IF YOU'D like to learn of another perspective on Portuguese stamps, check
out Marblehead (MA)-based anthropologist Dr Robert S Newman's essay
*Orientalism for Kids: Postage Stamps and 'Creating' South Asia.
Interesting.
Some extracts:
"It is useful to speculate on how much postage stamps
(and other such ephemera) influenced people around the
world to think about India in certain ways; how they
shaped people's thinking about the colonial rulers. Has
Goan been regarded traditionally as a 'Portuguese
enclave' on the coast of India because its stamps
never showed a single thing derived from Indian
culture? I believe the answer is 'yes' in minute
part -- there are, of course, other, more major
reasons, but philately was definitely part of the whole
project to say 'Aqui e' Portugal'.
"The Portuguese portrayal of India different from the
British and the French and also from their own
portrayal of other colonies in Africa and Asia on
postage stamps. Like French India, Portuguese India
(India Portuguesa or Estado da India) was tiny,
consisting of five enclaves separated by British
Indian territory, amounting to just over 1500 square
miles and some 650,000 souls when independent India
expelled the Portuguese in 1961. Stamps were issued
first in 1871 and Portugal continued to print stamps
for its lost colony for some time after 1961...
"The Portuguese always regarded their colonies as
much more an integral part of the metropole
than did the British or French. The stamps illustrated
this...
"The first stamp of Portuguese India by itself showed
Vasco da Gama and his flagship. This stamp, printed
in January 1925, set the tone for the next 36 years.
In that time well over 200 stamps were issued. Not one
gave the slightest hint that 50 per cent of the
population was not Catholic, only 10 per cent could speak
Portuguese, and there existed a very strong and
vibrant culture beyond the European. Rather than
'create' an India, the Portuguese denied it totally..."
This is from his book 'Of Umbrellas, Goddesses & Dreams: Essays on Goan
Culture and Society' (2001, Other India Press, Mapusa).
I guess the recent attempts at saffronising stamps -- and creating a new
set of 'heroes' -- by the BJP-dominated alliance at New Delhi could
also give researchers like Dr Newman a whole new dimension to look at! FN
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Frederick Noronha (FN) | http://www.fredericknoronha.net
Freelance Journalist | http://www.bytesforall.org
http://goalinks.pitas.com | http://joingoanet.shorturl.com
http://linuxinindia.pitas.com | http://www.livejournal.com/users/goalinks
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