Critical Theory in India

Course Type	Course Code	No. Of Credits
Discipline Elective	NSLG1LP112	4

Semester and Year Offered : Winter Semester

Course Coordinator and Team : Ngoru Nixon

Email of the coarse coordinator :

Pre-requisites: None

Does the course connect to, build on or overlap with any other courses offered in AUD?

‘Critical Theory in India’ course is offered as a core paper to 6^th semester students of B.A. law and politics. It serves more or less as a culmination of the politics stream of the programme in terms of the thematic and the critical trajectory. The course will take the students through certain evolving terms of debate animated around the question of the West and the non-west. Both the core courses (‘Introduction to Political Theory’, ‘Modern Indian Political Thought,’ ‘Western Political Thought,’ and ‘Themes in Indian Politics’) and non-core courses (such as ‘Nationalism in India,’ ‘Anti-colonialism and Post-colonial Futures,’ ‘Reading Gandhi,’ and ‘Reading Ambedkar’) of the politics stream taught across the previous semesters have laid a suitable platform for the ‘Critical Theory in India’ course to build on and engage.

Specific requirements on the part of students who can be admitted to this course: No Requirement
No. of students to be admitted (with justification if lower than usual cohort size is proposed): As per AUD rules
Course scheduling: (summer/winter course; semester-long course; half-semester course; workshop mode; seminar mode; any other – please specify) Semester-long course
Proposed date of launch: Winter Semester 2021

How does the course link with the vision of AUD and the specific programme(s) where it is being offered?

The normative values of equality and social justice are implicated in the larger postcolonial contestation on the question of conceiving the non-western reality through the western/modern categories. In examining the debate pertaining to the West and the non-west, the course aims to foreground the critical impetus underpinning the articulation of such values
Course Details:

Summary:

This course introduces and familiarizes students to the constituted modes of criticism, conceptualization, and contestation pertaining to and propelled by (borrowing David Scott’s words), “the demand for the decolonization of representation; the decolonization of the West’s theory of the non-west”. The project of decolonization centres on undoing the perceived Eurocentrism underpinning the theoretical framework/narrative and knowledge structure composed by the universal narrative of modernity. In seeking to disentangle the non-west from the hegemonic narrative of the West/modernity, the project also underlines a departure from the dominant nationalist thought. The latter is conceived as committed to asserting the subjectivity of the East (India) but within the epistemological framework instituted by colonial discourse. It is the enduring hegemonic narrative of the West/modernity and its instituted knowledge structure even after the formal end of colonialism that postcolonial criticism is directed against. Much of the criticism revolves around the concepts of history, knowledge, rationality, and violence

To the extent that the critique of the centrality of the West/modernity remains powerfully articulated in India, it has generated varied forms of formulations and contestations. Such engagement is marked by the contention over the attempt to homogenise the colonized and the different or contrasting experiences in non-west. The persistent debate on secularism and the issues of subordination and marginalization in the non-west are few of the significant examples. In such contestation, the engagement is directed towards the power configuration within the space of the non-west

Objectives The course intends to examine the mode of postcolonial critique and the evolving debate around it.

Expected Learning Outcomes:

After the completion of the course, the students would be able to:

Determine the nature of the complicity between modernity and colonialism.
Delineate and describe the approach of postcolonial critique.
Explain the contestations surrounding postcolonial critique in India.
Draw why the question of modernity continues to inform critical engagements in India.

Overall structure

Module 1: Modernity, Colonialism, and Critique: Mapping a Trajectory (3.5 weeks)

This module seeks to formulate the trajectory which would structure the terms of the unfolding engagement envisaged in the course. It does so by specifying the foundational tenets of modernity which have incited the scrutiny of postcolonial critique and further, by underlining the accompanying justificatory explanation for undertaking such task. In the scheme of postcolonial critique, modernity is less a disinterested phenomenon borne out of the 18^th century European Enlightenment than one which is intimately connected with colonialism. While explicating the intersection between colonialism and modernity, the course would also discuss how modern law is constitutive of colonial discourse.

Compulsory Readings:

Banerjee, Prathama, Aditya Nigam, Rakesh Pandey. “The Work of Theory: Thinking Across Traditions.” EPW, vol. LI, No. 37 (September 10, 2016). Pp. 42-50.
Cohn, Bernard S. Colonialism and Its Form of Knowledge: The British in India. Princeton University Press, 1996. (Chapter three- Law and Colonial State in India. Pp. 57-75)
Hall, Stuart and Bram Gieben. Eds. Formations of Modernity. The Open University, 1992. Pp. 17-45.
Mills, Sara. Michel Foucault. Routledge, 2003. (Chapter 4- power/knowledge, pp. 67-80).
Quijano, Anibal. “Coloniality and Modernity/Rationality.” Cultural Studies, Vol. 21, No. 2-3 (2007). Pp. 168-178.
Said, Edward W. Orientalism. Vintage Books, 1979. pp. 1-28.
Solomon, R.C. Continental Philosophy since 1750: The Rise and the Fall of the Self. Oxford University Press, 1988. pp. 8-15

Supplementary Readings:

Carey, Daniel and Lynn Festa. Eds. Postcolonial Enlightenment: Eighteenth-Century Colonialism and Postcolonial Theory. Oxford University Press, 2009.
Foucault, Michel. “What is Enlightenment?.” In Foucault Reader, edited by Paul Rabinow. Pantheon Books, 1984. Pp. 32-50.
Kant, Immanuel. “An Answer to the Question: ‘What is Enlightenment? In Kant: Political Writings, edited by H.S. Reiss. Cambridge University Press, 1991. Pp. 54-60.
Loomba, Ania. Colonialism/Postcolonialism. Routledge, 2005.

