Regula Burckhardt Qureshi
- Published in print:
- 2005
- Published Online:
- May 2008
- ISBN:
- 9780195173048
- eISBN:
- 9780199872091
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780195173048.003.0003
- Subject:
- Music, Ethnomusicology, World Music
By focusing on the celebration of the birthday of the Prophet Muhammad (milad) by South Asian Muslim women in Edmonton, Canada, this chapter refocuses the usual consideration of Islam as public and ...
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By focusing on the celebration of the birthday of the Prophet Muhammad (milad) by South Asian Muslim women in Edmonton, Canada, this chapter refocuses the usual consideration of Islam as public and male-oriented. Immigrant and ethnic Canadian Muslim women gather in homes and perform the prayers and recited texts that are not strictly considered music, employing texts and styles that are gathered from different traditions. The Arabic and Urdu languages are used separately and together, and distinctive styles and genres of worship are mixed to create musical practices traditional in Islam and new to Canada. The creativity of the Muslim women is considerable as it further creates new spaces for Islam that then becomes part of their religious and immigrant experiences in Canada.Less
By focusing on the celebration of the birthday of the Prophet Muhammad (milad) by South Asian Muslim women in Edmonton, Canada, this chapter refocuses the usual consideration of Islam as public and male-oriented. Immigrant and ethnic Canadian Muslim women gather in homes and perform the prayers and recited texts that are not strictly considered music, employing texts and styles that are gathered from different traditions. The Arabic and Urdu languages are used separately and together, and distinctive styles and genres of worship are mixed to create musical practices traditional in Islam and new to Canada. The creativity of the Muslim women is considerable as it further creates new spaces for Islam that then becomes part of their religious and immigrant experiences in Canada.
Phiroze Vasunia
- Published in print:
- 2010
- Published Online:
- September 2010
- ISBN:
- 9780199212989
- eISBN:
- 9780191594205
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199212989.003.0017
- Subject:
- Classical Studies, Prose and Writers: Classical, Early, and Medieval
This chapter examines Sikandar (1941), an Indian film about Alexander the Great, and situates it within broader contexts of colonialism and nationalism. It considers how cinema's engagement with the ...
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This chapter examines Sikandar (1941), an Indian film about Alexander the Great, and situates it within broader contexts of colonialism and nationalism. It considers how cinema's engagement with the historical past provides responses to political pressures, through such devices as narrative, representational strategy, and the use of tradition. In evaluating the film about Alexander (directed by Sohrab Modi and starring Prithviraj Kapoor as Sikandar), the chapter considers the broader socio‐political contexts in which the film was made, and also locate it within Indian historical writing on the ancient Greeks. The choice of Alexander was not entirely arbitrary, and the Macedonian figure offered Indian intellectuals a vehicle through which they could speak about specific contemporary issues raised by anti‐colonial struggles and aspirations to nationhood.Less
This chapter examines Sikandar (1941), an Indian film about Alexander the Great, and situates it within broader contexts of colonialism and nationalism. It considers how cinema's engagement with the historical past provides responses to political pressures, through such devices as narrative, representational strategy, and the use of tradition. In evaluating the film about Alexander (directed by Sohrab Modi and starring Prithviraj Kapoor as Sikandar), the chapter considers the broader socio‐political contexts in which the film was made, and also locate it within Indian historical writing on the ancient Greeks. The choice of Alexander was not entirely arbitrary, and the Macedonian figure offered Indian intellectuals a vehicle through which they could speak about specific contemporary issues raised by anti‐colonial struggles and aspirations to nationhood.
Wahida Shaffi (ed.)
- Published in print:
- 2009
- Published Online:
- March 2012
- ISBN:
- 9781847424105
- eISBN:
- 9781447302889
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Policy Press
- DOI:
- 10.1332/policypress/9781847424105.003.0006
- Subject:
- Sociology, Gender and Sexuality
This chapter describes the story of Natasha Almas Fell. She is 14 years old and wants to be an extreme-sports instructor, a marine biologist, or a Charlie's Angel. Natasha considers herself Muslim ...
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This chapter describes the story of Natasha Almas Fell. She is 14 years old and wants to be an extreme-sports instructor, a marine biologist, or a Charlie's Angel. Natasha considers herself Muslim because she has been brought up that way. She cannot speak Urdu fluently like she can English, but she knows some phrases. Most of the boundaries Natasha is subjected to are not to do with being a Muslim but with what her parents would like. Her family celebrates Eid and Christmas because her father is English and her mum is Pakistani.Less
This chapter describes the story of Natasha Almas Fell. She is 14 years old and wants to be an extreme-sports instructor, a marine biologist, or a Charlie's Angel. Natasha considers herself Muslim because she has been brought up that way. She cannot speak Urdu fluently like she can English, but she knows some phrases. Most of the boundaries Natasha is subjected to are not to do with being a Muslim but with what her parents would like. Her family celebrates Eid and Christmas because her father is English and her mum is Pakistani.
