Showing papers in "Contributions to Indian Sociology in 2018"
TL;DR: In this article, the post-harvest grain heap is reconceptualised as a critical entry point and analytic for the study of contemporary commodity markets, based on long-term ethnographic fieldwork in an agricultural market (mandi) in Madhya Pradesh.
Abstract: This article returns to what was once an ethnographic staple in the sociology of India: the post-harvest grain heap. Having long occupied centre stage in analyses of a moneyless, redistributive transactional order widely known as the jajmani system, it has also been the subject of influential critique, where it has been argued that the misconceived heap sustained a powerful anthropological fiction. Moving beyond these positions, which seem to have left the heap grounded in the past, the grain heap in this work is reconceptualised as a critical entry point and analytic for the study of contemporary commodity markets. Based on long-term ethnographic fieldwork in an agricultural market (mandi) in Madhya Pradesh, it finds that it is along the seams or internal margins of the market, at routine sites of physical transfer and exchange, assembly and dispersal, integration and disruption, that heaps of agricultural produce materialise. An analysis of critical aspects of the heap—its position, composition, measure...
17 citations
14 citations
TL;DR: This article demonstrates how new kinds of environments reflect and facilitate new sets of social relations, and generates a fresh perspective of a Muslim area as a hub of intersecting mobilities within a context of rural and urban transformation.
Abstract: India witnesses a proliferation of ‘Muslim’ and ‘Hindu’ residential areas, which reflect deepening segregation along religious lines. This article explores the production of such spaces through a case study of Anand in central Gujarat. It uses the lens of ‘mobilities’ to critically interrogate the ‘Muslim ghetto’, a notion that has come to figure prominently as a conceptual framework in discussions on residential segregation in contemporary India, and proposes to consider the residential spaces of Muslims instead as ‘hubs’ of urban and regional connectivity. Avoiding a false dichotomy between segregation-as-seclusion and cohabitation-as-connecting, the article demonstrates how new kinds of environments reflect and facilitate new sets of social relations, and generates a fresh perspective of a Muslim area as a hub of intersecting mobilities within a context of rural and urban transformation.
11 citations
TL;DR: The Aadhaar project which aims to provide all residents in India with a unique identity number requires much more attention from sociologists of India There are several areas of research where soc soc soc
Abstract: The Aadhaar project which aims to provide all residents in India with a unique identity number requires much more attention from sociologists of India There are several areas of research where soc
10 citations
TL;DR: The social worlds that dalit Muslims in North India daily negotiate are pervaded by contradictions between caste practices and Islamic ethics as mentioned in this paper, and they engage in manual scavenging and related activities.
Abstract: The social worlds that dalit Muslims in North India daily negotiate are pervaded by contradictions between caste practices and Islamic ethics. Dalit Muslims engaged in manual scavenging and related...
10 citations
8 citations
TL;DR: In this article, a study conducted in a tea plantation of Upper Assam, documents and analyses the struggle for Scheduled Tribe (ST) status by the Adivasis in Assam.
Abstract: This article, based on a study conducted in a tea plantation of Upper Assam, documents and analyses the struggle for Scheduled Tribe (ST) status by the Adivasis in Assam, which is linked to a large...
7 citations
TL;DR: This paper explored the relationship between charity and disability in South India and found that despite a stereotype of philanthropic aid as reproducible as reproducibility, it is not reproducible in practice.
Abstract: Drawing on multi-sited ethnographic fieldwork in Hyderabad, South India, this article explores the relationship between charity and disability. Despite a stereotype of philanthropic aid as reproduc...
6 citations
TL;DR: The notion of urban frontier involves the idea of a border between areas based on differences along various axes such as the nature and degree of development and what constitutes the urban. as mentioned in this paper defines an urban frontier as "the boundary between two areas that are different from each other".
Abstract: The notion of an urban frontier involves the idea of a border between areas based on differences along various axes such as the nature and degree of development and what constitutes the urban. Citi...
5 citations
5 citations
TL;DR: In this article, the authors draw upon the court case of one woman sentenced for killing her infant in the early decades of the last century, and read Pierre Bourdieu's insight on how the trial stages conflicts conflicts.
Abstract: Drawing upon the court case of one woman sentenced for killing her infant in the early decades of the last century, this article reads Pierre Bourdieu’s insight on how the trial stages conflicts pr...
TL;DR: A companion piece to Reetika Khera's account is an attempt to situate some of the key aspects of the Aadhaar debate within a sociological field of enquiry.
Abstract: This companion piece to Reetika Khera’s account above is an attempt to situate some of the key aspects of the Aadhaar debate within a sociological field of enquiry, looking into just how and in wha
TL;DR: The Indian Ocean tsunami (2004) devastated the Nicobar archipelago, a remote tribal reserve in the Indian Ocean, which the Nicobarese indigenes have traditionally inhabited.
Abstract: The Indian Ocean tsunami (2004) devastated the Nicobar archipelago, a remote tribal reserve in the Indian Ocean, which the Nicobarese indigenes have traditionally inhabited. The catastrophe attract...
TL;DR: The importance of the symbol of the shahid and shahadat in the Khalistani political project has been examined in this article through the examination of the post-1984 situation in Punjab.
Abstract: The post-1984 situation in Punjab indexes the importance (and fascination) of the symbol of the shahid (martyr) and shahadat (martyrdom) in the Khalistani political project. Through the examination...
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors focus on the closure in 1966 of Contributions to Indian Sociology, the journal founded in 1957 by Louis Dumont and David Pocock, and the two authors, T.N. Madan and...
Abstract: Comprising two parts, the article focuses on the closure in 1966 of Contributions to Indian Sociology, the journal founded in 1957 by Louis Dumont and David Pocock. The two authors, T.N. Madan and ...
TL;DR: This article translated four essays from the memoirs of a Gujarati writer Sharifa Vijaliwala that are replete with sociological insights and depicted the transformation in the web of social relations at the margins of Gujarati society and the present crisis of faith that underlies its civil society.
Abstract: This article translates four essays from the memoirs of Gujarati writer Sharifa Vijaliwala that are replete with sociological insights. Methodologically, the genre of memoir affords a rich source portraying the everyday social fabric of rural Gujarat in the 1970s and the changing landscape of the state in later years. In the course of essaying her life stories, she depicts the predicaments and contestations about place, mobility and social interactions within the larger matrix of Gujarati society. What is depicted in graphic detail is the transformation in the web of social relations at the margins of Gujarati society and the present ‘crisis of faith’ that underlies its civil society.