Theology as a systematic study of religion is an old enterprise. It originated in the West to study the Bible in a rational and methodical way of interpreting the sacred text(s). Universities were set up solely for this purpose and it was referred to as the queen of sciences. However, Immanuel Kant, with his sceptical argument with regard…
Globalization and its effects are current pervasive themes. In many ways India is very much in the grip of the globalization trend which has undoubtedly impacted certain segments of the political, cultural, economic, and religious life of India. The linking of global nuances with the local flavour can be seen particularly with the ascendancy of the media…
This is Vikram Chand;s second edited ;;book on the theme. In 2006, he;;;brought out Reinventing Public Service Delivery in India: Selected Case Studies (Sage) which this observer had the occasion to review then. As Senior Public Sector Management Specialist at the World Bank New Delhi office, Chand has had the opportunity…
Gujarat has been at the centre of media attention since March 2002 when a communal frenzy of the worst nature affected the state creating raw tensions between various groups. But Gujarat happens to be one of the fastest growing states of the Indian Union and is characterized by a long-term process of capitalist development…
Although complete in itself, the book under review has to be read in continuation of the author’s work published earlier this year, The Origin and Development of Islam (Orient Longman; 1980; pp. 247; Rs. 65). It appears that the two books were originally conceived as one.
A strong connection between famine and ethnic politics has been brought out by a number of scholars in the context of North East India. The economic backwardness of the region has been widely discussed in the light of contemporary ethnic political process. Yet, the origin of widespread insurgencies in the North East…
This book is an ambitious attempt to analyse the agricultural growth miracle of Gujarat. The editors point out in the preface that this is really no miracle but .a result of a well thought out strategy, meticulously planned and coordinated scheme of action, political will to take bold decisions and therefore reasonably replicable…
A collection of studies and perspectives, this report is an attempt to identify the generic processes and locate the developmental philosophy that is causing increasing marginalization of various sections of the population in India. The various essays covering the land question, social and gender discrimination, education, health…
2011
The essays in the volume written over a period of about two decades reflect Basus rare gift for identifying interesting problems at the borders of economics, politics, sociology and philosophy, setting them up within parsimonious frameworks and then drawing sharp and incisive observations…
Andre Bteille is a prolific writer who has addressed questions of inequality, power, social class, the family, the disciplines of sociology and social anthro-pology, and a whole range of issues, too vast to enumerate here. The array of problems he has sought to understand and his commitment as a writer stem from his unfailing…
One fact about the book is that it is a revised version of the general secretary’s report to the 22nd national conference of the All-India Kisan Sabha (AIKS) held at Vijayawada in June last year.
Rajen Harshe is one of those rare individuals who through their lives have played many roles. He has been and will no doubt remain an activist, scholar, teacher and institution-builder. To get a better sense of what this book offers and why it has been written the way it has, knowing the background of the author matters…
A K.Ramanujans translation of vachanas came out from Penguin in 1973, nearly four decades ago. The present re-translation and re-look at the Virasaivite vachanas by H.S.Shivaprakash and its publication by Penguin is therefore most timely. Some things are striking about the persona of both these translators…
2011
Walking back home from Francois Mitterands lunch party on 25 February 1980, Roland Barthes was evidently a tad preoccupied.
The book is an outcome of a project initiated by UNESCO to undertake cross-cultural studies of doctors in the context of development and modernization.
1980
New trends in social science research indicate a major departure in the assessment of the role of the researcher or the investigator. The traditional role of the researcher as a detached and ‘neutral’ analyst, while it proved suitable to a certain extent to describe the world as it exists, hardly equipped him to work for changing it.
Works of fiction often bear the charge of blasphemy, creating thereby a tenuous relationship between the art of narrative fiction and the fatwas issued against it. What this establishes beyond reasonable doubt, besides the threat to the authors life, is the fearful ability of art to mould, shape and influence the real and tangible world out there…
Scholars now widely recognize that folk literature is a rich source of information on popular culture of a society. Systematic collection and publication of folktales and folklores in India began in the 19th century.
2011
In reviewing this third volume of the three volume collection of short stories, one is immediately stuck by the importance of writing about the interiority of the economic. This more than anything, and rightly so, is an aspect of life that finds a stream of expression across the stories. And why should not the economic be represented…
2011
Mumbai Fables by Gyan Prakash is as layered as the city it explores. Walter Benjamin mentions a collectors passion bordering on the chaos of memories. The collector for him was as much a part of as he was apart from the various texts that make memories. There have been several writers who have used the collector as a tool to understand modernity…