Module 2: Decentering the West (2 weeks)

In this module, we will examine the significance assigned to the task of decentering the West in postcolonial critique. What does it mean to decenter the West? What is the nature of the decentering that is being proposed in postcolonial critique? And how is it differentiated from other contending modes? In examining these questions, it is instructive to elucidate the constituted categories of ‘the West’ and ‘the non-west/East’ in line with the related discussion in Module 1

Compulsory Readings:

Chakrabarty, Dipesh. Provincializing Europe: Postcolonial Thought and Historical Difference. Princeton University Press, 2000. (Introduction: The Idea of Provincializing Europe- Pp. 1-11).
Chatterjee, Partha. “Transferring a Political Theory: Early Nationalist Thought in India.” Economic and Political Weekly, Vol, 21, No. 3 (January 18, 1986). Pp. 120-128.
Lazarus, Neil. ‘The Fetish of “the West” in postcolonial Theory.’ In Marxism, Modernity and Postcolonial Studies, edited by Crystal Bartolovich and Neil Lazarus. Cambridge University Press, 2004. Pp. 43-64.
Sarkar, Sumit. Beyond the Nationalist Frames: Postmodernism, Hindu Fundamentalism, History. Permanent Black, 2002. (Selections).

Supplementary Readings:

Chatterjee, Partha. Nationalist Thought and the Colonial World: A Derivative Discourse. Zed Books, 1986.
Kaviraj, Sudipto. “An Outline of the Revisionist Theory of Modernity.” European Journal of Sociology, vol. 46, No. 3 (2005). Pp. 497-526.
Kaviraj, Sudipto. The Imaginary Institution of India: Politics and Ideas. Permanent Black, 2010. (Chapter 3- On the Structure of Nationalist Discourse.).
Mukherjee, Mithi. India in the Shadow of Empire: A Legal and Political History, 1774-1950. Oxford University Press, 2010.

Module 3 – Beyond the West (3.5 weeks)

The project of decolonization involves an insistence on the limitation of the universal narrative of the West/modernity. The limitation is commonly expressed in terms of (i) the ‘historical difference’ between the West and the non-west (ii) the incommensurability between the Western emanated/determined categories and the life-world/practices in the non-west. What ensues from these stipulations is to understand or theorise the non-west in its own term without having to validate it according to the yardsticks conceived by the West. The contemporary time has also witnessed increasingly assertive articulations on the return to tradition and samaj which is often legitimized by invoking the enduring hegemony of the colonial/western knowledge system. The module discusses these varied forms of conceptualizations in India.

Compulsory Readings:

Chatterjee, Partha. “Community in the East.” Economic and Political Weekly, vol. 33, No. 6 (Feb. 7-13, 1998). Pp. 277-282.
Devy. G.N. A Nomad Called Thief: Reflections on Adivasi Silence. Orient Longman, 2006.
Gandhi, M.K. Hind Swaraj and other Writings, edited by Anthony J. Parel. Cambridge University Press, 1997.
Nandy, Ashis. “Anti-Secular Manifesto.” India International Centre Quarterly, Vol. 22, No. 1 (September, 1995). Pp. 35-65.
Skaria, Ajay. Unconditional Equality: Gandhi’s Religion of Resistance. University of Minnesota Press, 2016. (Introduction: Surrender without Subordination, pp. 1-30).

Supplementary Readings:

Chatterjee, Partha. Nationalist Thought and the Colonial World: A Derivative Discourse. Zed Books, 1986. (Chapter 4- The Moment of Manoeuvre: Gandhi and the Critique of Civil Society). Pp. 85-130.
Bhargava, Rajeev. Ed. Secularism and its Critics. Oxford University Press, 1998.
Nandy, Ashis. Intimate Enemy: Loss and Recovery of Self under Colonialism. Oxford University Press, 1983.

Module 4- Between the West and the non-west (3 Weeks)

There exists a broad convergence among the critics across the spectrum in terms of the recognition of the debilitating idea of the singular narrative of modernity. But this convergence does not translate into identical way of conceiving the relation between the West/modernity and the non-west. This module will consider a form of engagement which relates to a ‘negotiated’ approach vis-à-vis the West. This mode of engagement is seen as being determined by the contextual exigency borne out of the conflicting imaginations within the space of the non-west (India) than by the acute desire to imitate the West.

Compulsory Readings

Bilgrami, Akeel. “Secularism, Nationalism, Modernity.” In Secularism and its Critics, edited by Rajeev Bhargava. Oxford University Press, 1998.
Geetha,V, and S.V. Rajadurai. Towards a Non-Brahmin Millennium: Lyothee Thass to Periyar. Samya, 1998.
Guru, Gopal. “The idea of India: Derivative, Desi, and Beyond.” Economic and Political Weekly, vol. XLVI, no. 37 (September 10, 2011). Pp. 36-42.
Sinha, Mrinal. Specters of Mother India: The Global Restructuring of an Empire. Duke University Press, 2006.

Supplementary Readings:

Ambedkar, B.R. Annihilation of Caste. Rupa Publications, 2018.
Bhargava, Rajeev. Ed. Secularism and its Critics. Oxford University Press, 1998.
Bhargava, Rajeev. “Overcoming the Epistemic Injustices of Colonialism.” Global Policy, vol.1, Issue 4 (November, 2013). Pp. 413-417.
Gopal, Guru. “Dalits in Pursuit of Modernity.” In India: Another Millennium?, edited by Romila Thapar. Penguin Books, 2000. Pp. 123-136.

Pedagogy:

Instructional design: combination of lectures, participation and presentations.
Special needs (facilities, requirements in terms of software, studio, lab, clinic, library, classroom/others instructional space; any other – please specify)
Expertise in AUD faculty or outside
Linkages with external agencies (e.g., with field-based organizations, hospital; any others)