New Books in South Asian Studies

Interviews with Scholars of South Asia about their New Books

Society & Culture
History
1176
Arthur Dudney, “Delhi: Pages From A Forgotten H...
Delhi: Pages From A Forgotten History (Hay House India, 2015) by Arthur Dudney tells the story of India’s capital and beyond through the lens of Persian literary culture. A lively read written for a mass readership,
69 min
1177
Peter van der Veer, “The Modern Spirit of Asia:...
What are the differences between religion, magic, and spirituality? Over time, these categories have been articulated in a variety of ways across differing cultures. However, many assume that the multiple understandings are merely derivative of western...
58 min
1178
Maria Heim, “The Forerunner of All Things: Budd...
Buddhaghosa, a fifth-century Pali Buddhist scholar or group of scholars, is the most influential commentator in Theravada Buddhist tradition, who has in many respects created the set of ideas we now associate with Theravada Buddhism today.
57 min
1179
Sanjay Srivastava, “Entangled Urbanism: Slum, G...
Entangled Urbanism: Slum, Gated Community and Shopping Mall in Delhi and Gurgaon (Oxford University Press, 2015) is the latest book by Sanjay Srivastava. A wonderfully readable piece of urban anthropology, the book explores the ways spaces and processe...
43 min
1180
Amanda Lucia, “Reflections of Amma: Devotees in...
Waiting several hours in line for a hug is well worth it for thousands of people, the devotees of the Guru, Amma, Mata Amritanandamayi. In Reflections of Amma: Devotees in a Global Embrace (University of California Press, 2014), Amanda Lucia,
55 min
1181
Neha Vora, “Impossible Citizens: Dubai’s Indian...
Neha Vora‘s Impossible Citizens: Dubai’s Indian Diaspora (Duke University Press, 2013) is a wonderfully rich and engaging account of middle class Indians who live and work, supposedly temporarily, in Dubai.
52 min
1182
Bhavani Raman, “Document Raj: Writing and Scrib...
Bhavani Raman‘s new book Document Raj: Writing and Scribes in Early Colonial South India (University of Chicago Press, 2012) explores the world of colonial clerks in the Madras Presidency. Arguing that paper played an important role in colonial rule,
30 min
1183
Alf Gunvald Nilsen and Srila Roy, “New Subalter...
New Subaltern Politics: Reconceptualizing Hegemony and Resistance in Contemporary India (Oxford University Press, 2015), edited by Alf Gunvald Nilsen and Srila Roy, is a wonderfully rich and theoretically coherent collection of texts that critically as...
35 min
1184
Gyanendra Pandey, “A History of Prejudice: Race...
A History of Prejudice: Race, Caste, and Difference in India and the United States (Cambridge University Press, 2013) is the latest book by Gyanendra Pandey. The book analyses prejudice and democracy through a comparison of African Americans and Indian...
55 min
1185
Mrinalini Chakravorty, “In Stereotype: South As...
In Stereotype: South Asia in the Global Literary Imaginary (Columbia University Press, 2014) is a masterful account of the importance of the stereotype in English language South Asian literature. Mrinalini Chakravorty explores such tropes as the crowd ...
41 min
1186
Venkat Dhulipala, “Creating a New Medina: State...
In the historiography on South Asian Islam, the creation of Pakistan is often approached as the manifestation of a vague loosely formulated idea that accidentally emerged as a nation-state in 1947. In his magisterial new book Creating a New Medina: Sta...
59 min
1187
Jeffery Witsoe, “Democracy against Development:...
Jeffery Witsoe‘s book Democracy against Development: Lower-Caste Politics and Political Modernity in Postcolonial India (University of Chicago Press, 2013) takes the reader to urban and rural Bihar and into the world of so called lower caste politics.
38 min
1188
Joyce B. Flueckiger, “When the World Becomes Fe...
