Documentation of traditional diving for pearl and chunk in Mannar Gulf, from the Sangam period onwards;
These funds were very useful as seed money for ethnographic study in the Tamil region. As a result, Tamil University has extended its helping hand to widen the survey for the Palk Bay region also. INSA, New Delhi, also provided some contingency grants to improve the study of traditional pearl and chank fishing. Since the Trust has encouraged such a small study, I feel more confident in pursuing further ethnographic study uncovered by the scholars.
Artistic expression of the Kodavas through artifacts, ritual and performance
The grant helped me to understand the ethnic culture of the Kodavas (Kodagu, Karnataka) and largely exposed me to the rural environment, paving the way to the use of natural materials, pigments, cloth for my growing practive of installation and site-specific work. I was awarded the Commonwealth Arts and Crafts Award and was artist-in residence at the University of Newcastle in 1997-8.
The construction of indigenous gods and linkages with the communities of eastern Uttar Pradesh
The award of a Small Study and Research grant proved invaluable for me for reasons probably different from many others. I was not a young scholar but a university teacher in mid-career, and had developed a serious academic interest in an area that was not directly related to my formal discipline of English literature. My independent readings in sociology, anthropology and history, along with my travels in the Indian countryside had opened the fresh arena of the creation and continuation of village gods as an intergral part of cultural existence in India.
To research the collections at the National Museum and to construct school loan kits as an aid in teaching history in schools
To study arms and weaponry of the Palaeolithic period and rock painting of Central India with special reference to Dhongarh, Madhya Pradesh
To study the masking traditions in tribal India
