Partition of India and Museums as Cultural Memory

Abstract

Partition of the Indian subcontinent generated a trauma which has not subsumed even after seventy five years. ‘Post memories’ as well as ‘prosthetic memories’ of partition continue to haunt generations born much later. It would not be an exaggeration to state that Partition qualifies as a ‘monumental traumatic event that resists understanding and integration’. Several factors contribute towards this lack of ‘integration’. A major one being, that Partition in its immediate aftermath was relegated to the realm of the “unspeakable.” No public memorial of partition existed until 2017. This paper seeks to examine how memorial spaces, and museums help in allowing for ritual mourning and enables healing in instances of corrosive cultural trauma.