Sumit Guha

Politics, Ecology and History: Asia in the Anthropocene

This is a reading course for students who want to engage diverse readings in political ecology. While Asia-focused the course is premised on Asia’s historical engagement with other parts of the world and the global environment. Students will engage with ‘clusters’ of reading around a particular topic and write three review essays responding to each set of readings within a 15 days of the last reading.

Assessment will be based on

(a) preparation and participation in class 34%

(b) Three review essays (out of the four clusters) 66%

The republic of India was the largest of the many Asian and African states that emerged from the retreat of Western empires after 1945. It emerged in unpropitious circumstances of bloodshed and acute poverty, but has uniquely avoided both civil war and dictatorship through the decades that followed. Students in this course will explore the dangers that beset the fledgling democracy and the many efforts needed to sustain and widen it. They will also study efforts at economic development in a changing world.

This course will teach students two distinct and graduated forms of analytic writing. One is the art of reviewing: it begins with learning to summarize (present the main points of another text concisely) and is completed by learning the skill of evaluating texts in comparison with other texts.

Textbooks:

Ramachandra Guha India after Gandhi: The History of the World’s Largest Democracy. New York: Harper Collins, 2008. Paperback edition. ISBN: 9780060958589. Required

Mukulika Banerjee Why India Votes? London: Routledge 2014. ISBN 978-1-138-01971-3 Required

Articles and documents from J-Stor and other sources will be available through Canvas.

Grades will be assigned on the basis of

* two short analytic papers (c. 1000 words, 15% + peer review 5% each)
* a book review (20%)
* a final essay peer review (10%) and final essay (20%).
* Attendance and participation 10%.  
* Peer reviewers will be graded on the basis of the knowledge, understanding and linguistic proficiency displayed in their review comments.
* Plus/minus grades may be used where appropriate.

The Indian Rebellion of 1857: War of Independence or Sepoy Mutiny?

This course carries the Independent Inquiry and Writing flags. The instructor will deliver two introductory lectures so that the course will be accessible to students who have not studied the history of the Indian subcontinent before. It will require students to formulate research questions (Independent Inquiry) and work with primary sources such as those listed below.

The course will have two phases: in the first phase we will consider how historians have debated the characterization of historical events (‘historiography’). In the second phase, students will analyze English-language primary (usually contemporary) sources in order to construct an evidence-based historical narrative, supported by references to the primary sources.

Texts include primary sources such as:
1. John Wilson, The Indian Military Revolt viewed in its religious aspects. London, 1858
2. Sitaram From Sepoy to Subedar translated by J.T. Norgate. third printing. London 1911.
3. Anon. A Lady's Diary of the Siege of Lucknow. London, 1858.
4. Syed Ahmed Khan The Causes of the Indian Revolt.  Benaras, 1873.
5. British House of Commons. Parliamentary paper of 1859, No. 162. "Evidence Taken at the Trial of the King of Delhi."

Grading:

Two short analyses of sources (10% x 2)
Four peer reviews (4x 5%)
Research prospectus 10%
Draft I 10%
Draft II 10%
Final paper 20%
Attendance & participation 10%

Plus/minus grades may be given, as appropriate.

This course surveys the long history of the Indian subcontinent. It has two goals. The first is to provide you with an outline of the major phases of South Asian history from the rise of its first civilization five thousand years ago, up to the development of modern self-governing states after the end of the British empire. The second is to enable you to think about how humans organize themselves to live in the mega-societies that occupy the world today. India created one of the earliest such societies on the planet. Since the course surveys five thousand years, it will be directed to identifying lasting patterns and institutions rather than individuals and events. But class discussions will especially focus on key personalities and important texts that have left historic legacies or offer insight into their times. The format will be a mix of lectures with discussion, as well as discussion meetings devoted to specific readings.

The course is designed to accommodate students with no previous knowledge of Asia. It does require students to attend regularly, contribute to a collective learning process, keep up with weekly readings and participate constructively in discussions. Discussions will usually focus on primary sources. A primary source is something that historians use as a valid record of the past. All good historical narrative is constructed on the basis of evidence from primary sources. Reading and discussing these will enable you reason from evidence, just as historians do

Texts:

Thomas R. Trautmann India: Brief History of a Civilization

Second Edition Publication Date - January 2015

ISBN: 9780190202491

All other readings will be available on the course website or free download.

