12.2. Is Anthropology Legal Earthquakes, Blitzrieg, and Ethical Futures

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Is anthropology legal?
Earthquakes, blitzkrieg, and ethical futures

Edward Simpson

Abstract: This article is a contribution to the growing literature that suggests that
the methodological and writing practices of anthropology are out of kilter with the
times. The processual structures and regulative mechanisms that produce anthro-
pological knowledge were formed when objection and engagement were not the
almost-inevitable consequence of publication. Those who inform anthropological
research now frequently object to the ways they are represented. My argument
here focuses particularly on the relationship between the ethical structures of an-
thropology and the nature of objection. Thus far, the consistent response from an-
thropologists has been to explain away objections as differences in epistemology.
In this light, I draw on an objection to my own research on postdisaster recon-
struction in India to ask why there should not be disagreement between anthro-
pologists and those who inform research. I also illustrate why the epistemological
explanation is now insufficient and why new structures of research and writing
might be required to make the leap from an age of objection.
Keywords: ethics, legality, methodology, objection, post-exotic

blitzkrieg (German): lighting war; those who objected did not like how they were
sudden and surprise attack represented. Specifically, they thought the an-
thropologist had made misleading connections,
I do not know exactly when the age of objec- revealed secrets, and drawn on inappropriate
tion dawned on the anthropological landscape. evidence. Others have made the profound but
Those who lived in the houses close to Ma- difficult point that they have a right to lead “un-
linowski’s tent probably thought he was a queer examined” lives (Scheper-Hughes 2001: xvi).
cove on occasion, but their opinions have not Objections might also be raised to the perpetua-
survived. Dawn was more clearly signaled by tion of the extractive and metropolitan traditions
the emergence of anguished accounts by an- of anthropology in a more general sense.
thropologists who had published material that Objection is an exciting challenge to compla-
those who informed their ethnography objected cency, a signal that things could be done differ-
to (see Brettell 1993 for an overview). Generally, ently. Objection also signifies that anthropology

Focaal—Journal of Global and Historical Anthropology 74 (2016): 113–128


© Stichting Focaal and Berghahn Books
doi:10.3167/fcl.2016.740109
114 | Edward Simpson

is being read, and read by those with both in- nication. Social media in particular have en-
clination and motivation to articulate their ob- couraged a general awareness of the politics of
jections. Having said that, when objections were self-presentation and representation. In some
raised to my anthropology, I found the experi- ways, social networking has made mainstream
ence both stressful and unpleasant. Why? Also, many of the ideas about relationships, kinship,
why should it have come as such a confounding and connectedness that anthropologists had
surprise? I had not been trained to expect, ac- been talking about behind closed doors for de-
commodate, or respond to it. I had spent more cades. The ways in which data are stored, sorted,
than twenty years diligently refining a disci- and shared continue to shift. Transnationalism
plinary practice, which my objectors simply dis- has created bridges and fences that do not sim-
missed as “fiction”—in the “made up” sense, not ply recreate the older patterns and sympathies
in the nicer sense of Writing culture (Clifford of nation-states. Phenomena such as deforesta-
and Marcus 1986). tion, terrorism, and disease, once framed by the
Global structures and locations of power have intricacies of particular localities, are often now
changed since the coming of modern anthropol- considered global concerns; at other moments,
ogy. As David Mosse succinctly puts it: the desk one part of the world worries about such issues
has collapsed into the field (2006: 937). People in another. Anthropology has new terrains and
and things are mixed up more and differently: modes of engagement, as well as new publics
China builds roads and grows food in Africa; and audiences.
India is one of the largest investors in the econ- The subject area of anthropology has both ex-
omy of the United Kingdom; everybody’s carbon panded and contracted because of new geopol-
emissions are melting polar and Andean ice. itics. New forms of anthropology are emerging
Anthropological knowledge is no longer “our” outside the traditional university and national
exclusive possession; “we” are no longer a “we” settings. Significantly, for many anthropologists,
(although the idea that “we” once were is usually radical difference or alterity has ceased to be the
overstated). For former colonists, the discipline core generative idea of the discipline. Like col-
helped to ease and explain the transition from leagues in New Delhi, for example, with whom
colonial to postcolonial world order. Postcolonial I have been debating such issues, I find the idea
anthropology inherited a mixture of guilt, self- of absolute cultural difference or relativism or
interest, and intellectual curiosity, which, argu- ontology untenable intellectually and politically.
ably, continue to form the structure the discipline. But then, those who objected to my anthro-
Now there are political movements in many pology perhaps think this stance is part of the
parts of the world that have deliberately rekindled problem, because they thrive on the public idea
memories of colonialism, integrating an idea of of cultural relativism. Instead, as I have gradu-
revenge or redistributive justice into their polit- ally moved from ethnographic practice rooted
ical mission. Invasions, bombings, and drones in a particular location toward the anthropol-
have given rise to new forms of inequality and ogy of big stuff, earthquakes, infrastructure,
conflict. Post-postmodern states of precarious- and the like, I have found myself focusing on
ness have been introduced. Parts of the world are processes, consequences, and the ripples caused
off limits because they are too dangerous; other by things rather than on bounded groups of
parts of the world restrict access through border people. People still matter, of course; however,
and visa controls. Post-postcolonial anthropol- when previously religious, regional, or linguis-
ogy faces new challenges: shifting empires and tic labels might have seemed the most salient
ethics and notions of democracy and truth. An- units of analysis, I now tend to see such things
thropology should belong to these times. as layers that are nestled within other kinds of
Information technologies have transformed layering such as institutions, policies, histories,
the accessibility, reach, and pace of commu- ideologies, and so on.
Is anthropology legal? | 115

