Death and Life in the Bordersand: On the Queer Remembrance of Partition through Geetanjali Shree’s Tomb of Sand

Abstract

This essay reads Geetanjali Shree’s Tomb of Sand as a radical queer remembrance of Partition at the conjuncture of its 75^th anniversary. By coining “bordersand,” where “sand” takes “land’s” place, I highlight the symbolic role that sand plays both in queering the inarticulate space of death, chronicling human connections from milliseconds to billions of years, and demonstrating a universal empathy to the trans/gression of borders. My reading of the novel engages with feminist historiography, making queer kin, and hauntology, showcasing how Shree de-localizes the responsibility of remembering Partition as a nation-state-based interest. To a broader audience interested in tackling the limits of archive and the folly of treating state and tribal violence as an aberrant moment in the history of democracy, Shree exemplifies the use of creative narrative techniques—such as a “second act” for the silenced subaltern—to rewrite the experiences of mass disappearance and displacement caused by global structural violence.

Keywords:

• Tomb of sand
• partition
• hauntology
• queer
• historiography

Disclosure Statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Notes

1 It was not until 2021 that Indian leaders, represented by Prime Minister Narendra Modi, declared that August 14^th as the country’s annual “Partition Horrors Remembrance Day.” As Modi emphasized the goal of “strengthen[ing] the spirit of oneness, social harmony and human empowerment,” the speech eluded Partition’s aftershocks that are intricated in India’s contemporary communalism and continued effort to depict a future-oriented present in an antagonistic relationship to the bitter past.

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Weiling Deng

Dr. Weiling Deng is Assistant Professor of Interdisciplinary Studies and Digital Humanities at Champlain College. Her research interests include feminist historiography, gender and race in technology, comparative education, urban and digital humanities, Asian and Asian American Studies, and critical oceanic studies.