MPhil/MSt in Modern South Asian Studies CORE COURSE THE HISTORY AND CULTURE OF SOUTH ASIA Readings and Classes General Reference Works Crispin Bates, Subalterns and Raj: South Asia since 1600 (2007) S. Bose & A. Jalal, Modern South Asia (1998) Band T Metcalf, A concise history ofIndia (2002) Catherine B. Asher and Cynthia Talbot, India Before Europe (2006) GOl'don Johnson, Cultural Atlas ofIndia (1995) F. Robinson, The Cambridge Encyclopedia ofSouth Asia (1989) CA Bayly, The Raj, India and the British 1600-1947 (1990) CA Bayly, Indian Society and the Making of the British Empire (1998) Srnnit Sarkar, Modern India 1885-1947 (1989) D. Krnnar & M. Desai eds. Cambrige Economic History ofIndia vol2 (1983) Journals Modern Asian Studies Journal ofAsian Studies Indian Economic & Social History Review South Asia Economic and Political Weekly JSTOR: online archive for articles The Hindu online, especially Frontline fortnightly magazine. 5 MICHAELMAS TERM WEEK 1: EARLY MODERN SOUTH ASIA: CONTEXTS Questious (i) What significant changes marked the coming of the 'early modern' in India? (ii) How far was 'early modernity' in South Asia reflected in new literary genres and intellectual frameworks? Primary source *Wheeler M. Thackston, (ed.), The Baburnama: Memoirs ofBabur, Prince and Emperor. Oxford University Press 1996, 'Events of the Year 932' (1525-6), pp. 311-362. (i) Societies and economies *John F Richards, The Mughal Empire (1993) 1-58. *Catherine B. Asher and Cynthia Talbot India Before Europe (2006)', ch 6: Expanding political and economic spheres, 1550-1650': 152-85. David Washbrook, 'India in the early modern world economy: modes of production, reproduction and exchange' in Journal ofGlobal History, 2, (2007): 87-111. Ashin Das Gupta and MN Pearson (eds), India and the Indian Ocean, 1500-1800 (2000) Introduction and ch. 5 *Sanjay Subrahmanyam, 'Connected Histories: Notes towards a Reconfiguration of Early Modern Eurasia' in Modern Asian Studies 31, 3, (1997), 735-762. __. 'Intra-Asian Elite Migration and Early Modern State Formation', Journal of Asian Studies (1993) (ii) Intellectual histories Stephen Frederic Dale, 'Steppe humanism: the autobiographical writings of Zahir ai-Din Muhammad Babur, 1483-1530' in International Journal ofMiddle Eastern Studies, no. I, February 1990, pp. 37-58. Sheldon Pollock, 'New Intellectuals in seventeenth century India' in Indian Economic and Social History Review, 38,1, (2001): 1-31 Muzaffar Alam and Sanjay Subrahmanyam, Indo-Persian Travels In The Age Of Discoveries, 1400-1800 (2007), Introduction ***************************************** WEEK 2: EMPIRES AND STATES IN EARLY MODERN INDIA Questions (i) Did the success of the Mughal state rest on the common frameworks that it imposed, or on the degree to which it was able to accommodate cultural difference and regional identities? 6 (ii) How far did Indian political elites share a coherent theory of 'virtuous government' in early modern India? (iii) Is it meaningful to talk about 'religious community identity' in early modern India? (iv)How far does the study of the body and of norms for comportment amplify our understanding of Mughal political culture? Primary sources *Akbar's Dasturu'l 'amal (A circular enumerating the Duties of Officers) addressed to the Ummal and Mutasuddis of the Empire, 21 March 1594, in Mansura Haidar, Mukatabar-i-Allami (Insha'I Abu'l Fazl) (1998): 79-88 (i) The Mughal Empire and Regional Societies Muzaffar Alam and Sanjay Subrahmanyam (eds) The Mughal State 1526-1750 (1998): 1- 71. John Richards, The Mughal Empire, Cambridge University Press (1993): 58-93. ~~_. Kingship and Authority in South Asia (1998): ch 7, 'Rajput Loyalties during the Mughal Period' *Catherine B. Asher and Cynthia Talbot India Before Europe (2006) chs 6 and 8. Richard Eaton, A social history of the Deccan, 1300-1761: eight Indian lives (2005): chs 4-5. :::-__.. India's Islamic traditions, 711-1750 (2003): 1-36 (Introduction). Stewart Gordon, 'Zones of Military Entrepreneurship in India' in Stewart Gm'don, Marathas, Marauders and State Formation in Eighteenth Century India, 1500-1700 (1994): 182-208. __.. The Marathas 1600-1818 (1993), chs 2-3, 38-90 (ii) Political thonght and intellectual cultures *CA Bayly, Origins ofNationality in South Asia: Patriotism and Ethical Government in the Making ofModern India (1998): 11-30. Kum Kum Chatterjee, 'History as self-representation: the recasting of a political tradition in late eighteenth century eastern India', in Modern Asian Studies, 32, 4, (1998) Sheldon Pollock, The Ends of Man at the End of Pre-Modernity (2005) 'Artha: Rajadharrnasastra and the End of Political Theory': 63-78 Muzaffar Alam, The Languages of Political Islam. India 1200-1800. (2004), ch. 2: 'Sharia, Akhlaq and Governance', 26-80. Muzaffar Alam and Sanjay Subrahmanyam, 'The Making of a Munshi' in Comparative Studies ofSouth Asia, Africa and the Middle East, 24.2.