The Psychic Lives of Statues
Reckoning with the Rubble of Empire
An exploration of global statue controversies and cultural memory
From Cape Town to Bristol and Richmond, statues have become sites of resistance and contestation of our imperial past and postcolonial present. The Psychic Lives of Statues by Rahul Rao offers an insightful exploration of these global controversies, demonstrating that beneath their surface lie deeper struggles over race, caste, and the politics of decolonisation.
Rao takes readers on a journey through South Africa, England, the US, Ghana, India, Australia, and Scotland, revealing how statue controversies have dramatically rearranged the canon of anticolonial political thought. By examining these debates through a personal and literary lens, Rao addresses the multifaceted issues of justice, cultural memory, and belonging.
The Psychic Lives of Statues examines both the toppling of colonial statues and the raising of postcolonial ones, demonstrating that the statue form as a medium of representation and a bid for immortality is by no means obsolete. Engaging with artists, scholars, and activists, Rao provides fresh perspectives on how societies grapple with and reinterpret the past and present through iconography.
'This compulsively readable book clearly and forcefully lays out the stakes of the global debate over statues, monuments and other commemorative practices. It shows us that rather than a superficial skirmish in the culture wars, the struggle over statues is about how we live with and relate to one another, and the urgent fight over equality and dignity in the present'
- Laleh Khalili, Institute of Arab and Islamic Studies, University of ExeterAcknowledgements
List Of Abbreviations
- Fallism And The Endtimes Of Apartheid
- The Libidinal Lives Of Statues
- Mahatmas Must Fall
- Statue Of Impunity
- The Pitfalls Of Decolonial Consciousness
- We Are Here Because You Were There
Notes
Index
eBook ISBN: 9780745350806
140mm x 216mm