Journals and Magazines in the Formation of the Modern Punjabi Literary Imaginary

Presenter:

---

Abstract

From the formation of early journals in colonial India, such as Punjābī Darbār in Lyallpur (now Faislabad) in 1928, Prīt Laṛī (founded by Gurbakhsh Singh in 1933), to more recent initiatives, such as Huṇ, in the Indian Punjab, and Bārāh Māh, founded in 2018 in Lahore, literary magazines have served a foundational role in the articulation of modern Punjabi literary worlds across the borders that have divided Punjabis. This is so both for Punjabi speakers in India and Pakistan, as well as within the multiple Diasporic national settings where Punjabis write and publish. The literary journal Watanoṅ Dūr or “Far from the Homeland,” founded in the greater Vancouver, Canada area in 1973, was later revived as Watan, indicating both the acceptance of Canada as “home” – and the place of Punjabi in that homeland. This paper will assess the role of the modern Punjabi literary magazine in broad historical terms, to provide a sense of the genre as a whole, through key examples, and analysis of its role in promoting and disseminating modern Punjabi literary production in diverse national contexts.