Robert is a DPhil research student and Senior Scholar at New College, University of Oxford. He received his Double First Class MA in History from New College and MPhil in American History from Cambridge, before working in education and social outreach in London. He is interested in the British counterculture of the 1960s and early 1970s, and specifically its fascination with Indian music and spirituality. His research asks how Indian cultural forms became so prominent a mere generation after Indian independence from Britain and partition in 1947. The project was inspired by his own experiences of playing psychedelic music and numerous travels through India. 

---

Colloquium Presentation: 30 January 2026 (Sir Henry Wellcome Building, G17 3.30-5pm)

---

A Trip to India: Countercultural Indophilia and Post-Imperial Memory, c. 1965-1973

Abstract

This paper explores British countercultural thinking between the mid-1960s and early 1970s. It focuses on contemporary written sources to investigate the fascination of so-called ‘hippies’ with a culturally contingent and philosophically unifying idea of India. Engaging with recent historiography, it argues that the importance of India to British culture, following Indian independence and partition in 1947, has been significantly underplayed. It will be demonstrated that the psychedelic experience was central to such shifting perceptions. How did these people understand themselves and their worlds? And how does this specifically relate to enduring colonial ideas of India? Taking ‘hippie thought’ seriously from an intellectual history perspective also raises questions about how we should live our lives and implement our values in the West, as well as the importance of respectfully learning from other cultures around the world.