Nile Green
- Published in print:
- 2012
- Published Online:
- September 2012
- ISBN:
- 9780198077961
- eISBN:
- 9780199080991
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780198077961.003.0019
- Subject:
- History, Indian History
This chapter surveys the widespread phenomenon of the migrant Sufi saint in South Asian history. It examines how non-Indian origins were important to the success of Sufis and how these holy migrants ...
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This chapter surveys the widespread phenomenon of the migrant Sufi saint in South Asian history. It examines how non-Indian origins were important to the success of Sufis and how these holy migrants were often connected to larger communities of migrants. After the general survey section, the chapter turns to two case studies that show how migration could be both real and imagined, with the prestige of non-Indian origins leading to exaggerations or changes in the biographies of particular Muslim saints.Less
This chapter surveys the widespread phenomenon of the migrant Sufi saint in South Asian history. It examines how non-Indian origins were important to the success of Sufis and how these holy migrants were often connected to larger communities of migrants. After the general survey section, the chapter turns to two case studies that show how migration could be both real and imagined, with the prestige of non-Indian origins leading to exaggerations or changes in the biographies of particular Muslim saints.
Nile Green
- Published in print:
- 2012
- Published Online:
- September 2012
- ISBN:
- 9780198077961
- eISBN:
- 9780199080991
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780198077961.003.0036
- Subject:
- History, Indian History
This chapter draws on the oral traditions preserved at Sufi shrines in south India to show how the shrines serve as concrete anchors of historical memory that preserve the past into the present. ...
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This chapter draws on the oral traditions preserved at Sufi shrines in south India to show how the shrines serve as concrete anchors of historical memory that preserve the past into the present. Showing how stories of saints are linked to the memory of kings, empires and settlers, the chapter shows how with the emergence of Muslim communities in India, the institutions of Sufi Islam helped create places of belonging in new homelands. Early modern history and the present day are in this way seen to be connected through oral traditions rooted in specific urban spaces.Less
This chapter draws on the oral traditions preserved at Sufi shrines in south India to show how the shrines serve as concrete anchors of historical memory that preserve the past into the present. Showing how stories of saints are linked to the memory of kings, empires and settlers, the chapter shows how with the emergence of Muslim communities in India, the institutions of Sufi Islam helped create places of belonging in new homelands. Early modern history and the present day are in this way seen to be connected through oral traditions rooted in specific urban spaces.
Irfan Ahmad
- Published in print:
- 2017
- Published Online:
- May 2018
- ISBN:
- 9781469635095
- eISBN:
- 9781469635101
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- University of North Carolina Press
- DOI:
- 10.5149/northcarolina/9781469635095.001.0001
- Subject:
- Religion, Islam
Irfan Ahmad makes the far-reaching argument that potent systems and modes for self-critique as well as critique of others are inherent in Islam—indeed, critique is integral to its fundamental tenets ...
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Irfan Ahmad makes the far-reaching argument that potent systems and modes for self-critique as well as critique of others are inherent in Islam—indeed, critique is integral to its fundamental tenets and practices. Challenging common views of Islam as hostile to critical thinking, Ahmad delineates thriving traditions of critique in Islamic culture, focusing in large part on South Asian traditions. Ahmad interrogates Greek and German as well as French Enlightenment notions of reason and critique, and he notes how they are invoked in relation to “others,” including Muslims. To move away from the Enlightenment’s equation with reason and critique, the book turns to the axial age, an “age of criticism.” Like the Prophets Moses and Jesus, Muhammad was a critic-reformer. Drafting an alternative genealogy of critique in Islam, Ahmad reads religious teachings and texts, drawing on sources in Hindi, Urdu, Farsi, and English, and demonstrates how they serve as expressions of critique. Throughout, he depicts Islam as an agent, not an object, of critique. On a broader level, Ahmad expands the idea of critique itself. Drawing on his fieldwork among marketplace hawkers in Delhi and Aligarh, he construes critique anthropologically as a sociocultural activity in the everyday lives of ordinary Muslims, beyond the world of intellectuals. Religion as Critique allows space for new theoretical considerations of modernity and change, taking on such salient issues as nationhood, women’s equality, the state, culture, democracy, and secularism.Less
Irfan Ahmad makes the far-reaching argument that potent systems and modes for self-critique as well as critique of others are inherent in Islam—indeed, critique is integral to its fundamental tenets and practices. Challenging common views of Islam as hostile to critical thinking, Ahmad delineates thriving traditions of critique in Islamic culture, focusing in large part on South Asian traditions. Ahmad interrogates Greek and German as well as French Enlightenment notions of reason and critique, and he notes how they are invoked in relation to “others,” including Muslims. To move away from the Enlightenment’s equation with reason and critique, the book turns to the axial age, an “age of criticism.” Like the Prophets Moses and Jesus, Muhammad was a critic-reformer. Drafting an alternative genealogy of critique in Islam, Ahmad reads religious teachings and texts, drawing on sources in Hindi, Urdu, Farsi, and English, and demonstrates how they serve as expressions of critique. Throughout, he depicts Islam as an agent, not an object, of critique. On a broader level, Ahmad expands the idea of critique itself. Drawing on his fieldwork among marketplace hawkers in Delhi and Aligarh, he construes critique anthropologically as a sociocultural activity in the everyday lives of ordinary Muslims, beyond the world of intellectuals. Religion as Critique allows space for new theoretical considerations of modernity and change, taking on such salient issues as nationhood, women’s equality, the state, culture, democracy, and secularism.
