods, active contributors to anti-colonial > organizations. Even the much-mythologized Goan diaspora did not simply flee > or passively await return; its members actively shaped transnational > networks of ideas, capital, and identity. > > Recognizing this distributed agency dismantles the comforting but > misleading image of a homogeneous, uniformly victimized population. It > replaces the passive object with the active subject. > > From Victimhood to Responsibility > > Victimhood narratives have emotional and political utility: they create > solidarity, justify claims for redress, and provide moral clarity. Yet they > also carry costs. When a society defines itself primarily through what was > done to it, it risks absolving itself of responsibility for what it did. > > In Goa’s case, responsibility includes uncomfortable truths: > > 1. Some Goans participated in the mechanisms of conversion and cultural > policing, whether for social advancement or under coercion. > 2. Upper-caste Hindus and Christians alike often collaborated in > maintaining exploitative agrarian structures.3. Communal tensions, caste > discrimination, and exclusionary practices were reproduced within Goan > society across religious lines. > 4. Internal hierarchies and inequalities were not solely imported; they > were also locally sustained and adapted. > > Accepting these shades does not cancel the real suffering inflicted by > colonial violence, conversion separation, cultural erasure campaigns, or > economic exploitation. It simply refuses to externalize every failing onto > an outside enemy. A mature historical consciousness holds both truths > simultaneously: the damage done to Goans and the damage done by Goans. > > Toward a Plural, Responsible Goan History > > Nationalist historiography, especially when cast in spiritual-biographical > form, offers comfort and coherence at the price of simplification and > exclusion. It flattens Goans into symbols rather than treating them as full > historical subjects. It often serves contemporary religious and political > projects more than it illuminates the past. > > Let humbly offer a richer approach: > > 1. Center the plurality of Goan voices and experiences rather than a > single teleological storyline.2. Cultural hybridity as a creative > achievement rather than a symptom of alienation. > Distribute agency across classes, castes, genders, religions, and regions. > 4. Replace narratives of pure victimhood with narratives of complex, > morally ambiguous agency. > 5. Accept collective responsibility for both the luminous and shadowed > parts of the Goan past. > > Only through such a reckoning can Goans claim full authorship of their > history not as objects of someone else’s dark chapter, but as co-authors of > a complicated, living story that continues to unfold. > > -- > You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups > "Goa-Research-Net" group. > To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an > email to [email protected]. > To view this discussion, visit > https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/goa-research-net/CAH3OY9zFzddpWa0NFXvLp5hDMioKhS-dgV_b2K0430g1BB_zmg%40mail.gmail.com > <https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/goa-research-net/CAH3OY9zFzddpWa0NFXvLp5hDMioKhS-dgV_b2K0430g1BB_zmg%40mail.gmail.com?utm_medium=email&utm_source=footer> > . > > -- > You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups > "Goa-Research-Net" group. > To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an > email to [email protected]. > To view this discussion, visit > https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/goa-research-net/48585146.75596.1769489943850%40mail.yahoo.com > <https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/goa-research-net/48585146.75596.1769489943850%40mail.yahoo.com?utm_medium=email&utm_source=footer> > . > > -- > You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups > "Goa-Research-Net" group. > To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an > email to [email protected]. > To view this discussion, visit > https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/goa-research-net/DB8PR10MB3766FAAA1FF62AD884808A52A590A%40DB8PR10MB3766.EURPRD10.PROD.OUTLOOK.COM > <https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/goa-research-net/DB8PR10MB3766FAAA1FF62AD884808A52A590A%40DB8PR10MB3766.EURPRD10.PROD.OUTLOOK.COM?utm_medium=email&utm_source=footer> > . > -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Goa-Research-Net" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to [email protected]. To view this discussion, visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/goa-research-net/CA%2Bmqab9MLPbmXP143iqPJ4oNG4rGN%2BBYVQc3Sk8Qz%2B9OQALBxQ%40mail.gmail.com.
