---
title: "Bangladesh Culture, Literature and Institutions"
description: "Survey Bangladesh's cultural heritage, literary canon, and national institutions, from Tagore and Nazrul to the Bangla Academy, Shilpakala, and UNESCO"
url: "https://modeldiplomat.com/learn/lessons/bcs-bangladesh-affairs-culture-literature-national-institutions"
---

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Culture, literature & national institutions

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# Culture, literature & national institutions

Bangladesh's cultural heritage, literary canon and national institutions—from Tagore and Nazrul to Bangla Academy, Shilpakala and UNESCO recognitions—mapped for BCS preliminary and

## The Bengali literary canon

Bangladeshi cultural identity is anchored in the Bengali language and its literature, a body of work the BCS treats as core general-knowledge territory. The oldest specimen of Bengali literature is the *Charyapada*, a collection of Buddhist mystic songs composed roughly between the 8th and 12th centuries, discovered by Haraprasad Shastri in the Nepal Royal Court Library in 1907 and published in 1916. Medieval Bengali literature produced the *Mangalkavya* tradition, Chandidas's Vaishnava lyrics, and Alaol's *Padmavati* (17th century, Arakan court).

The modern canon is dominated by two towering figures whom candidates must distinguish precisely. **Rabindranath Tagore (1861–1941)** won the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1913 for *Gitanjali*, the first non-European laureate; his composition *Amar Sonar Bangla* (written 1905, during the anti-partition agitation of Bengal) was adopted as Bangladesh's national anthem. **Kazi Nazrul Islam (1899–1976)**, the *Bidrohi Kobi* (Rebel Poet) whose poem *Bidrohi* appeared in 1922, was brought to Dhaka in 1972 and declared the national poet; he died on 29 August 1976 and is buried beside Dhaka University mosque.

## Builders of Bengali prose and verse

Michael Madhusudan Dutta (1824–1873) pioneered the Bengali sonnet and blank verse with *Meghnad Badh Kavya* (1861). Bankim Chandra Chattopadhyay wrote the first major Bengali novel, *Durgeshnandini* (1865), and *Anandamath* (1882), containing *Vande Mataram*. Among figures more specifically tied to East Bengal/Bangladesh: Begum Rokeya Sakhawat Hossain (1880–1932), pioneer of Muslim women's education and author of *Sultana's Dream* (1905); Jasimuddin (1903–1976), the *Polli Kobi* (folk poet) of *Nakshi Kanthar Math* (1929); Shamsur Rahman (1929–2006), the leading poet of the Liberation generation; and Jahanara Imam (1929–1994), whose memoir *Ekattorer Dingulee* (1986) gave the 1971 war its enduring civilian voice and who led the 1992 Gana Adalat against war criminals.

## Folk traditions and intangible heritage

Bangladesh's folk culture carries formal international recognition that BCS questions exploit. UNESCO inscribed the **Baul songs** of Lalon Shah's mystic tradition on the Representative List of Intangible Cultural Heritage in 2008; **Jamdani weaving** of Dhaka in 2013; **Mangal Shobhajatra**, the Pohela Boishakh procession originating at Dhaka University's Faculty of Fine Arts in 1989, in 2016; and the **art of Shital Pati weaving** of Sylhet in 2017. The Sundarbans (1997) and the ruins of the Buddhist Vihara at Paharpur (Somapura Mahavihara, 1985) and the Mosque City of Bagerhat (Sixty Dome Mosque, 1985) are UNESCO World Heritage Sites. Pohela Boishakh (14 April) and the Ekushey (21 February) observances are the twin pillars of the national cultural calendar, the latter recognised by UNESCO as International Mother Language Day from 1999.

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