The Social Space of Language: Vernacular Culture in British Colonial Punjab"This is a pioneering study. Mir draws upon largely unfamiliar material and suggests new approaches to religio-cultural questions of great importance to South Asianists across a wide disciplinary spectrum."--Christopher Shackle, SOAS, University of London "Mir makes creative use of archival and folkloric material to tell the history of a composite, modern, and gendered Punjabi self in colonial India that was sadly lost in the welter of partition politics and violence. The story of the legendary lovers Heer and Ranjha haunts her narrative like an artistic lament about a lost Punjabi self without in any way compromising the academic quality of her research and the rigor of her exposition. A very significant contribution to South Asian history."--Dipesh Chakrabarty, The University of Chicago "Farina Mir has given us an outstanding work of literary and cultural history. She skillfully unravels the many versions of the famous folk-tale about Hir and Ranjha to illuminate gender, class and community relations in Punjab. This book will compel historians to rethink the links between language, religion and power and to reconsider the contingencies of union and partition in late colonial India."--Sugata Bose, author of A Hundred Horizons "Mir's archival work covers and foregrounds the breadth of the story-telling or qissa tradition, great and little, high and low, Sufi, Sikh and Hindu, showing its wide dissemination. Mir's findings are of immense significance, given the turbulent history of the region in post-independence India and the political turmoil today, particularly on the Pakistani side of the border. Panjabi seldom finds this kind of focus in cultural history."--Vasudha Dalmia, University of California, Berkeley |
Contents
Introduction | 1 |
1 Forging a Language Policy | 27 |
2 Punjabi Print Culture | 62 |
3 A Punjabi Literary Formation | 91 |
4 Place and Personhood | 123 |
5 Piety and Devotion | 150 |
Conclusion | 183 |
Other editions - View all
The Social Space of Language: Vernacular Culture in British Colonial Punjab Farina Mir Limited preview - 2010 |
Common terms and phrases
activities administration al-Din Amritsar argues associated authority British caste central chapter circulated colonial colonial Punjab Company composed compositions consider context continued court critical culture Delhi devotion early established example figures genres given Government Gurmukhi Harfi Hindi Hindu Hir-Ranjha Hir-Ranjha texts Hir’s Husain identity important included India institutions Islam Lahore language late nineteenth century linguistic listening literature missionaries movement Muhammad Muslim narrative newspapers nineteenth century noted official opens organizations Pakistan particular performance period Persian played poetry poets political popular practices present produced provides province published Punjabi literary formation qazi Qissa Hir qisse Ranjha record reference reform region religion religious reports represented role rule saint script Shah shared shrine significant Sikh Singh social society South status Sufi suggests texts tion tradition twentieth understanding University Press Urdu vernacular women writes