Grading: total of 4 map quizzes/ responses to readings – 20%; one 1000-1200 word book report – 20%; mid-term and final in-class exams – total 25 + 25%; attendance 10%.

Regular attendance is expected. A student may be absent or late three times without penalty. Make-up for missing a quiz/test/exam will only be permitted if a documented and satisfactory explanation is provided.

Grades will be assigned as follows:

A+ = 97-100                 A=93-96           A- = 90-93

B+ = 86-89                   B= 82-85          B-= 78-81

C+ = 74-77                   C=70-73           C-=66-69

D+ = 62-65                   D= 58-61          D-=57-53

52 and lower are F.

The purpose of this course is to conduct an interdisciplinary exploration of language history, language ideology and politics in the past and present with a particular focus on South Asia in comparative Asian and global setting.

All complex human activity is constituted in and mediated by language. It has therefore, long been used to organize human interaction on every scale, from the imagined interlocutor of the soliloquy to the largest programs of making States and re-making subjects. It is as new as efforts to sanctify the status of English in the USA and as old as the first empires.

The many-layered linguistic patterns of South Asia past and present have long made it a focus for the systematic study of socio-linguistics and linguistic anthropology. South Asian materials therefore figure significantly in the readings. But it will also review English-language materials on post-colonial Latin America and Asia so as to frame South Asia in a comparative framework.

Readings will include the important works of Pierre Bourdieu and John Gumperz as well as Muzaffar Alam, Bernard Cohn, Benedict Anderson and Sheldon Pollock. Twentieth century controversies in India and Pakistan will be addressed via both primary and secondary sources.

Students may choose to take the course as either a reading or a research seminar. Students who opt to take the course as a research seminar will be allotted significant primary sources and will write a final paper analyzing those materials. But both groups will work through important secondary readings in the first eight or nine weeks of the semester. Each student will present a short response paper to each week’s reading and lead at least one class discussion. A final longer paper will also be required

India: The struggle to build an Asian democracy, 1947-2008

HIS 350 L (38660); ANS 361 (30820). Meets Mondays 3-6 PM, GAR 0.132

Instructor: Sumit Guha

Office: GAR 2.140 Email: sguha@austin.utexas.edu

Office hours: Wed. 2-4 PM & by appointment

Description:

The republic of India was the largest of the many Asian and African states that emerged from the retreat of Western empires after 1945. It emerged in unpropitious circumstances of bloodshed and acute poverty, but has uniquely avoided both civil war and dictatorship through the decades that followed. Students in this course will explore the dangers that beset the fledgling democracy and the many efforts needed to sustain and widen it.

            This course carries a Writing Flag. Such classes meet the Core Communications objectives of Critical Thinking, Communication, Teamwork, and Personal Responsibility as established by the Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board. Writing Flag courses are designed to improve student expertise with writing in an academic discipline, in this case, History.  This course teaches students two distinct and graduated forms of analytic writing. One is the art of reviewing: it begins with learning to summarize (present the main points of another text concisely) and is completed by learning the skill of evaluating texts in comparison with other texts.

Textbooks:

Ramachandra Guha India after Gandhi: The History of the World’s Largest Democracy. New York: Harper Collins, 2008. Paperback edition. ISBN: 9780060958589. Required

Mukulika Banerjee Why India Votes? London: Routledge 2014. ISBN 978-1-138-01971-3 Required

Other readings will be available free on Canvas, or online via the UT Library system.

Evaluation:

Attendance and participation 33%

Précis of early reading 10%.

Book Review draft and final version 22%

Final essay draft and final 35%

Points will be converted to letter grades as follows:

86-100=       A

70-85=         B

55-69=          C

40-54=         D

Below 40=   F

Asian business and Western empire c.1500-1940: Studies in global political economy

HIS 364G (38829)/ ANS 361 (30787)

Class meets MWF 11-12 AM, PAR 203

Instructor: Sumit Guha                                   Email: sguha@austin.utexas.edu

Office: GAR 2.140.                Office Hours: Wed. 2-4 PM & by appointment

Description: Asia has for centuries been a region characterized by a complex division of labor, a vibrant commerce and sophisticated financial and fiscal structures. But its external commerce – and for a time, even much of its modern industry was governed by Western firms. Yet its businessmen adapted and survived, developing hybrid types of organization as they adopted modern techniques. The course studies these efforts, looking at both successes and failures.