(2004): 61-72. SAA Rizvi, Religious and Intellectual History of the Muslims in Akbar 's Reign (1975): ch. 9: 'Religious and political thinking of Abu'l Fazl': 339-372 V. Narayana Rao and Sanjay Subrahmanyam, 'Notes on political thought in medieval and early Modem South India' in Modern Asian Studies, vol. 43, Part 1, January 2009. (iii) Religious relations and identities 'CA Bayly, 'The Pre-history of "Communalism"? Religious conflict in India, 1700- 1860', in Origins ofNationality in South Asia: Patriotism and Ethical government in the Making ofModern India. (1998): 210-37 7 Cynthia Talbot, 'Inscribing the Self, Inscribing the Other: Hindu-Muslim Identities in Pre-Colonial India' in Richard M. Eaton. India's Islamic traditions, 711-1750. (2003): 84-117 Richard M. Eaton. India's Islamic traditions, 711-1750. (2003): Introduction, 1-36. ~~_. 'Temple Desecration and Indo-Muslim States' in David Gilmartin and Bruce Lawrence (eds), Beyond Turk and Hindu: rethinking religious identities in Islamicate South Asia (2000): ch. 10: 246-81. Eleanor Zelliot, 'A Medieval Encounter Between Hindu and Muslim: Eknath's Drama­ Poem, Hindu-Turk Samvad' in Richard M. Eaton. India's Islamic traditions, 711-1750. (2003): 64-82 Stewart Gordon, 'Maratha Patronage of Muslim Institntions in Burhanpur and Khandesh' in Richard M. Eaton. India's Islamic traditions, 711-1750. (2003): 327-338. SAA Rizvi, Shah Wali-Allah and His Times: A study ofEighteenth Century Islam, Politics and Society in India (1980) ch. 6: The political and social thought of Shah Wali­ allah' pp. 286-316. Muzaffar Alam, 'The Mughals, the Sufi Shaikhs and the formation of the Akbari Dispensation' in Modern Asian Studies, vol. 43, Part 1, January 2009. (iv) Gender, honsehold and social norms Ruby Lal, Domesticity and Power in the Early Mughal World (2005) ch 6. *Rosalind O'Hanlon, 'Kingdom, household and body: history, gender and imperial service under Akbar', Modern Asian Studies (2007): 887-922 =-~_. 'Manliness and Imperial Service in Mughal North India' in Journal of the Economic and Social History ofthe Orient, 42, 1, 1999. JF Richard, 'Norms of Comportment among Imperial Mughal Officers' in Barbara Daly Metcalf (ed.), Moral Conduct and Authority: The Place ofAdab in South Asian Islam (1984). ***************************************** WEEK 3: COSMOPOLITAN AND VERNACULAR LANGUAGES Questions (i) How far and in what ways did the 'cosmopolitan' languages of early modern India facilitiate the process of vernacular is at ion? (ii) 'The development of regional states, rather than the communicative needs of devotional traditions, drove on the process of vernacularisation in early modern India'. Discuss (iii) In what senses were vernacular languages 'languages of place'? Primary source 'Krsnadevaraya' in Velcheru Narayana Rao and David Shulman (eds), Classical Telugu Poetry: An Anthology. (2002) ch 12,166-177. (i) Interplays between cosmopolitan and vernacular languages 8 Muzaffar Alam, 'The Culture and Politics of Persian in Precolonial Hindustan' in Sheldon Poliock, Literary Cultures in History: Reconstructions from South Asia, (2003), pp. 159-71 Shantanu Phukan, "'Through Throats Where Many Rivers Meet": The Ecology of Hindi in the World of Persian' , Indian Economic and Social History Review 2001,38:1, pp. 33- 58. *Sheldon Poliock, 'The Cosmopolitan Vernacular' in Journal ofAsian Studies, 57, 1 (1998),6-37. Yigal Bronner and David Shulman, 'A Cloud Turned Goose: Sanskrit in the Vernacular Millennium' in Indian Economic and Social History Review, 43.1: 1-30 Vasudha Narayan, 'Religious vocabulary and regional identity: A Study of the Tamil Cirappuranam (,Life of the PropheC)', in Richard M. Eaton. India's Islamic traditions, 711-1750.. (2003): 392-410. Shamsur Rahman Faruqi. Early Urdu Literary Culture. (2001). Sanjay Subrahmanyam, 'Recovering Babel' in Daud Ali (ed.), Invoking the Past: The Uses ofHistory in South Asia, (1999): 280-321. (ii) Regional states and vernacnlar langnages Sumit Guha, 'Transitions and Translations: Regional Power and Vernacular Identity in the Dakhan, 1500-1800' in Comparative Studies ofSouth Asia, Afhca and the Middle East, 24:2 (2004). 24:1, pp. 23-31. Richard Eaton, A social history of the Deccan, 130.0.-1761: eight Indian lives (2005) ch. 6: 129-54. Allison Busch, 'Literary Responses to the Mughal Imperium: The Historical Poems of Kesavdas' in South Asia Research, 1, (2005): 31-54. *Cynthia Talbot, Pre-Colonial India in Practice: Society, Region and Identity in Medieval Andhra (2001), Conclusion: 'Towards a new model of medieval India', 208-15. ____. 'Inscribing the Self, Inscribing the Other: Hindu-Muslim