Violence and identities in South Asia

Grievance and memory in Community-Formation

Bibliographic Data

ID20041097
AuthorsSanjay Subrahmanyam (0000-0001-7781-086X, École des hautes études en sciences sociales, corresponding author)
Year2001
Pages47-70
Publication date2001-01-01
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessYes
TypeCHAPTER
VenueLa question identitaire en Asie du Sud (SOURCE_BOOK)
PublisherÉditions de l’École des hautes études en sciences sociales (PUBLISHER)
DOI10.4000/books.editionsehess.24057
OpenAlexW4232406945
ISBN9782713231414
LanguageEN
References cited16

This brief essay seeks to re-examine the history and historiography of collective violence in late pre-colonial South Asia, and its relationship to identity formation in the same period. It uses as a point of departure the well-known essay by C. A. Bayly on the subject (and the responses of its critics), as well as a recent debate between Sheldon Pollock and B. D. Chattopadhyaya, in order to define the main positions in the historiography. It then examines a series of narratives in order to argue that the relationship between violence, grievance, and community-formation is far more ambiguous than one may gather from the literature. In conclusion, using comparative materials, it is suggested that neither history, nor indeed any other mode of memory, can by itself be seen to drive the construction of communities and collective identities. It is hence time that analysts ceased to blame History for what is wrong with our relationship with the past

Aesthetics · Art · Blame · Collective identity · Colonialism · Grievance · Historiography · Literature · Narrative · Political science · Sociology · Anthropological Studies and Insights · Gender Studies · History · Law · Psychology · Social Psychology · South Asian Studies and Conflicts · Southeast Asian Sociopolitical Studies

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