Objectives: (a) introduce students to the business history of Asia, showing one way that its peoples responded to the powerful challenge mounted by Europeans from the sixteenth to the twentieth century

(b) Study how economic organizations shape and are shaped by their social and institutional settings and

(c) Introduce key ideas that have shaped modern economic life

Grading policy:

There will be a mid-term exam (20%), two map quizzes (10%) and four class discussions (5% each) and a final exam (40%). Attendance and participation will count for 10%. Discussion sessions are intended to review and reinforce material recently covered in the class and will be the basis of questions asked in the exams.

Textbooks:

Faure, David China and Capitalism: A History of Business Enterprise in Modern China Hong Kong University Press, 2006. Hardback ISBN 978-962-209-783-4, eISBN 978-988-220-383-9 Paperback ISBN 978-962-209-784-1. Ebook available from the Press website for $12.99

Furber, Holden Rival Empires of Trade in the Orient. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press 1976. Available as e-book from UT library system. One copy held in PCL 2 hour reserve.

This course surveys the long history of the Indian subcontinent. It has two goals. The first is to provide you with an outline of the major phases of South Asian history from the rise of its first civilization five thousand years ago, up to the development of modern self-governing states after the end of the British empire. The second is to enable you to think about how humans organize themselves to live in the mega-societies that occupy the world today. India created one of the earliest such societies on the planet. Since the course surveys five thousand years, it will be directed to identifying lasting patterns and institutions rather than individuals and events. But class discussions will especially focus on key personalities and important texts that have left historic legacies or offer insight into their times. The format will be a mix of lectures with discussion, as well as discussion meetings devoted to specific readings.

The course is designed to accommodate students with no previous knowledge of Asia. It does require students to attend regularly, contribute to a collective learning process, keep up with weekly readings and participate constructively in discussions. Discussions will usually focus on primary sources. A primary source is something that historians use as a valid record of the past. All good historical narrative is constructed on the basis of evidence from primary sources. Reading and discussing these will enable you reason from evidence, just as historians do.

Grading: total of six map quizzes/ responses to readings – 30%; two book reports – 20%; mid-term and final in-class exams – 20 and 25%%; attendance 5%.

Regular attendance is expected. A student may be absent or late three times without penalty. Make-up for missing a quiz/test/exam will only be permitted if a documented and satisfactory explanation is provided.

Texts:

Thomas R. Trautmann India: Brief History of a Civilization

Second Edition Publication Date - January 2015

ISBN: 9780190202491

All other readings will be available on the course website or free download.

FLAGS:   GC  |  Wr  |  II

This is primarily a writing class but the instructor will deliver two introductory lectures. Assignments will build up from short book/video reports up to two longer take-home essays due on October 16 and December 7. Students will be required to critically examine texts and images (including video-film) and confront them, in turn, with the primary sources. The readings/viewings are designed with this end in view.

Texts:

There is no required textbook; all the readings and notes will be available on the course website. A full list will be found in the syllabus.

For consultation: A companion to the "Indian mutiny" of 1857 / general editor, P.J.O. Taylor (New York: Oxford University Press, 1996) will be held in PCL 2 hour reserve.

Grading:

Grades distributed as follows: Participation including class questions and peer reviewing 30%; Assignment 1 10%; Assignment 2 15%; Assignment 3 20%; Final essay – 25%

This course surveys the long history of the Indian subcontinent. It has two goals. The first is to provide you with an outline of the major phases of South Asian history from the rise of its first civilization five thousand years ago, up to the development of modern self-governing states after the end of the British empire. The second is to enable you to think about how humans organize themselves to live in the mega-societies that occupy the world today. India created one of the earliest such societies on the planet. Since the course surveys five thousand years, it will be directed to identifying lasting patterns and institutions rather than individuals and events. But class discussions will especially focus on key personalities and important texts that have left historic legacies or offer insight into their times. The format will be a mix of lectures with discussion, as well as discussion meetings devoted to specific readings.