Joyce B. Flueckiger‘s new bookWhen the World Becomes Female: Guises of a South Indian Goddess (Indiana University Press, 2013) is a rich and colorful analysis of the goddess Gangamma’s festival and her devotees.
57 min
1189
Steven E. Kemper, “Rescued from the Nation: Ana...
In his recent book, Rescued from the Nation: Anagarika Dharmapala and the Buddhist World (University of Chicago Press, 2015), Steven E. Kemper examines the Sinhala layman Anagarika Dharmapala (1864-1933) and argues that this figure has been misundersto...
68 min
1190
Julie Billaud, “Kabul Carnival: Gender Politics...
Kabul Carnival: Gender Politics in Postwar Afghanistan (University of Pennsylvania Press, 2015) by Julie Billaud is a fascinating account of women and the state and ongoing ‘reconstruction’ projects in post-war Afghanistan.
46 min
1191
Tenzin Chogyel (trans. Kurtis R. Schaeffer), “T...
Kurtis R. Schaeffer‘s new translation of Tenzin Chogyel’s The Life of the Buddha(Penguin Books, 2015) is a boon for teachers, researchers, and eager readers alike. Composed in the middle of the eighteenth century,
61 min
1192
Nicholas B. Dirks, “Autobiography of an Archive...
Nicholas B. Dirks‘ Autobiography of an Archive: A Scholar’s Passage to India (Columbia University Press, 2015) is a wonderful collection of essays, loosely arranged along the line’s of the author’s scholarly life.
51 min
1193
Pedro Machado, “Ocean of Trade: South Asian Mer...
Pedro Machado‘s Ocean of Trade:South Asian Merchants, Africa and the Indian Ocean, c.1750-1850 (Cambridge University Press, 2014) is a richly detailed and engaging account of Gujarati merchants and their role in the trade of textiles,
43 min
1194
Ananya Vajpeyi, “Righteous Republic: The Politi...
Righteous Republic: The Political Foundations of Modern India (Harvard University Press, 2012) by Ananya Vajpeyi is a rethinking of the self in self-rule, as understood in the ideas generated and reworked by five leading figures of the Indian independe...
67 min
1195
Jamal Elias, “Aisha’s Cushion” (Harvard UP, 2012)
In his remarkable new book Aisha’s Cushion: Religious Art, Practice, and Perception in Islam (Harvard University Press, 2012), Jamal Elias, Professor of Religious Studies at the University of Pennsylvania, presents a magisterial study of Muslim attitud...
51 min
1196
Ritu G. Khanduri, “Caricaturing Culture in Indi...
Caricaturing Culture in India: Cartoons and History in the Modern World (Cambridge University Press, 2014) is a wonderful piece of visual anthropology by Ritu Gairola Khanduri, which uses the history of cartoons, from colonial to current times,
33 min
1197
Peter Gottschalk, “Religion, Science, and Empir...
When did religion begin in South Asia? Many would argue that it was not until the colonial encounter that South Asians began to understand themselves as religious. In Religion, Science, and Empire: Classifying Hinduism and Islam in British India (Oxfor...
61 min
1198
Dhara Anjaria, “Curzon’s India: Networks of Col...
I won’t speak for you, but I find it utterly remarkable that the British were able to “rule” India. Britain, of course, is a small island off a small continent some significant distance from most of its colonies. India, in contrast,
45 min
1199
Mukulika Banerjee, “Why India Votes?” (Routledg...
Why India Votes? (Routledge, 2014) is the latest book by Mukulika Banerjee and is a deep, engaging and continually surprising account of elections in India. Weaving together ethnographic research in field sites across the country,
49 min
1200
Cabeiri Robinson, “Body of Victim, Body of Warr...
The idea of jihad is among the most keenly discussed yet one of the least understood concepts in Islam. In her brilliant new book Body of Victim, Body of Warrior: Refugee Families and the Making of Kashmiri Jihadists (University of California Press,
91 min