This book argues that road-building was naturalised in the twentieth century to the point of common sense, integrating roadbuilding into a system of climate change denial hidden within a broad international development imperative. But if we can ‘read’ South Asian roads as forms of governance and knowledge, we can challenge the region’s established geopolitical narratives, and the idea of a never-ending future.Highways to the End of the Worldexplores the political economy o...

Post India’s economic liberalization in the 1990s, the village ceased to be central to ongoing sociological concerns. As a result, the period saw a marginalization of rural life and agrarian economy in the national imagination. However, in the 21st century as India transforms, so does its rural life. This book revisits the realities of contemporary rural India, exploring the trajectories of change across regions such as those in rural economies, the relationship of villages to the outside ...

Based on substantial ethnographic, textual and archival research, this interesting book offers a new perspective on the anthropology of the western Indian Ocean. Writing in a clear, engaging style, and covering an impressive range of theoretical terrain, Simpson critically explores the relationships between people and things that give life to the region and drive shifting patterns of social change among Muslims in the highly-politicized state of Gujarat.Scholars of the Indian Ocean...

This book consolidates scholarship on Gujarat in English and other European languages, notably, Dutch, German, French, Italian and Portuguese. It draws together well-known sources, as well as rare and under-exploited research material. Detailed bibliographical references are provided for books, chapters, periodical literature, dissertations, project reports, other materials published since 1800; anonymous works and select government publications, such as gazetteers and census reports, are als...

Hindu nationalism came to world attention in 1998, when the Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) won national elections in India. Although the BJP was defeated nationally in 2004, it continues to govern large Indian states, and the movement it represents remains a major force in the world's largest democracy. This book presents the thought of the founding fathers and key intellectual leaders of Hindu nationalism from the time of the British Raj, through the independence period, t...

Bringing South Asian and British imperial history together with recent scholarship on transnationalism and postcolonialism, Tony Ballantyne offers a bold reevaluation of constructions of Sikh identity from the late eighteenth century through the early twenty-first. Ballantyne considers Sikh communities and experiences in Punjab, the rest of South Asia, the United Kingdom, and other parts of the world. He charts the shifting, complex, and frequently competing visions of Sikh identity that h...

The neighboring north Indian districts of Jaipur and Ajmer are identical in language, geography, and religious and caste demography. But when the famous Babri Mosque in Ayodhya was destroyed in 1992, Jaipur burned while Ajmer remained peaceful; when the state clashed over low-caste affirmative action quotas in 2008, Ajmer's residents rioted while Jaipur's citizens stayed calm. What explains these divergent patterns of ethnic conflict across multiethnic states? Using archival research and e...

A Concise History of Modern India by Barbara D. Metcalf and Thomas R. Metcalf, has become a classic in the field since it was first published in 2001. As a fresh interpretation of Indian history from the Mughals to the present, it has informed students across the world. In the third edition of the book, a final chapter charts the dramatic developments of the last twenty years, from 1990 through the Congress electoral victory of 2009, to the rise of the Indian high-tech industry in a countr...

From the local to the global level, religion is – more than ever – an important and hotly debated part of modern life in the twenty-first century.From silver rings to ringtones and from clubs to headscarves, we often find the cultural role and discussion of religion in unexpected ways.Now in its second edition, Religion: The Basics remains the best introduction to religion and contemporary culture available. The new edition has been fully revised and updated, and i...

Hinduism is practised by nearly eighty per cent of India's population, and by some seventy million people outside India. In this Very Short Introduction, Kim Knott offers a succinct and authoritative overview of this major religion, and analyses the challenges facing it in the twenty-first century. She discusses key preoccupations of Hinduism such as the centrality of the Veda as religious texts, the role of Brahmins, gurus, and storytellers in the transmission of divine truths, a...

India’s unfolding story, from the ancient Hindu dynasties to the coming of Islam, from the Mughal Empire to the present dayIndia has always been a land of great contradictions. To Alexander the Great, the country was a place of clever naked philosophers and massive armies mounted on elephants – which eventually forced his army to retreat. To ancient Rome, it was a source of luxuries, mainly spices and textiles, paid for in gold—hence the enormous numbers of Roman g...

Homeless in the title of this book means cosmopolitan. Mukul Kesavan, considered by many to be Indias most articulate and sophisticated scholar-journalist in English, covers a huge range of political and cultural subjects, local and international, in this collection of opinion pieces. These include Hollywood and Bollywood, Salman Rushdie and Martin Amis, Steve Jobs and Julian Assange, Sri Lanka and Israel, wildlife at the Kruger National Park and beachlife in Goa.Kesavans viewpoints can veer ...