Scott Kugle
- Published in print:
- 2016
- Published Online:
- January 2017
- ISBN:
- 9781469626772
- eISBN:
- 9781469626796
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- University of North Carolina Press
- DOI:
- 10.5149/northcarolina/9781469626772.001.0001
- Subject:
- Religion, Islam
Two poets lived separate lives in the Deccan during the eighteenth century. Comparing them, this book illustrates the complexity of gender, sexuality, and religious practice in Islamic culture. Shah ...
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Two poets lived separate lives in the Deccan during the eighteenth century. Comparing them, this book illustrates the complexity of gender, sexuality, and religious practice in Islamic culture. Shah Siraj Awrangabadi (1715–1763), whose name means "Sun," was a Sunni Muslim who, after a youthful love affair, gave up sexual relationships to follow Sufi mysticism. Mah Laqa Bai Chanda (1768–1820), whose name means "Moon," was a Shi'i Muslim and courtesan who transferred her seduction of men to the pursuit of mystical love. Both were Urdu poets who specialized in the ghazal, often fusing a spiritual quest with erotic imagery. This book features translations of Urdu and Persian poetry previously unavailable in English. Shah Siraj and Mah Laqa Bai were exceptions to the gender norms common in their patriarchal society. Their poetry lets us understand the reach and the limitations of gender roles and erotic imagery in Islamic and Indian culture. This study shows how poetry, music, and dance are integral to Islamic devotional traditions.Less
Two poets lived separate lives in the Deccan during the eighteenth century. Comparing them, this book illustrates the complexity of gender, sexuality, and religious practice in Islamic culture. Shah Siraj Awrangabadi (1715–1763), whose name means "Sun," was a Sunni Muslim who, after a youthful love affair, gave up sexual relationships to follow Sufi mysticism. Mah Laqa Bai Chanda (1768–1820), whose name means "Moon," was a Shi'i Muslim and courtesan who transferred her seduction of men to the pursuit of mystical love. Both were Urdu poets who specialized in the ghazal, often fusing a spiritual quest with erotic imagery. This book features translations of Urdu and Persian poetry previously unavailable in English. Shah Siraj and Mah Laqa Bai were exceptions to the gender norms common in their patriarchal society. Their poetry lets us understand the reach and the limitations of gender roles and erotic imagery in Islamic and Indian culture. This study shows how poetry, music, and dance are integral to Islamic devotional traditions.
Maryam Wasif Khan
- Published in print:
- 2021
- Published Online:
- September 2021
- ISBN:
- 9780823290123
- eISBN:
- 9780823297351
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Fordham University Press
- DOI:
- 10.5422/fordham/9780823290123.001.0001
- Subject:
- Literature, Criticism/Theory
Who is a Muslim? Orientalism and Literary Populisms argues that modern Urdu literature, from its inception in colonial institutions such as Fort William College, Calcutta, to its dominant forms in ...
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Who is a Muslim? Orientalism and Literary Populisms argues that modern Urdu literature, from its inception in colonial institutions such as Fort William College, Calcutta, to its dominant forms in contemporary Pakistan—popular novels, short stories, television serials—is formed around a question that is and historically has been at the core of early modern and modern Western literatures. The question—who is a Muslim—is predominant in eighteenth-century literary and scholarly orientalist texts, the English oriental tale chief amongst them, but takes on new and dangerous meanings once it travels to the North-Indian colony, and later to Pakistan. A literary-historical study spanning some three centuries, this book argues that the modern Urdu literary formation, far from secular or progressive, has been shaped as the authority designate on the intertwined questions of piety, national identity, and citizenship, first in colonial India and subsequently in contemporary Pakistan.Less
Who is a Muslim? Orientalism and Literary Populisms argues that modern Urdu literature, from its inception in colonial institutions such as Fort William College, Calcutta, to its dominant forms in contemporary Pakistan—popular novels, short stories, television serials—is formed around a question that is and historically has been at the core of early modern and modern Western literatures. The question—who is a Muslim—is predominant in eighteenth-century literary and scholarly orientalist texts, the English oriental tale chief amongst them, but takes on new and dangerous meanings once it travels to the North-Indian colony, and later to Pakistan. A literary-historical study spanning some three centuries, this book argues that the modern Urdu literary formation, far from secular or progressive, has been shaped as the authority designate on the intertwined questions of piety, national identity, and citizenship, first in colonial India and subsequently in contemporary Pakistan.
Syed Akbar Hyder
- Published in print:
- 2008
- Published Online:
- September 2011
- ISBN:
- 9780195373028
- eISBN:
- 9780199851973
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780195373028.003.0002
- Subject:
- Religion, Islam
This chapter examines the texts and contexts of the majlis by reflecting on commemorations by Shii Muslims. It discusses the aesthetics of the majlis by focusing on Karbala’s contribution to Urdu ...
