Manu Bhagavan

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This volume investigates the diverse discourses of identity politics that relate the history of nationalism to current concerns and debates. The essays are laid out as a series of three interrelated conversations. Focusing upon the peripheries of modern India-Assam and Jammu and Kashmir-the first explores the ways in which people living on the margins of a homogenizing nation-state critique the centre and carve out different spaces of experience. The next part analyses the works of Mirza Ghalib and epic traditions in south India to delineate the plurality of narrative and consciousness in literary production. The last section interrogates the writings of Muhammad Iqbal and Mahatma Gandhi to shed new light on their ideas of justice and to situate them in the moment of manoeuvre in nationalist discourse in late colonial India. The volume concludes with a discussion of what it means to construct a post-history of communalism. The essays taken together present an engaging account of the multiplicity of historical experiences in India both within and without the discourse of nationalism. This book will interest scholars and students of modern South Asian history, politics, and sociology, particularly those concerned with identity politics and nationalism. It will also be useful for policymakers, activists, and civil society organizations.