Sericulture Blogs

http://simoncharsley.blogspot.in/

SILK IN S INDIA

THIS NEW SITE IS FOR POSTINGS FOR 'SILK PRODUCTION IN SOUTH INDIA: AN EVALUATIVE HISTORY OF DEVELOPMENT SCHEMES, 1790S TO 1990S', SUPPORTED IN 2008-2010 BY THE BRITISH ACADEMY.




http://silkwormmori.blogspot.in/

THE SILKWORM

This blog covers the entire domain of sericulture. It is designed for providing a common platform for discussion between scientists, policy makers and students in the field. reproduction of content from this blog with due acknowledgement is encouraged.

http://silkwormmori.blogspot.in/2010/11/sericulture-in-cevennes-from-first.html
Sericulture in the Cévennes: from a first visit, autumn 2010

"Prof.Simon Charsley’s name evokes mixed feelings of respect, admiration and affection in our minds."

"Professor Charsley spent his prime years in India, and took up study on a topic which would have appeared rather unfashionable to the contemporary intelligentsia. His introduction to Indian Sericulture was quite accidental. In his own words”... I first came to India on a Younger Scientist exchange programme and found sericulture in Mysore. The enthusiasm that I met led me to a research project on the silk industry and how it worked in practice, and also to many good friends....” That was in the mid seventies- an era marked by rapid modernisation of Indian sericulture sector. The result of his intensive study of the rural livelihood was the classic “Culture and Sericulture (1982)” which still remains one of the most authentic documentations on Indian sericulture and probably the only one comparable to the work of Lefroy and Ansorge (1915), though different in perspective and purpose. Subsequently he wrote a number of papers practically covering every aspect of the industry viz.regulated markets, middlemen, technology, silk reeling etc. which still remain most valuble reference material for students of respective disciplines.

Indian sericulture is indebted to Prof. Charsley, primarily for bringing it into the contemporary developmental rhetoric. He was the first and (unfortunately) the last to address sericulture as a livestock industry. Probably its scope of being so designated is largely under-estimated by the academics and policy makers. Prof. Charsley argued that sericulture shares much with and historically has led the way for other livestock industries and advocated its importance in the developmental context. His view of sericulture- as a ‘study material’ in social and anthropological assessment of development in a society where people are separated not only by status, culture and life circumstances but also by religion caste and politics is still highly relevant. "