Projects Collaborated π
The project surveyed historical Tamil and Malayalam mathematical treatises, particularly texts belonging to the Kanakkatikaram genre, and documented their locations, versions, editions, and publications. It also identified a substantial but understudied body of manuscripts on architecture, including Manaiyadi Sastiram and Manai Alankaram. The project produced a survey of manuscripts identified through exploratory visits to institutions and private collections.
The project tried to document Chettiar Mercantile Account Keeping Practices to understand how elementary arithmetic training was transformed into practical accounting skills and computational practices in business. A fullfledged project exploring relationship between accounting expertise, computational prowess of chettiar accountants, and the mercantile networks through which commodities, capital, and labour moved across the Indian Ocean in yet to be conceived.
The project surveyed and digitally preserved manuscripts and printed materials documenting the mathematical, scientific, cultural, and educational practices of Islamic communities along the Coromandel and Malabar coasts. Materials from private collections, mosques, and madrasas were digitised, with particular attention to early sources on calculation, Islamic sciences, astronomy, medicine, architecture, folklore, and literature in Tamil and Malayalam.
The project preserved and digitised K.V.AL.RM.M.RM.M Valli Muthiah’s family archive containing mercantile records from business ventures in historic Burma and Malaya, dating from the 1890s to 1946. The archive provides primary sources for studying Chettiar mercantile networks, business practices, accounting traditions, arithmetic training, and the movement of capital, commodities, and labour across the Indian Ocean.
The project aims to preserve ways of life and traditional knowledge of fishing communities by archiving magazines, newsletters, booklets, and pamphlets produced by members of the fishing community themselves.
The project examined vernacular mathematical practices in Tamil Nadu and Kerala between the 9th and 16th centuries, moving beyond the traditional focus on canonical Sanskrit treatises. It investigated the development of mathematical notations and measurement practices, the education and social role of village accountants, and the relationships between different mathematical sub-cultures in South India.
The project explores the histories of measurement practices in Tamil Nadu, Keralam, and Karnataka by tracing the value chains of commodities and the social lives of measuring instruments across time and communities. It aims to develop a digital archive of mathematical practices and measuring instruments as well as a Historical Atlas of Metrology documenting measuring objects and practices, alongside ethnographic research into how measurement shapes notions of value, fairness, and justice.