Writing people Anthropology puts people through the mill.


At one level, anthropologists turn people into
Together, these global trends alongside shifting writing. Writing is words, sentences, and para-
topics and writing and publishing technologies graphs, which cannot replicate the complexities
mean that those who inform anthropology are and particular sense of self-integrity possessed
often now in a position to read what is written by an individual. Anthropology can be neither a
about them. Consequently, anthropological vehicle for the communication of the unspoken
writing about cheated, disenchanted, and angry consciousness of an other nor a reflection of an
informants/research participants/interlocutors ego. The gaze and techniques are geared to do
is emerging as an important and challenging other things, which have been characterized in
subgenre. This new tradition is clearly in its many varied ways. Hastrup (2004), for example,
infancy, not having moved far beyond the self- suggests anthropology is a kind of explanation
justificatory trope. The fact of disagreement is beyond the truth of events themselves. Anthro-
to be explained, often as a piece of anthropol- pology is not simply a methodological approach
ogy itself; rendering it an intra-anthropological through which to understand events, practices
subject matter, which effects a double exclu- and ideas, but a means to appreciating how
sion of informants. Disagreement or objection these come to appear meaningful, inevitable or
emerges, usually quite genuinely, as differing mandatory, contestable or ridiculous. My own
epistemologies and expectations. Objection has experiences of sharing academic writing have
yet to be embraced, solicited, or understood to also impressed on me that anthropology is a
signal the possibility that anthropology needs rather violent and abrupt process, which takes
to be done differently. However, before I con- place slowly in a gradual and usually friendly
tinue with this tack, I want to rhetorically ask fashion: pious fraudulence, professionalized du-
you why there should not be disagreement be- plicity, or ritualistic sanctimony?
tween anthropologists and those who inform In addition, there are other issues to con-
research? Why should we expect informants to sider here too, which add to the difficulties of
approve texts? What kind of relationship does non-anthropologists understanding anthropol-
this imply? ogy, such as the precarious intellectual edifice
The first time I deliberately shared my an- which is an anthropological argument, and the
thropology with someone in India was a pointed drift and consequences of our own professional
learning experience. The man in question, whom ethics codes, but I will deal with these at greater
I felt I knew quite well, was very angry about length in what is to come. This article points
what I had written. He said I had misquoted to some of the directions in which anthropol-
him, turned his story into a banality, and por- ogy might need to shift in the age of objection.
trayed him as an eccentric. Furthermore, I had The research material is drawn from my own
not even bothered to get his name right. Just mo- Gujarat ethnography and correspondence and
ments before he told me this, I had been excited encounters in the United Kingdom. I conclude
about sharing my work, believing I had quoted with a salutary discussion of research ethics and
him precisely and generously, represented his questions about the possible legal status of pub-
story as something profound and bold, and por- lished anthropology.
trayed him as a heroic pioneer. I had, of course,
used a pseudonym rather than his real name, as
was expected of me in universityland, which is Background and key terms
why he thought I had got his name wrong. This
humbling experience made me begin to under- In 2004 I contributed a chapter titled “Hindutva
stand what anthropology often does to people, as a rural planning paradigm” to an edited col-
and what it cannot do. lection on popular political mobilization in In-
116 | Edward Simpson