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This chapter examines the texts and contexts of the majlis by reflecting on commemorations by Shii Muslims. It discusses the aesthetics of the majlis by focusing on Karbala’s contribution to Urdu literature and poetics. This discussion entwines itself around issues of shifting cultural and regional codes, that in turn facilitate a localization of Karbala in South Asia. It also draws attention to the ways in which Karbala is invoked to mediate the personal sorrows of the devotees. The styles of Shii mourning, the texts and formats of the commemorative gatherings, and the general discourse surrounding Karbala vary over time and space, and what appears in this chapter are just a few reflections of Shii commemorations. This chapter brings to light the imaginative aesthetic and devotional frameworks within which Karbala and martyrdom are articulated, re-articulated, and localized within Shii contexts.Less
This chapter examines the texts and contexts of the majlis by reflecting on commemorations by Shii Muslims. It discusses the aesthetics of the majlis by focusing on Karbala’s contribution to Urdu literature and poetics. This discussion entwines itself around issues of shifting cultural and regional codes, that in turn facilitate a localization of Karbala in South Asia. It also draws attention to the ways in which Karbala is invoked to mediate the personal sorrows of the devotees. The styles of Shii mourning, the texts and formats of the commemorative gatherings, and the general discourse surrounding Karbala vary over time and space, and what appears in this chapter are just a few reflections of Shii commemorations. This chapter brings to light the imaginative aesthetic and devotional frameworks within which Karbala and martyrdom are articulated, re-articulated, and localized within Shii contexts.
Kavita Datla
- Published in print:
- 2013
- Published Online:
- November 2016
- ISBN:
- 9780824836092
- eISBN:
- 9780824871208
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- University of Hawai'i Press
- DOI:
- 10.21313/hawaii/9780824836092.001.0001
- Subject:
- History, Indian History
During the turbulent period prior to colonial India's partition and independence, Muslim intellectuals in Hyderabad sought to secularize and reformulate their linguistic, historical, religious, and ...
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During the turbulent period prior to colonial India's partition and independence, Muslim intellectuals in Hyderabad sought to secularize and reformulate their linguistic, historical, religious, and literary traditions for the sake of a newly conceived national public. Responding to the model of secular education introduced to South Asia by the British, Indian academics launched a spirited debate about the reform of Islamic education, the importance of education in the spoken languages of the country, the shape of Urdu and its past, and the significance of the histories of Islam and India for their present. This book pursues an alternative account of the political disagreements between Hindus and Muslims in South Asia, conflicts often described as the product of primordial and unchanging attachments to religion. It suggests that the political struggles of India in the 1930s, the very decade in which the demand for Pakistan began to be articulated, should not be understood as the product of an inadequate or incomplete secularism, but as the clashing of competing secular agendas. The book explores negotiations over language, education, and religion at Osmania University, the first university in India to use a modern Indian language, that is, the Urdu language, as its medium of instruction, and sheds light on questions of colonial displacement and national belonging.Less
During the turbulent period prior to colonial India's partition and independence, Muslim intellectuals in Hyderabad sought to secularize and reformulate their linguistic, historical, religious, and literary traditions for the sake of a newly conceived national public. Responding to the model of secular education introduced to South Asia by the British, Indian academics launched a spirited debate about the reform of Islamic education, the importance of education in the spoken languages of the country, the shape of Urdu and its past, and the significance of the histories of Islam and India for their present. This book pursues an alternative account of the political disagreements between Hindus and Muslims in South Asia, conflicts often described as the product of primordial and unchanging attachments to religion. It suggests that the political struggles of India in the 1930s, the very decade in which the demand for Pakistan began to be articulated, should not be understood as the product of an inadequate or incomplete secularism, but as the clashing of competing secular agendas. The book explores negotiations over language, education, and religion at Osmania University, the first university in India to use a modern Indian language, that is, the Urdu language, as its medium of instruction, and sheds light on questions of colonial displacement and national belonging.
Kavita Saraswathi Datla
- Published in print:
- 2013
- Published Online:
- November 2016
- ISBN:
- 9780824836092
- eISBN:
- 9780824871208
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- University of Hawai'i Press
- DOI:
- 10.21313/hawaii/9780824836092.003.0005
- Subject:
- History, Indian History
This chapter examines the question of the Urdu language and the modernizing agendas of the Muslim intellectuals associated with Osmania University by taking a closer look at their activities outside ...
