Kajri Jain, Gods in the Time of Democracy

This book, Gods in the Time of Democracy, is theoretically sophisticated. Based on research from 2007 to 2018, inter alios, with Hindu sculptors in north and south India, including fieldwork with Hindu diaspora in Trinidad and Mauritius, it examines the multilayered interrelationships amongst intensified construction of and visitation, from the 1990s on, to Hindu religious monuments, practices of democracy, economic reforms, aesthetic forms and modality of global capital. While concerned with the force and form of novelty of these relationships, Kajri Jain rightly does not allow her analysis to be seduced by the present and instead productively tethers it to the longue dure of colonial modernity and nationalism. With self-admittedly no "single overarching argument or central theme" (p. 13) instituted, she asks a "conventional" question: "why does this form [of Hindu religious icons, temples, statues and monuments] appear in India at this moment?" (p. 18). With no separate conclusion, the final fifth chapter dwells on three major statue sites in Mauritius, Trinidad and India. The last one is the world's tallest statue (182-meter) of Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel, described as India's "first deputy Prime Minister."

Art · Democracy · Political science · Politics · Indian and Buddhist Studies · Indian History and Philosophy · Law · Mathematics

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