The Cracked Mirror
An Indian Debate on Experience and Theory
Price: 495.00 INR
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ISBN:
9780199474592
Publication date:
01/06/2017
Paperback
264 pages
Price: 495.00 INR
We sell our titles through other companies
Disclaimer :You will be redirected to a third party website.The sole responsibility of supplies, condition of the product, availability of stock, date of delivery, mode of payment will be as promised by the said third party only. Prices and specifications may vary from the OUP India site.
ISBN:
9780199474592
Publication date:
01/06/2017
Paperback
264 pages
Gopal Guru and Sundar Sarukkai
Using the format of a dialogue between two authors, this book confronts the problematic issues of experience and theory by first beginning with an analysis of the nature of experience followed by an argument for an ethics of theorizing. These topics are discussed within the context of theorizing Dalit experience and conceptualizing the problematic category of untouchability by drawing upon both Indian and Western intellectual traditions.
Rights: World Rights
Gopal Guru and Sundar Sarukkai
Description
Western constructs giving precedence to ideas over experience have, for long, dominated theorization in Indian social sciences. Problematizing their tenuous relationship, this book presents a passionate plea to create new frameworks for describing contemporary Indian social experiences.
Using a dialogic form and placing the reality of untouchability and Dalit life at the centre of analyses, Gopal Guru and Sundar Sarukkai examine the ontological and epistemological nature of experience, thereby exhibiting the politics of experience. By illustrating ways of using alternative frameworks for theorizing, The Cracked Mirror argues for a more careful understanding of the ethics of representation.
About the Author
Gopal Guru is Professor, Centre for Political Studies, Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi.
Sundar Sarukkai is Professor, National Institute of Advanced Studies, Indian Institute of Science Campus, Bengaluru.
Gopal Guru and Sundar Sarukkai
Table of contents
Acknowledgements
List of Abbreviations
Introduction
Gopal Guru and Sundar Sarukkai
1. Egalitarianism and the Social Sciences in India
Gopal Guru
2. Experience and Theory: From Habermas to
Gopal Guru
Sundar Sarukkai
3. Understanding Experience
Sundar Sarukkai
4. Experience, Space, and Justice
Gopal Guru
5. Experience and the Ethics of Theory
Gopal Guru
6. Ethics of Theorizing
Sundar Sarukkai
7. Phenomenology of Untouchability
Sundar Sarukkai
8. Archaeology of Untouchability
Gopal Guru
9. Conclusion
Gopal Guru and Sundar Sarukkai
References
Index
Gopal Guru and Sundar Sarukkai
Gopal Guru and Sundar Sarukkai
Review
‘This explosive and radical book is a dialogue between a philosopher and a social theorist based in India on the nature of experience, theory, ethics, and politics. In addition to its many other virtues, it is also a remarkable reflection on the logic of untouchability and thus of caste in Indian thought and experience, one which should force all social scientists concerned with inequality and humiliation in Indian society to rethink their most cherished dogmas.’
—Arjun Appadurai
Goddard Professor of Media, Culture and Communication,
New York University, USA
‘The outcome of a dialogue between two of India’s leading thinkers, one a philosopher, the other a political scientist, The Cracked Mirror marks an intellectual event of international importance. Not only is lived experience brought forcefully back into social theory, but it is the inassimilable experience of the Dalit, which for centuries has been distorted in the consciousness of the dominant. This is real "theory from the South", and it demands to be read everywhere.’
—Sheldon Pollock
Ransford Professor of Sanskrit and Indian Studies,
Columbia University in the City of New York, USA
‘This book deserves to be read with care and interest, and marks a genuine advance in current debates. There is much food for thought in their exchanges for all of us. This is only to say that more such dialogues (or multilogues) are the need of the hour, to bring further experiences to light and in order to develop more theories for our collective liberation.’
—Mary E. John
Senior Fellow at the Centre for Women’s Development Studies,
New Delhi, India
Description
Western constructs giving precedence to ideas over experience have, for long, dominated theorization in Indian social sciences. Problematizing their tenuous relationship, this book presents a passionate plea to create new frameworks for describing contemporary Indian social experiences.
Using a dialogic form and placing the reality of untouchability and Dalit life at the centre of analyses, Gopal Guru and Sundar Sarukkai examine the ontological and epistemological nature of experience, thereby exhibiting the politics of experience. By illustrating ways of using alternative frameworks for theorizing, The Cracked Mirror argues for a more careful understanding of the ethics of representation.
About the Author
Gopal Guru is Professor, Centre for Political Studies, Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi.
Sundar Sarukkai is Professor, National Institute of Advanced Studies, Indian Institute of Science Campus, Bengaluru.
Reviews
‘This explosive and radical book is a dialogue between a philosopher and a social theorist based in India on the nature of experience, theory, ethics, and politics. In addition to its many other virtues, it is also a remarkable reflection on the logic of untouchability and thus of caste in Indian thought and experience, one which should force all social scientists concerned with inequality and humiliation in Indian society to rethink their most cherished dogmas.’
—Arjun Appadurai
Goddard Professor of Media, Culture and Communication,
New York University, USA
‘The outcome of a dialogue between two of India’s leading thinkers, one a philosopher, the other a political scientist, The Cracked Mirror marks an intellectual event of international importance. Not only is lived experience brought forcefully back into social theory, but it is the inassimilable experience of the Dalit, which for centuries has been distorted in the consciousness of the dominant. This is real "theory from the South", and it demands to be read everywhere.’
—Sheldon Pollock
Ransford Professor of Sanskrit and Indian Studies,
Columbia University in the City of New York, USA
‘This book deserves to be read with care and interest, and marks a genuine advance in current debates. There is much food for thought in their exchanges for all of us. This is only to say that more such dialogues (or multilogues) are the need of the hour, to bring further experiences to light and in order to develop more theories for our collective liberation.’
—Mary E. John
Senior Fellow at the Centre for Women’s Development Studies,
New Delhi, India
Table of contents
Acknowledgements
List of Abbreviations
Introduction
Gopal Guru and Sundar Sarukkai
1. Egalitarianism and the Social Sciences in India
Gopal Guru
2. Experience and Theory: From Habermas to
Gopal Guru
Sundar Sarukkai
3. Understanding Experience
Sundar Sarukkai
4. Experience, Space, and Justice
Gopal Guru
5. Experience and the Ethics of Theory
Gopal Guru
6. Ethics of Theorizing
Sundar Sarukkai
7. Phenomenology of Untouchability
Sundar Sarukkai
8. Archaeology of Untouchability
Gopal Guru
9. Conclusion
Gopal Guru and Sundar Sarukkai
References
Index