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This chapter examines the question of the Urdu language and the modernizing agendas of the Muslim intellectuals associated with Osmania University by taking a closer look at their activities outside the domain of the university proper, in Urdu-language organizations and as literary scholars. It first considers the politics of the Urdu language and its relationship to place before turning to two Urdu organizations headquartered within the boundaries of Hyderabad: the Anjuman-i Taraqqī-i Urdu (Organization for the Advancement of Urdu) and the Idāra-i Adabiyāt-i Urdu (Institution for Urdu Literature). In particular, it discusses the two organizations' connection to the Deccan. It also explores the history of Urdu literature and Mohiuddin Qadri Zore's assertion that Deccani has as much claim to Hindustani language as do Hindi and Urdu. Finally, it looks at Urdu's position with the question of Indian nationalism.Less
This chapter examines the question of the Urdu language and the modernizing agendas of the Muslim intellectuals associated with Osmania University by taking a closer look at their activities outside the domain of the university proper, in Urdu-language organizations and as literary scholars. It first considers the politics of the Urdu language and its relationship to place before turning to two Urdu organizations headquartered within the boundaries of Hyderabad: the Anjuman-i Taraqqī-i Urdu (Organization for the Advancement of Urdu) and the Idāra-i Adabiyāt-i Urdu (Institution for Urdu Literature). In particular, it discusses the two organizations' connection to the Deccan. It also explores the history of Urdu literature and Mohiuddin Qadri Zore's assertion that Deccani has as much claim to Hindustani language as do Hindi and Urdu. Finally, it looks at Urdu's position with the question of Indian nationalism.
Arthur Dudney
- Published in print:
- 2022
- Published Online:
- April 2022
- ISBN:
- 9780192857415
- eISBN:
- 9780191948213
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/oso/9780192857415.001.0001
- Subject:
- Religion, Religion and Literature
This study traces the development of philology (the analysis of literary language) in the Persian tradition in India, concentrating on its socio-political ramifications. The most influential ...
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This study traces the development of philology (the analysis of literary language) in the Persian tradition in India, concentrating on its socio-political ramifications. The most influential Indo-Persian philologist of the eighteenth century was Sirāj al-Dīn ʿAlī Ḳhān (d. 1756), whose pen-name was Ārzū. Besides being a respected poet, Ārzū was a rigorous theoretician of language whose intellectual legacy was side-lined by colonialism. His conception of language accounted for literary innovation and historical change in part to theorize the tāzah-goʾī [literally, “fresh-speaking”] movement in Persian literary culture. Although later scholarship has tended to frame this debate in anachronistically nationalist terms (Iranian native speakers versus Indian imitators), the primary sources show that contemporary concerns had less to do with geography than with the question of how to assess innovative “fresh-speaking” poetry, a situation analogous to the Quarrel of the Ancients and the Moderns in early modern Europe. Ārzū used historical reasoning to argue that as a cosmopolitan language Persian could not be the property of one nation or be subject to one narrow kind of interpretation. Ārzū also shaped attitudes about reḳhtah, the Persianized form of vernacular poetry that would later be renamed and reconceptualized as Urdu, helping the vernacular to gain acceptance in elite literary circles in northern India. This study puts to rest the persistent misconception that Indians started writing the vernacular because they were ashamed of their poor grasp of Persian at the twilight of the Mughal Empire.Less
This study traces the development of philology (the analysis of literary language) in the Persian tradition in India, concentrating on its socio-political ramifications. The most influential Indo-Persian philologist of the eighteenth century was Sirāj al-Dīn ʿAlī Ḳhān (d. 1756), whose pen-name was Ārzū. Besides being a respected poet, Ārzū was a rigorous theoretician of language whose intellectual legacy was side-lined by colonialism. His conception of language accounted for literary innovation and historical change in part to theorize the tāzah-goʾī [literally, “fresh-speaking”] movement in Persian literary culture. Although later scholarship has tended to frame this debate in anachronistically nationalist terms (Iranian native speakers versus Indian imitators), the primary sources show that contemporary concerns had less to do with geography than with the question of how to assess innovative “fresh-speaking” poetry, a situation analogous to the Quarrel of the Ancients and the Moderns in early modern Europe. Ārzū used historical reasoning to argue that as a cosmopolitan language Persian could not be the property of one nation or be subject to one narrow kind of interpretation. Ārzū also shaped attitudes about reḳhtah, the Persianized form of vernacular poetry that would later be renamed and reconceptualized as Urdu, helping the vernacular to gain acceptance in elite literary circles in northern India. This study puts to rest the persistent misconception that Indians started writing the vernacular because they were ashamed of their poor grasp of Persian at the twilight of the Mughal Empire.
MIRIAM BUTT and GILLIAN RAMCHAND
- Published in print:
- 2005
- Published Online:
- January 2010
- ISBN:
- 9780199280445
- eISBN:
- 9780191712845
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199280445.003.0006
- Subject:
- Linguistics, Syntax and Morphology
This chapter examines two types of complex verbal predication in Hindi/Urdu, and argues that the language internal diagnostics support a constructionalist view of lexical meaning. It first shows ...
