Wofür steht die JNU und wem gehört ihr Campus? – Der symbolische Deutungskampf um den Campus der Jawaharlal Nehru Universität

Abstract

This article examines how the campus of the Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU) has changed since 2016 (materially and structurally) and how these developments influence everyday life on the campus. I argue that these changes represent a negotiation process around the symbolism of JNU, which links to the understanding of the idea of nationality as well as the idea of a university. This article shows how the JNU university administration (and furthermore the government) strategically attempts to intervene in the campus space and thereby change the idea represented by JNU. Further, I look at resistant patterns of action and reinterpretation as well as transmedia memory practices used by students to sustain an inter-generational narrative of JNU as a utopian space based on the identity markers “excellent teaching” and “anti-establishment culture.” In this context, I understand the university and its campus as a space that is discursively and materially constructed through narrative, collective memory practices, and everyday tactics. Starting from an apparent micro-event in campus life, I argue that the campus has become a symbolic battlefield in the ongoing fight over spaces, bodies, and memories. Everyday practices of resistance are used to counter state- directed techniques of control.