dia. Nine years later, two sadhus (“priests”) from My fieldwork at this time allowed me to see
a Hindu religious movement presented me with at first hand the aftermath of mass anti-Muslim
their written objections. In what follows, I re- violence in Gujarat during 2002. I sat through
flect on what I wrote, how they responded, and some of the ensuing “hate speeches” made by
what might have happened in the intervening Hindu politicians in the name of post-earth-
years. The encounter made me appreciate that quake reconstruction and nationalist politics. I
anthropology is run through with enchanted also saw and heard horse trading as a neoliberal
ideas that are largely incomprehensible to a gen- arrangement brought public and private part-
erally educated reader expecting “science.” Par- ners together in the reconstruction initiative.
adoxically almost, some forms of anthropology Consequently, in my 2004 chapter, I also made
have moved toward becoming an exotic form of the unremarkable claim that an earthquake in
knowledge in a world that is increasingly seen Gujarat had proved an opportunity for many or-
as “post-exotic” (Elie 2012). However, the more ganizations, especially those of religious and cul-
constructive conclusion from this encounter is: tural bent, to advance particular agendas. I use
anthropological knowledge is humanitarian, the term “unremarkable” not to be self-depre-
disruptive, and important but needs to develop cating but because opportunism was everywhere
more robust and politically astute ways of ex- during those early years after the earthquake: I
plaining, presenting, and defending itself. thought I was restating the obvious.
The “Hindutva” of the 2004 chapter’s title This immediate post-earthquake period also
means “Hindu-ness” and is associated with marked the deliberate intensification and ex-
various kinds of Hindu culturalist and nation- pansion of nationalist politics (see Shah 2002;
alist philosophy (Savarkar 1938; for contrast- Shani 2007), which eventually brought Narendra
ing overviews see Bhatt 2001; Hansen 1999; Modi to power on a BJP ticket as the national
Mathur 2008). Today these ideas vary in status leader of India in 2014. The BJP or Bharatiya Ja-
between unequivocal truth, common sense, nata Party is commonly thought of as the Hindu
pride, and a stance. Significantly, the various nationalist party in India, and, as the then pres-
strands of nationalist philosophy deny a dis- ident of the party publicly said as far back as
tinction between political rule and religion, 2002, the “experiment” in populism in Gujarat
seeing this as an artifice of “Western” cultures was the preparatory step to pushing its agenda
and a legacy of colonialism. Instead, the ideas to the national level.1 In fact, it seems unlikely
of Indian civilization, which are understood ex- that Modi would have been able to come to
clusively as the ideas of Hindu civilization, see power in Gujarat in 2001, at least in the way that
rule and religiosity as part of the same complex he did, without the earthquake. He and his ad-
(Upadhyaya 1965, for example). Hindutva as a visors used the aftershocks to topple an incum-
political ideology emerged strongly in the early bent Keshubhai Patel from the chief minister’s
twentieth century as part of the anticolonial seat; Modi became the chief minister of the state
movement. In the postcolonial era, as the ide- without having faced an election. His subse-
ology was encouraged to enter the mainstream quent rule over Gujarat is commonly associated
at all levels, Hindutva became an increasingly with strong economic growth figures, violence,
nationalistic way of thinking about the organi- firebrand politics, and rapacious industrializa-
zation of history, politics, and social life. In my tion. Against this backdrop, in my work on the
2004 chapter, I suggested that variants of such aftermath of the earthquake, I chose to focus
ideas served as paradigmatic guides for some on, among other things, the everyday manufac-
of the organizations that had reconstructed vil- tured seep of nationalistic ideas into the lives
lages after an earthquake in Gujarat, western of ordinary people. I saw that this “seep” was
India, in 2001. often encouraged by mechanisms and pro-
Is anthropology legal? | 117