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This chapter examines two types of complex verbal predication in Hindi/Urdu, and argues that the language internal diagnostics support a constructionalist view of lexical meaning. It first shows empirically that these constructions must be distinguished both from genuine biclausal structures on the one hand, and auxiliary-verb monoclausal structures on the other. It then shows that the semantic contribution and linear order of the components of the complex predicate can be understood under an event structure decomposition, represented syntactically in the ‘first phase’. Specifically, one species of light verb will be argued to be an instantiation of a ν ‘initiational’ head, while another species of light verb instantiates a ‘process’-event head with the main verb providing a ‘result’ predicational head. If the authors' analysis is correct, complex constructions in Hindi/Urdu are a test case that offers striking semantic evidence for an event structure decomposition of the form ‘initiation → < process, result >’, and of its syntactic reality.Less
This chapter examines two types of complex verbal predication in Hindi/Urdu, and argues that the language internal diagnostics support a constructionalist view of lexical meaning. It first shows empirically that these constructions must be distinguished both from genuine biclausal structures on the one hand, and auxiliary-verb monoclausal structures on the other. It then shows that the semantic contribution and linear order of the components of the complex predicate can be understood under an event structure decomposition, represented syntactically in the ‘first phase’. Specifically, one species of light verb will be argued to be an instantiation of a ν ‘initiational’ head, while another species of light verb instantiates a ‘process’-event head with the main verb providing a ‘result’ predicational head. If the authors' analysis is correct, complex constructions in Hindi/Urdu are a test case that offers striking semantic evidence for an event structure decomposition of the form ‘initiation → < process, result >’, and of its syntactic reality.
A. G. Noorani
- Published in print:
- 2004
- Published Online:
- October 2012
- ISBN:
- 9780195670561
- eISBN:
- 9780199080618
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780195670561.003.0009
- Subject:
- History, Indian History
This chapter presents several documents focusing on the state of Urdu. The documents included show how Urdu has been discouraged; pleas of eminent Muslims before the Constituent Assembly to use ...
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This chapter presents several documents focusing on the state of Urdu. The documents included show how Urdu has been discouraged; pleas of eminent Muslims before the Constituent Assembly to use Hindustani as the national language; Maulana Hasrat Mohani’s plea for inclusion of education in the concurrent list; Nehru’s plea for equal importance to both Hindi and Urdu; and memorandum submitted on 24 February 1956 by a delegation from Bihar to President Rajendra Prasad on recognition of Urdu as a regional language.Less
This chapter presents several documents focusing on the state of Urdu. The documents included show how Urdu has been discouraged; pleas of eminent Muslims before the Constituent Assembly to use Hindustani as the national language; Maulana Hasrat Mohani’s plea for inclusion of education in the concurrent list; Nehru’s plea for equal importance to both Hindi and Urdu; and memorandum submitted on 24 February 1956 by a delegation from Bihar to President Rajendra Prasad on recognition of Urdu as a regional language.
Francesca Orsini
- Published in print:
- 2009
- Published Online:
- October 2012
- ISBN:
- 9780198062202
- eISBN:
- 9780199081431
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780198062202.003.0003
- Subject:
- History, Indian History
Since the nineteenth century, language and literature had been the subject of intense debates about the progress and reform of India. In the context of Hindi, such arguments gave rise to a cultural ...
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Since the nineteenth century, language and literature had been the subject of intense debates about the progress and reform of India. In the context of Hindi, such arguments gave rise to a cultural identification with the language, over a wide geographical area and in opposition to Urdu, English, and to earlier multiple linguistic saṃskāras. The growing support for Hindi, along with its politicization in the 1920s on the wave of Mahatma Gandhi's nationalism, suddenly made the question of a national language (rāṣṭrabhāṣā) appear plausible and even urgent. The provincial contest between scholars of Hindi and Urdu became an issue of national politics. This chapter examines how the nationalist perspective influenced Hindi debates on language and literature and on the role of the writer, how Hindi intellectuals reacted to the new publicity of the literary sphere, and the publicity and evaluation of Hindi literature based on prizes, popularity, and criticism.Less
Since the nineteenth century, language and literature had been the subject of intense debates about the progress and reform of India. In the context of Hindi, such arguments gave rise to a cultural identification with the language, over a wide geographical area and in opposition to Urdu, English, and to earlier multiple linguistic saṃskāras. The growing support for Hindi, along with its politicization in the 1920s on the wave of Mahatma Gandhi's nationalism, suddenly made the question of a national language (rāṣṭrabhāṣā) appear plausible and even urgent. The provincial contest between scholars of Hindi and Urdu became an issue of national politics. This chapter examines how the nationalist perspective influenced Hindi debates on language and literature and on the role of the writer, how Hindi intellectuals reacted to the new publicity of the literary sphere, and the publicity and evaluation of Hindi literature based on prizes, popularity, and criticism.
Shobna Nijhawan
- Published in print:
- 2018
- Published Online:
- February 2019
- ISBN:
- 9780199488391
- eISBN:
- 9780199095834
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/oso/9780199488391.001.0001
- Subject:
- Sociology, Culture
Investigating the emergence of Hindi publishing in colonial Lucknow, long a stronghold of Urdu and Persian literary culture, Shobna Nijhawan offers a detailed study of literary activities emerging ...
