9 September 2023, 2.00 - 4.00pm Zoom Archived
Monthly Guild Meeting – Bidisha Malik on Mira Behn and Khadi
Bidisha will introduce to you Madeleine Slade (1892-1982), better known in India as Mira Behn, the most famous European associate of Mohandas K. Gandhi, who was also a progressive environmental thinker, a fact the world knows less about. She formulated perhaps the first environmentalist agenda in India, highlighting the social and ecological constraints to development and unlimited economic growth.
Mira Behn’s lessons in Gandhian thinking began not in the soil of India but in England, where she learned carding, spinning, and weaving at the Kensington Weavers of London. In India, Mira Behn went on to become a key figure in Gandhi’s Constructive Program for village economic self-reliance: she helped develop and expand Gandhi’s idea of khadi (Indian homespun cloth) through her choice and advocacy of clothes and aesthetics that transcended colonial, gender, class, and elitist bias and her tireless work to improve the methods of spinning, carding, and weaving for village self-determination during India’s independence movement.
Non members can book their place via the following link: https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/bidisha-malik-mira-behn-gandhi-and-khadi-tickets-664148805957