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"Kaviraj, Sudipta"
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Can Nāstikas Taste Āstika Poetry? Tagore’s Poetry and the Critique of Secularity
This paper asks the following question: can an atheist reader fully taste the aesthetic meaning of poetry written by a theist author? This question is discussed with specific reference to the devotional poetry of Tagore. The paper discusses forms of pre-modern religious thinking which influenced Tagore’s conceptions of God, his relation to Nature, human society, and the human self. But it stresses that Tagore’s time was different from those of pre-modern believers. Tagore, as a modern thinker, had to fashion a response to the ‘problem’ of disenchantment. He constructed a philosophic vision that embraced modern science, but argued that it did not dispel the sense of living in an enchanted universe. Consequently, it is argued that a nastika can enjoy his poetry. This requires the nastika to view the idea of God not as a failure of cognition, but as a triumph of the imagination. I can continue to enjoy Tagore’s poetry without unease.
Journal Article
What is Western About Western thought?
The question at the centre of this paper is part of a larger debate. Though the more limited question is hardly ever asked in academic discussions, the larger question – how can knowledge - or more broadly and less helpfully- thought in the world outside the West can be decolonized is at the center of lively debates surrounding the ‘end’ of postcolonial theory. Even this question can be asked in two significantly separate forms: about decolonizing knowledge in these societies; or, alternative, knowledge about these societies, which would presumably include knowledge produced in the Western academia about these societies. The two propositions make a lot of difference. This essay, therefore, deals with that larger question of the humanistic and the historical sciences indirectly, because I believe that without becoming clear about this smaller question – what is Western about Western thought? - which might strike people as odd, we cannot make much progress. Indeed, my claim is that so much of uncertainty still attaches to the first discussion – whether we are making any progress at all or not – is precisely because the second question is not seen with clarity as being a precondition to making progress in the first.
Journal Article
Rethinking Representation
Representation is a significant problem in both political and artistic theory. This article distinguishes between three stages in the development of the modern state, and suggests that the problem of representation has a specific form in each of them. It deploys two concepts from Kashmiri aesthetic theory—imitation and commonization—to analyze the character of modern political representation.
Journal Article
The imaginary institution of India
For decades Sudipta Kaviraj has worked with and improved upon Marxist and subaltern studies, capturing India's social and political life through its diverse history and culture. While this technique has been widely celebrated in his home country, Kaviraj's essays have remained largely scattered abroad. This collection finally presents his work in one convenient volume and, in doing so, reasserts the brilliance of his approach.
As evidenced in these essays, Kaviraj's exceptional strategy positions Indian politics within the political philosophy of the West and alongside the perspectives of Indian history and indigenous political thought. Studies include the peculiar nature of Indian democracy; the specific aspects of Jawaharlal Nehru's and Indira Gandhi's regimes; political culture in independent India; the construction of colonial power; the relationship between state, society, and discourse; the structure of nationalist discourse; language and identity formation in Indian contexts; the link between development and democracy, or democratic functioning; and the interaction among religion, politics, and modernity in South Asia. Each of these essays explores the place of politics in the social life of modern India and is powered by the idea that Indian politics is plastic, reflecting and shaping the world in which people live.
eBook
An Outline of a Revisionist Theory of Modernity
Modernization, contrary to the common assumption of most writings in the field, does not follow a uniform path. The diversity of the historical experiences in the Third World countries imposes a severe revision of the theory. The case of India is taken as a good example. It helps the author to declare that there are two theorical lines which must be at the same time divided and connected. The first is functionalist, the second sequentiel, including contradictions and break thoughts. A last section is devoted to the necessity of reflexivity. La généralisation d’un processus uniforme de modernisation qui est un présupposé de la théorie dominante ne résiste pas à l’examen dès lors qu’on considère la diversité des chemins menés par les pays émergents. Le cas de l’Inde est analysé de près à titre d’exemple. L’auteur dégage deux lectures de la modernisation, l’une fonctionnaliste et l’autre séquentielle avec contradictions et ruptures. La liaison entre capitalisme et démocratie est loin d’être toujours observée. Une attention particulière est portée à la question de la réflexivité. Die Verallgemeinerung eines einheitlichen Modernisierungsprozesses ist ein Grundsatz der dominierenden Theorie, die einer genaueren Untersuchung aber nicht standhält, sobald man die unterschiedlichen Entwicklungen der Schwellenländer betrachtet. Indien steht hier als Beispiel. Zwei Beschreibungen der Modernisierung legt der Autor vor, die erste ist funktionalistisch, die zweite sequenziell mit Widersprüchen und Unterbrechungen. Die Beziehung zwischen Kapitalismus und Demokratie ist nicht immer eindeutig. Besondere Aufmerksamkeit wird der Frage einer möglichen Reflektivität geschenkt.
Journal Article
