Event

In this more participatory session, we intend to demonstrate the purpose and method of our project. We show how the reading of medieval inscriptions helped us visualize a spatio-temporal mapping of how people measured and made values through calculations performed as part of routine occupations and in everyday life. After creating darabase of information about measures, were were able to reconstruct a historical atlas of metrology for the Kaveri Delta. We then read select inscriptions and used them to interact with local land workers, helping both parties to understand patterns of land organization and settlements with respect to canal irrigation and field measures. This exercise raised important questions about standards, measures and the political economy of abstraction. All of these enquiries came together suggesting a new approach doing history of computational practices, allowing us to think about making an archive of practices as a pedagogic resource for all those impacted by the practice of measuring. We hope that all will gain a better understanding of the relation between, text, practice and practitioner and the crucial nexus of knowledge production in a caste society. Some of this material is already available and we will invite students and scholars to engage with these resources and provide us with critical feedback in this session.