The course is designed to accommodate students with no previous knowledge of Asia. It does require students to attend regularly, contribute to a collective learning process, keep up with weekly readings and participate constructively in discussions. Discussions will usually focus on primary sources. A primary source is something that historians use as a valid record of the past. All good historical narrative is constructed on the basis of evidence from primary sources. Reading and discussing these will enable you reason from evidence, just as historians do. There may be occasional snap quizzes.

Texts:

Thomas Trautmann India: Brief History of a Civilization Oxford University Press, 2011 pback, ISBN 978-0-19-973632-4

All other readings will be available on the course website or free download.

Grading:

Make-ups will be available for those absent for adequate and documented reasons (e.g. illness). Extra participation credit may be awarded for attendance at special lectures or events.

The purpose of this course is to conduct an interdisciplinary exploration of language history, language ideology and politics in the past and present with a particular focus on South Asia in comparative Asian and global setting.

All complex human activity is constituted in and mediated by language.It has therefore, long been used to organize human interaction on every scale, from the imagined interlocutor of the soliloquy to the largest programs of making States and re-making subjects. It is as new as efforts to sanctify the status of English in the USA and as old as the first empires.

The many-layered linguistic patterns of South Asia past and present have long made it a focus for the systematic study of socio-linguistics and linguistic anthropology. South Asian materials therefore figure significantly in the readings.

Readings will include the important works of Pierre Bourdieu and John Gumperz as well as Muzaffar Alam, Bernard Cohn, Benedict Anderson and Sheldon Pollock. Twentieth century controversies in India and Pakistan will be addressed via both primary and secondary sources. Most readings will be available via Canvas as pdf-s so students will need to acquire a limited number of books.

Books required:

Muzaffar Alam The Language of Political Islam in India 1200-1800 (Delhi: Permanent Black, 2001) ISBN 81-7824-062-9 [as this is hard to find, additional copies will be held in PCL for short-term loan]

Michael E. Brown and Sumit Ganguly eds. Fighting Words: Language Policy and Ethnic Relations in Asia (MIT Press 2003) ISBN 0-262-52333-7

Patrick Eisenlohr Diaspora, Time and Ethnolinguistic Belonging in Hindu Mauritius (Berkeley: University of California Press 2006) ISBN 0-520-24880-5

Pierre Bourdieu Language and Symbolic Power (Cambridge MA: Polity Press 1991) ISBN 0-674-51041-0

Grading:

Starting with the second week of semester, each student will post a short response paper on the course Canvas site by 5 PM on the day preceding every class.

In addition to the response papers, each student will chair at least one session of the class. That means the student will go over the main points in the reading and consider some of the strengths and failures of the arguments raised in the assigned books and articles. Leadership and participation in the class will count for 50% of the class grade. 

Each student will write two review essays: the first on readings for September-October and the second on the readings October-December. Each paper will account for 25% of the total grade.

The Indian sub-continent was long viewed as dominated by religious values that bred fatalism and ensured economic stagnation. Yet this is a region with a recorded history of four thousand years of economic and cultural exchange with other parts of the world. This course will introduce you to the long history of commerce and enterprise in the Indian sub-continent up to the present. It will also enhance your understanding of the sociology of economic activity, the role of governance and the changing representation of the entrepreneur in popular culture. The course does not require previous study of South Asia (the Indian subcontinent), though students without such exposure will need to acquire some additional background information.

 Texts:

Most readings will be available on Blackboard or the Library web-site.

Students must purchase Dwijendra Tripathi and Jyoti Jumani Concise Oxford History of Indian Business ISBN 019568429X (Oxford University Press, 2007) and borrow or purchase Mani Ratnam's biopic Guru (2007).

 I also recommend purchase of Thomas Trautmann India: Brief History of a Civilization

 Oxford University Press 2011 as a ready reference for those without a background in South Asian studies.

