The Politics of Self-Expression The Urdu Middle-Class Milieu of Early 20th Century India and Pakistan (Royal Asiatic Society Books)

The 1930s to 1950s witnessed the rise and dominance of a political culture across much of North India which combined unprecedented levels of mobilization and organization with an effective de-politicization of politics. On the one hand obsessed with world events, people also came to understand politics as a question of personal morality and achievement. In other words, politics was about expressing the self in new ways and about finding and securing an imaginary home in a fast-moving and often terrifying universe. The scope and arguments of this book make an innovative contribution to the historiography of modern South Asia, by focusing on the middle-class milieu which was the epicentre of this new political culture. Annotation Middleclass political culture in interwar North India was haunted by fascistic resonance. Activists from various political camps believed in forms of Social-Darwinism, worshipped violence and war and focused their political action on public spectacles and paramilitary organization. This book argues that these features were part of a larger political culture - the politics of self-expression - that had lost sight of society as the normal space in which politics was to be conducted. Instead, there was an emphasis on the inner worlds of individuals who increasingly came to understand politics as an avenue to personal salvation. It proposes that this re-orientation of politics was the result of social transformations brought about by the coming of a consumer society. The politics of self-expression was fixated with matters related to political choices, the branding of clothes and bodies and the use of a political language that closely resembled advertising discourse. This study traces the socio-genesis of this new form of politics through a detailed analysis of material culture in the Urdu middleclass milieu. It examines how middleclass people arrived at their political opinions in consequence of how they structured their immediate spatial surroundings, and how they strove to define the experiences of their own bodies in a particularly middleclass way. The scope and arguments of this book make an innovative contribution to the historiography of modern South Asia "Middle-class political culture in interwar North India was haunted by fascistic resonances. Activists from various political camps believed in forms of Social-Darwinism, worshipped violence and war and focused their political action on public spectacles and paramilitary organization. This book argues that these features were part of a larger political culture - the politics of self-expression - that had lost sight of society as the normal space in which politics was to be conducted. Instead, there was an emphasis on the inner worlds of individuals who increasingly came to understand politics as an avenue to personal salvation. It proposes that this re-orientation of politics was the result of social transformations brought about by the coming of a consumer society."--Jacket BOOK COVER......Page 1 HALF-TITLE......Page 2 SERIES-TITLE......Page 3 TITLE......Page 6 COPYRIGHT......Page 7 DEDICATION......Page 8 CONTENTS......Page 10 PREFACE......Page 12 NOTE ON TRANSLITERATION......Page 16 INTRODUCTION......Page 18 1 POLITICS AGAINST SOCIETY......Page 35 2 STATES OF POWER......Page 77 3 A CLASS OF BODIES......Page 110 4 SPACES OF SELF-EXPRESSION......Page 145 5 THE CONSUMPTION OF POLITICS......Page 179 CONCLUSION......Page 222 NOTES......Page 228 BIBLIOGRAPHY......Page 253 INDEX......Page 264 The scope and arguments of this book aim to make a contribution to the historiography of modern South Asia, by focusing on the middle-class milieu which was the epicentre of this new political culture