Call for Papers : 12th International THAAP Conference 2023 -Indus Valley (Harappa) Culture: its legacy and relevance.

12th International THAAP Conference 2023 
Indus Valley (Harappa) Culture: its legacy and relevance.
 

November 2023

Venue: THAAP, 43-G, Gulberg-III, Lahore, Pakistan

CALL FOR PAPERS
Abstract Submission Deadline: 15th July 2023

Theme: At an excavation near Mehergarh along the Bolan River in Balochistan, a tributary of the River Indus, archaeologists discovered that the people of the valley lived in clusters of houses made of standardized, fire-burnt clay bricks more than 9,000 years ago. The technical expertise and social organization to do so, sets that people of antiquity at a high level of development. Archaeologist have discovered similar patterns, further developed in time, throughout the Indus Valley covering parts of Pakistan, India, and beyond to the Gujrat region in India and the Helmand River system in Afghanistan. Hundreds of such sites have been identified and archaeological research has been carried out, and continues, since its discovery in the earlier part of the last century. A long term coordinated research program still awaits permissions from the three countries.
Survival at any level requires technical and social development to find, manipulate and use resources ranging from the tangible, such as food and shelter, to the intangible, such as language, love, peace, and then to celebrate existence through expressions like song, dance and art. Humans interact with nature – water and land, flora and fauna, fire and thunder - to carve out an existence. Depending on the nature of such a struggle within the region and among the family of their birth, accidental as it is, they develop a specific life style with a belief system to explain away the unknown aspects. Culture is the story of that life, both individual and societal. Cultural traditions of Indus Valley Basin, with its regional sub-parts, survive to the present in architecture, dance, small scale replicas of life (toys?) weights and measures, sculpture (clay and metal), body and fabric embellishment, cooking pots, water storage containers, as the tangible aspects and on the intangible side the veneration of the Pipal tree, burial customs, symbol of the bull, personified in the Bull, language (the script though still not deciphered), meaning if any of the beads, shells, and other aspects of the Intangible culture find echo in the present day residents of the area. Life is a one long continuum.

THAAP proposes to organize a conference to further investigate and record the legacy and relevance of the Harappa Culture to our present day. The following are the suggested topics.
1. ARTS:
• Sculpture: clay and metal; human, animal and mythological depiction; small scale replicas of everyday life (toys?)
• Seals and tablets: Design and Composition, Technology, Meaning (?), symbols (?), Trade Facilitation,
• Body Embellishment: Bangles, Jewelry, Color (?)
• Architecture: Brickwork- as decoration, pattern making, firing and skills of masonry.
• Fabric & Textile: making, embellishment and usage
2. Governance, Religion & Decentralization
• Social & Political organization: The vast area has evidence of some centralized standardization enforces covertly or more subtly e.g. standard weights and measures for trade and commerce; A high effective methodology of conflict resolution to sustain a relatively peaceful society over decades, Absence of any dominant centralized authority
• Weaponry
3. River Transportation and Unique Geography
• River Wind (Sind-Bad) Combination in Sind: Vast plain of the river valley in Sind allowed unimpeded strong sea breeze to enable use of sail to come upstream Northward and flow of river to allow goods to simple float down to the Southward. Ideal conditions for transport of goods and thus trade.
• Boat Building, life along the river: Sail making from fabric, Carpentry, Rowing techniques and methods.
• Expansion of the culture to Gujrat India, Oman and other linked areas, inland to Afghanistan, links

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Scholars are invited to research, write, and present papers at the conference to be held on November 2023.
Please send us an abstract of no more than 300 words , at thaap.conference@gmail.com .The actual paper shall be 3000 to 4000 words.
The abstract should be inclusive of the title of the paper and keywords. It should also have the email Id and phone number of the corresponding author.

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A confirmation email will be sent to you when we receive your abstract. If you do not get the confirmation email within a week of sending your abstract, please assume that we have not received your abstract and send us the abstract again.

VENUE
THAAP Premises, 43-G, Gulberg III, Lahore,Pakistan
 

IMPORTANT DATES
Abstract Submission Deadline: 15th July 2023

Ar. Mehreen Mustafa