 Grading:

Your progress will be tested by mid-term and final examinations, periodic quizzes, and two 3-page review essays. Participation in class discussions is an important part of the course and will count for 20%of the overall grade. Anyone who misses a quiz or mid­ term for a valid, documented reason may be permitted one opportunity to make-up the work within 7 days.

This course (a reading seminar) will introduce you to the long history of South Asia and its peoples’ interaction with the world. We shall look at cultures, perceptions and especially political economy. We will consider the movement of ideas and migration of practices as well as people. We shall especially focus on the political economy of labor migration and long history of a key textile fiber – cotton both as commodity and symbol.

It will require weekly responses in addition to a short intermediate and longer end-semester paper. The latter will use primary and secondary sources on the theme of the political economy of cotton. The topic will be selected in consultation with the instructor and must be decided before the eighth week of the semester. The papers will then be presented in one or two sessions held in conference format at the end of the semester.

The short intermediate paper will be an analysis in 4-5 pages of one or two primary source documents on laboring migrants and their fates.

Responses need to address all the readings assigned but need not be integrated essays. They may (for example) be a set of notes on each individual reading with page numbers for specific citations. I would encourage, but not require a supplemental comment on the readings as a whole.

Texts for acquisition (other readings will be available via Blackboard)

Manfred Steger Globalization: A very short introduction Oxford University Press 2008; ISBN 978-0-19-955226

Richard H. Davis Global India c. 100 CE: South Asia in Early World History Ann Arbor: Association for Asian Studies 2009

Prakash C. Jain ed. Indian Diaspora in West Asia Delhi: Manohar 2007 [recommended, not required]

Sunil Khilnani Idea of India New York: Farrar Strauss 1999 [any complete edition acceptable]

Emma Tarlo Clothing Matters. Chicago: University of Chicago Press 1996.

All the books above are available in inexpensive paperback editions; print copies will be held on reserve at the PCL.

Select other readings: grouped by topic will be available via Blackboard.

Aims

This course surveys the long history of the Indian subcontinent. It has two goals. The first is to provide you with an outline of the major phases of South Asian history from the rise of its first civilization five thousand years ago, up to the development of modern self-governing states after the end of the British empire. The second is to enable you to think about how humans organize themselves to live in the mega-societies that occupy the world today. India created one of the earliest such societies on the planet.

Class discussions will especially focus on key institutions, personalities and important texts that have left historic legacies or offer insight into their times. The format will be a mix of lectures with discussion, as well as discussion meetings devoted to specific readings. 

Requirements and evaluation

The course is designed to accommodate students with no previous knowledge of Asia. It does require students to attend regularly, contribute to a collective learning process, keep up with weekly readings and participate constructively in discussions. Discussions will usually focus on primary sources. A primary source is something that historians use as a valid record of the past. All good historical narrative is constructed on the basis of evidence from primary sources. Reading and discussing these will enable you reason from evidence, just as historians do.

Grading:

There will be three in-class examinations through the semester (20%+20%+20%)

One book report on a play or novel (20%)

Participation 20%

Books required for purchase:

Thomas Trautmann India: Brief History of a Civilization Oxford University Press, 2011 pback, ISBN 978-0-19-973632-4

All other readings will be available on the course website or via Blackboard.Consult the syllabus for a fuller description. Please email the Professor if you have questions!

This course aims to introduce students to the problems faced in historical research via the scrutiny of the sources and historical writings on one of the most contentious episodes in the history of the British in India. The year 1857 saw the most violent and widespread attempt ever made to destroy the British empire in South Asia. It was ferociously suppressed after a war of re-conquest lasting over a year. Various episodes in this struggle entered British imperial folklore and legend, while Indian nationalists gave them radically different meanings. Students will be required to critically examine texts and images (including video-film) generated by these controversies and confront them, in turn, with the primary sources. The readings/viewings are designed with this end in view.  The crafting of coherent prose narratives from primary sources is a major focus of this course.

Each student will write drafts and final versions of two research papers as well as one analysis of a primary source.

Texts:

There is no required textbook; all the readings and notes will be available on the course website. A full list will be found in the syllabus.

Grading:

Primary source analysis: 15%

Two research paper drafts: 10+10%

Two final papers: 20+20%

Participation: 25%.

Please see the syllabus for a more detailed account.