Photography as witness and weapon amid civil warThis groundbreaking ethnography explores how, in the context of Sri Lanka’s protracted civil war and its turbulent aftermath, photography has become bound to the Tamil political imagination. From state-commissioned images meant to surveil and rebel documentation of armed resistance, to the fragile memorials created from identity photographs of the disappeared, A Volatile Picture traces the making and moving o...

**Instant Amazon Best Seller and Hot New ReleaseFor readers of Caste and Radical Dharma, an urgent call to action to end caste apartheid, grounded in Dalit feminist abolition and engaged Buddhism.**“Dalit” is the name that we chose for ourselves when Brahminism declared us “untouchable.” Dalit means broken. Broken by suffering. Broken by caste: the world’s oldest, longest-running dominator system...yet although “Dalit” means broken, it also means resil...

Now updated: An "eminently readable, highly engaging" anthology about the lives of ordinary citizens in India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Nepal, and Sri Lanka (Margaret Mills, Ohio State University).For the second edition of this popular textbook, readings have been updated and new essays added. The result is a timely collection that explores key themes in understanding the region, including gender, caste, class, religion, globalization, economic liberalization, national...

From websites devoted to battling a 'Left-liberal' media ecosystem to the formidable internet army of Hindu Right volunteers, from online narratives of Hindu valour to Narendra Modi's impeccably-managed social media presence, new media is an integral part of present-day Hindu nationalism.The Virtual Hindu Rashtra examines the relationship of Hindu nationalism and new media across a range of internet spaces, including Twitter trends in support of the Bharatiya Janata Party's government poli...

For many years, the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh has been working towards social reconstruction in India, which is then used by the Bharatiya Janata Party for political benefit. Contrary to popular understanding, the RSS has transformed to become more technologically savvy and socially inclusive, making the message of Hindu nationalism appealing to a large section of Indians. It has been actively mobilizing Dalits, tribals and other marginalized communities to assimilate them into the Hindu...

Wendy Doniger and Martha Nussbaum bring together leading scholars from a wide array of disciplines to address a crucial question: How does the world's most populous democracy survive repeated assaults on its pluralistic values? India's stunning linguistic, cultural, and religious diversity has been supported since Independence by a political structure that emphasizes equal rights for all, and protects liberties of religion and speech. But a decent Constitution does not implement itself, an...

In 2002, after an altercation between Muslim vendors and Hindu travelers at a railway station in the Indian state of Gujarat, fifty-nine Hindu pilgrims were burned to death. The ruling nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party blamed Gujarat's entire Muslim minority for the tragedy and incited fellow Hindus to exact revenge. The resulting violence left more than one thousand people dead--most of them Muslims--and tens of thousands more displaced from their homes. Parvis Ghassem-Fachandi witnessed...

Conventional wisdom says that integration into the global marketplacetends to weaken the power of traditional faith in developingcountries. But, as Meera Nanda argues in this path-breaking book,this is hardly the case in todays India. Against expectations ofgrowing secularism, India has instead seen a remarkable intertwiningof Hinduism and neoliberal ideology, spurred on by a growingcapitalist class. It is this “State-Temple-Corporate Complex,”she claims, that now wields decisive political...

From tracing the possible first arrival of man in India to writing about love, sex, money, parenting and values in Indian society and discussing nationalism, religion and democracy, Miniya Chatterji presents an accessible yet brilliant intellectual treatise about issues that affect Indians the most. Indian Instincts is a seminal and deeply philosophical work, presented tactfully with entertaining and memorable instances. It is a must-read for anyone who wants to know what makes an Indian. ...

In the twenty-first century, there has been a seismic shift in Indian political, religious and social life. The country’s guiding spirit was formerly a fusion of the anti-caste worldview of B.R. Ambedkar; the inclusive Hinduism of Mahatma Gandhi; and the agnostic secularism of Jawaharlal Nehru. Today, that fusion has given way to Hindutva.This now-dominant version of Hinduism blends the militant nationalism of V.D. Savarkar; the Brahmanical anti-minorityism of M.S. Golwalkar; and t...

Over the course of the last twenty-five years, Tom O’Neill has traveled frequently to Kathmandu and the Helambu region of Nepal to undertake ethnographic fieldwork with the Yolmo business owners and carpet weavers of the area. The Heart of Helambu is an evocative and touching account of his experiences working in Nepal during those turbulent times.In his autoethnographic memoir, O’Neill reflects on the complex relationships he developed with his research participa...

This feeble blemished light, this dawn mangled by night, this is not the morning we had all so longed for... -Faiz Ahmed Faiz In the two decades since the early 1990s, when India confirmed its allegiance to the Free Market, more of its citizens have become marginalized than ever before, and society has become more sharply riven than ever. In 'Looking Away', Harsh Mander ranges wide to record and analyse the many different fault lines which crisscross Indian society today. There is increasi...