Dr. Audrey Truschke, Professor of History at Rutgers University, will present a lecture on the subject of "Erasing Indian Muslims in the Hindu Nationalist Past and Present."

This talk analyzes major features of the ongoing Hindu nationalist project to sideline and, ultimately, erase Indian Muslims from India’s past and present. Professor Truschke argues that the two projects—erasing Indo-Muslim contributions to Indian history and disenfranchising Muslims in contemporary India—are deeply linked through the twin poles of Islamophobia and Hindu supremacy that animate Hindutva ideology. She explores that linkage and its devastating consequences for India’s largest religious minority through discrete cases, focusing on north India’s built landscape and Indo-Muslim cultural contributions. Towards the end of the talk, Professor Truschke will consider Hindutva mythology about the past and supremacy of the present that is cultivated to replace India’s demonized Muslims and analyze its likely implications for Indian society.

This event is sponsored by the Islamic Studies program and the Center for Global and Area Studies.