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Investigating the emergence of Hindi publishing in colonial Lucknow, long a stronghold of Urdu and Persian literary culture, Shobna Nijhawan offers a detailed study of literary activities emerging out of the publishing house Gaṅgā Pustak Mālā in the first half of the twentieth century. Closely associated with it was the Hindi monthly Sudhā, a literary, socio-political, and illustrated periodical, in which Hindi writings were promoted and developed for the education and entertainment of the reader. In charting the literary networks established by Dularelal Bhargava, the proprietor of Gaṅgā Pustak Mālā and chief editor of Sudhā, this volume sheds light on his role in the development of Hindi language and literature, creation of canonical literature, and commercialization and nationalization of books and periodicals in the north Indian Hindi public sphere. Using vernacular primary sources and drawing on scholarship on periodicals and publishing houses as well as editor-publishers that has emerged over the past two decades, Nijhawan shows how one publishing house singlehandedly impacted the role of Hindi in the public sphere.Less
Investigating the emergence of Hindi publishing in colonial Lucknow, long a stronghold of Urdu and Persian literary culture, Shobna Nijhawan offers a detailed study of literary activities emerging out of the publishing house Gaṅgā Pustak Mālā in the first half of the twentieth century. Closely associated with it was the Hindi monthly Sudhā, a literary, socio-political, and illustrated periodical, in which Hindi writings were promoted and developed for the education and entertainment of the reader. In charting the literary networks established by Dularelal Bhargava, the proprietor of Gaṅgā Pustak Mālā and chief editor of Sudhā, this volume sheds light on his role in the development of Hindi language and literature, creation of canonical literature, and commercialization and nationalization of books and periodicals in the north Indian Hindi public sphere. Using vernacular primary sources and drawing on scholarship on periodicals and publishing houses as well as editor-publishers that has emerged over the past two decades, Nijhawan shows how one publishing house singlehandedly impacted the role of Hindi in the public sphere.
Megan Eaton Robb
- Published in print:
- 2020
- Published Online:
- November 2020
- ISBN:
- 9780190089375
- eISBN:
- 9780190089405
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/oso/9780190089375.001.0001
- Subject:
- History, Asian History, History of Religion
In early twentieth-century British India, prior to the arrival of digital medias and after the rise of nationalist political movements, a small-town paper from the margins became a key node for an ...
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In early twentieth-century British India, prior to the arrival of digital medias and after the rise of nationalist political movements, a small-town paper from the margins became a key node for an Urdu journalism conversation with particular influence in the United Provinces and Punjab. Understanding this newspaper’s rise shows how a print public characterized by bottom-up as well as top-down approaches influenced the evolution of a new type of Urdu public in twentieth-century South Asia. Addressing a gap in scholarship on Urdu media in the early twentieth century, during the period when it underwent some of its most critical transformations, this book contributes a discursive and material analysis of a previously unexamined Urdu newspaper, Madinah, augmenting its analysis with evidence from contemporary Urdu, English, and Hindi papers; government records; private diaries; private library holdings; ethnographic interviews with families who owned and ran the newspaper; and training materials for newspaper printers. Madinah identified the Urdu newspaper conversation both explicitly and implicitly with Muslim identity, a commitment that became difficult to manage as the pro-Congress paper sought simultaneously to counter calls for Pakistan, to criticize Congress’s treatment of Muslims, and to emphasize Urdu’s necessary connection to Muslim identity. Since Madinah delineated the boundaries of a Muslim, public conversation in a way that emphasized rootedness to local politics and small urban spaces like Bijnor, this study demonstrates the necessity of considering spatial and temporal orientation in studies of the public in South Asia.Less
In early twentieth-century British India, prior to the arrival of digital medias and after the rise of nationalist political movements, a small-town paper from the margins became a key node for an Urdu journalism conversation with particular influence in the United Provinces and Punjab. Understanding this newspaper’s rise shows how a print public characterized by bottom-up as well as top-down approaches influenced the evolution of a new type of Urdu public in twentieth-century South Asia. Addressing a gap in scholarship on Urdu media in the early twentieth century, during the period when it underwent some of its most critical transformations, this book contributes a discursive and material analysis of a previously unexamined Urdu newspaper, Madinah, augmenting its analysis with evidence from contemporary Urdu, English, and Hindi papers; government records; private diaries; private library holdings; ethnographic interviews with families who owned and ran the newspaper; and training materials for newspaper printers. Madinah identified the Urdu newspaper conversation both explicitly and implicitly with Muslim identity, a commitment that became difficult to manage as the pro-Congress paper sought simultaneously to counter calls for Pakistan, to criticize Congress’s treatment of Muslims, and to emphasize Urdu’s necessary connection to Muslim identity. Since Madinah delineated the boundaries of a Muslim, public conversation in a way that emphasized rootedness to local politics and small urban spaces like Bijnor, this study demonstrates the necessity of considering spatial and temporal orientation in studies of the public in South Asia.
Margrit Pernau
- Published in print:
- 2019
- Published Online:
- April 2020
- ISBN:
- 9780199497775
- eISBN:
- 9780190990831
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/oso/9780199497775.001.0001
- Subject:
- History, Indian History, Social History
With this pioneering project, Margrit Pernau brings the ‘history of emotions’ approach to South Asian studies. A theoretically sophisticated and erudite investigation, Emotions and Modernity in ...
