| Inhalt |
The South Asian region is home to nearly two billion people, belonging to groups of diverse ethnic, religious, linguistic, and cultural backgrounds. Waves of European colonization gave way, during the twentieth Century, to various anticolonial and independence movements across South Asia, an uneven trajectory that has been marked by violence, sectarianism, political and communal divisions, including armed conflicts, the legacies of which reverberate to date. The aim of this course is to critically examine the contours of the region, South Asia, as defined by history, culture, geopolitics, and academic discourse alike. Furthermore, we will interrogate those analytical categories that have been associated with the study of South Asia, such as caste, communalism, nationalism, empire and postcolonialism, and religion to name a few, asking how they might illuminate or, perhaps, obscure our understanding of South Asian societies in all their diversity. In addition to questioning the very notion of a coherent, clearly demarcated region, this course aims to challenge the preeminence of India in the field, highlighting, instead, historical and cultural continuities, intersections and disjunctures, across and beyond the South Asian subcontinent. While the course’s approach is anthropological, we will read broadly, across disciplinary boundaries and writing genres, focusing on case studies that span the geographical, as well as historical, political, and cultural, breadth of the region. |