Edward Moon-Little, PhD, University of Cambridge

Thomas Callan Hodson’s confession and the challenges of colonial biographies in Northeast India 

Why did British anthropologist Thomas Callan Hodson quip that he had a “lurid, unprintable past, and no future”? Hodson was an anthropologist, former colonial administrator in Manipur, and coiner of the term “sociolinguistics”. He held positions at several universities in England and the United States before becoming the first William Wyse Professor of Social Anthropology at the University of Cambridge. This paper engages recent debates about decolonisation within the University of Cambridge, and, more broadly, reviews the life and career of Hodson. Building on Hodson’s cryptic remark, I show how Hodson’s conduct in Manipur was deemed so poor that it endangered the prestige of the Raj. In order to grapple with the contradictions of a man who was at turns well-liked and violent, the paper takes inspiration from critical readings of Robert Louis Stevenson’s gothic novel Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde. In addition, the talk will bring to light Hodson’s private reflections on an episode of divine vengeance in Manipur.

Moderator: Maisnam Arnapal