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With this pioneering project, Margrit Pernau brings the ‘history of emotions’ approach to South Asian studies. A theoretically sophisticated and erudite investigation, Emotions and Modernity in Colonial India maps the history of emotions in India between the uprising of 1857 and World War I. Situating the prevalent experiences, interpretations, and practices of emotions of the time within the context of the major political events of colonial India, Pernau goes beyond the dominant narrative of colonial modernity and its fixation with discipline and restrain, and traces the contemporary transformation from a balance in emotions to the resurgence of fervor. The current volume is based on a large archive of sources in Urdu, many being explored for the first time. Pernau grounds her work on such diverse sources as philosophical and theological treatises on questions of morality, advice literature, journals and newspapers, nostalgic descriptions of courtly culture, and even children’s literature. This close look into individual experiences, practices, and interpretations reveals the myriad emotions of the day, and the importance of these micro-histories in presenting an alternative account of colonial India.Less
With this pioneering project, Margrit Pernau brings the ‘history of emotions’ approach to South Asian studies. A theoretically sophisticated and erudite investigation, Emotions and Modernity in Colonial India maps the history of emotions in India between the uprising of 1857 and World War I. Situating the prevalent experiences, interpretations, and practices of emotions of the time within the context of the major political events of colonial India, Pernau goes beyond the dominant narrative of colonial modernity and its fixation with discipline and restrain, and traces the contemporary transformation from a balance in emotions to the resurgence of fervor. The current volume is based on a large archive of sources in Urdu, many being explored for the first time. Pernau grounds her work on such diverse sources as philosophical and theological treatises on questions of morality, advice literature, journals and newspapers, nostalgic descriptions of courtly culture, and even children’s literature. This close look into individual experiences, practices, and interpretations reveals the myriad emotions of the day, and the importance of these micro-histories in presenting an alternative account of colonial India.
Akshaya Kumar
- Published in print:
- 2021
- Published Online:
- December 2021
- ISBN:
- 9780190130183
- eISBN:
- 9780190992590
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/oso/9780190130183.003.0004
- Subject:
- Sociology, Urban and Rural Studies
This chapter recounts the language politics of north India, with particular stress upon the heydays of Hindi nationalism, which wrested control of literary production from Urdu on behalf of the ...
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This chapter recounts the language politics of north India, with particular stress upon the heydays of Hindi nationalism, which wrested control of literary production from Urdu on behalf of the ‘Hindis’ of northern plains. Bhojpuri among other ‘tongues’ were therefore side-lined by the nationalist fervour. Tracing the trajectory of women’s folksongs, popular chapbooks and theatre troupes, the chapter reconstructs the resurgence of the vernaculars via audiocassettes, VCDs/DVDs and microSD cards. Electronic media thus absorbed the energies pushed out of the literate public sphere. The chapter also highlights the role played by a lateral-ness of address to unspool Bhojpuri from its ‘folk’ bearings and mount a mass address upon it. At the end, the chapter places the language politics of north India in relation to the Trojan horse of English, and the attendant struggle for the political existence of the vernacular linguistic communities.Less
This chapter recounts the language politics of north India, with particular stress upon the heydays of Hindi nationalism, which wrested control of literary production from Urdu on behalf of the ‘Hindis’ of northern plains. Bhojpuri among other ‘tongues’ were therefore side-lined by the nationalist fervour. Tracing the trajectory of women’s folksongs, popular chapbooks and theatre troupes, the chapter reconstructs the resurgence of the vernaculars via audiocassettes, VCDs/DVDs and microSD cards. Electronic media thus absorbed the energies pushed out of the literate public sphere. The chapter also highlights the role played by a lateral-ness of address to unspool Bhojpuri from its ‘folk’ bearings and mount a mass address upon it. At the end, the chapter places the language politics of north India in relation to the Trojan horse of English, and the attendant struggle for the political existence of the vernacular linguistic communities.
Margrit Pernau
- Published in print:
- 2013
- Published Online:
- September 2013
- ISBN:
- 9780198092285
- eISBN:
- 9780199082582
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780198092285.003.0013
- Subject:
- History, Indian History
Discussions of women’s behaviour were never concerned exclusively with women; rather, they were central to the definition of an identity and the creation of a community which also included men. This ...
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Discussions of women’s behaviour were never concerned exclusively with women; rather, they were central to the definition of an identity and the creation of a community which also included men. This chapter examines the claim that women’s conduct was meant to mark them as the bearers of an unspoilt Indian tradition. The first section discusses educational novels written for women and girls. The second section looks at non-fiction texts, focusing on religious guidebooks for women. The final section considers the women’s journal Ismat, which was founded and published by a man, but to which women also contributed in increasing numbers, and asks how women themselves responded to the qualities expected of them and demands made of them, where they accepted these and where reinterpretations took place.Less
Discussions of women’s behaviour were never concerned exclusively with women; rather, they were central to the definition of an identity and the creation of a community which also included men. This chapter examines the claim that women’s conduct was meant to mark them as the bearers of an unspoilt Indian tradition. The first section discusses educational novels written for women and girls. The second section looks at non-fiction texts, focusing on religious guidebooks for women. The final section considers the women’s journal Ismat, which was founded and published by a man, but to which women also contributed in increasing numbers, and asks how women themselves responded to the qualities expected of them and demands made of them, where they accepted these and where reinterpretations took place.
