The international Indological conference “Tradition and Innovation in the Languages and Cultures of Premodern South Asia” invites papers exploring the role of consciously and unconsciously established canons and standards in the cultural and linguistic history of the South Asian subcontinent — with particular attention to India — as well as the phenomena and processes that drove their formation and shaped their preservation, transformation, and reception across time.

The conference will serve as the closing event of a four-year research project hosted by Eötvös Loránd University (ELTE) and funded by the Hungarian National Research, Development and Innovation Office (NKFIH). The project (No. K 142535) has investigated processes of canonisation in premodern South Asia from a range of disciplinary perspectives, including philology, philosophy, linguistics, literary history, and religious studies.

Invited speakers

Shonaleeka Kaul (Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi)

Alexander Lubotsky (Universiteit Leiden) 

Peter Bisschop (Universiteit Leiden)

Harunaga Isaacson (Universität Hamburg)

Hugo David (École française d’Extrême-Orient, Paris)