cesses that were clearly both organized and changes I do not recall him asking me directly
orchestrated. about the contents of the chapter. At the time,
he was also starting to conduct research on the
movement himself.
Plot, main cast, and bit players In between the original publication and the
delivery of the objection, I edited a book along
Those who objected to my own anthropology in with Aparna Kapadia called The idea of Gujarat
an unpublished and unsigned document called (Simpson and Kapadia 2010). Hanna Kim, who
me an “academic fraud” writing with “improper conducts research with BAPS, was one of the
ideological bias” and “substandard ethnography.” contributing authors. During the production
Those I imagine to be the authors are members of that volume, she forwarded our considerable
of a Hindu religious movement that had “ad- editorial correspondence about her chapter to
opted” a village in Gujarat through a public- BAPS for scrutiny and comment. She later apol-
private reconstruction initiative. This village was ogized to me for this unusual act, I believe sin-
not particularly damaged by the earthquake, cerely. However, the episode made me aware of
but this significant point seems to have been the kinds of relationships researchers working
allowed to fade over the years. The movement with BAPS have to entertain to retain research
built a new village slightly away from the orig- access.
inal location and gave it a new name. As other Kim’s chapter (2010) argued that Swamina-
organizations were doing in hundreds of other rayan (BAPS) ways of being are not dependent
villages, the movement facilitated the construc- on Western notions of individualism, auton-
tion of infrastructure and houses. They also omy, and subjectivity. There is poignancy in this
built a temple in the center of the new village; conclusion because as a woman Kim cannot
this was, significantly, a rather less common oc- speak to the sadhus in person and has to use a
currence throughout the region as a whole. proxy. She critically reviewed the literature that
From my point of view, evidence for my portrays the movement as a player in right-
claim that the earthquake advanced a particular wing political Hinduism (especially Nussbaum
political project was ubiquitous. New temples 2007; McKean 1996; Shukla 1997). At the time,
appeared; villages, streets, and buildings were our editorial line was that Kim’s project was a
renamed; and “victims” of the earthquake were worthwhile and unsettling one, but that we
demonstrably pressured to adopt particular ways should not uncritically reproduce ideas given
of being. Given the violence, jingoism, and gen- to her by sadhus without contextualizing them
eral fervor that saturated Gujarat at the time, it against a broader backdrop of events in Gujarat.
did not occur to me that provocation would be However, Kim’s claim (also 2009, 2012) that the
found in my conclusions. movement was “apolitical” raised particular in-
In 2009 John Zavos, chief editor of the orig- tellectual and methodological concerns for me.
inal book, told me that “BAPS” had concerns Like Kim, BAPS also repeatedly stresses this
about my chapter. BAPS (or Bochasanwasi Shri sentiment and has developed a well-rehearsed
Akshar Purushottam) is the Hindu movement narrative to support the claim to be “apolitical”;
that had built one of the three villages referred but what BAPS appears to mean by this is that—
to in the 2004 chapter. Founded in 1907, BAPS variously, and not consistently—the trustees
is particularly popular in Gujarat and among of their temples are not members of political
the sizable diaspora overseas. I do not know parties. Their statement is not and cannot be a
how BAPS learned of the chapter or developed denial of involvement in what social scientists
semipublic concerns. John Zavos emerged as generally consider as politics in the more gen-
a broker, although aside from brief email ex- eral sense, as I discuss further below.
118 | Edward Simpson

At the suggestion of John Zavos, I arranged acts within the procedures of a regulatory state.
to meet with the sadhus for a discussion. Despite In their presentation of post-earthquake recon-
having invited one person, four men turned up struction, there is no slippage of meaning, am-
at the School for Oriental and African Studies biguity, or room for different interpretations.
(SOAS) and caused considerable disruption in While the authors could well have had their own
the corridor. The spokesman on that occasion reasons for presenting the world in this way, I
told me that when they had visited Dr. Zavos at doubt it was a self-conscious strategy. Of the two
the University of Manchester, he told them I was sadhus who may have written the document,
writing a book. They also told me that they had neither was directly involved in the adoption
come with an “open heart to improve my schol- and reconstruction of villages in Gujarat. At the
arship,” but that they were also interested in just time, one was an undergraduate student and the
punishment for my slander, institutional disci- other was yet to be initiated; neither has a back-
pline, or my resignation to save the face of my ground in social science. Instead, I suspect their
institution. The sadhu said that anthropology approach to what I had written points to a more
should be “representative” and that there should general disparity between how critical social an-
be “triangulation” in my method. I tried to ex- thropologists describe the world and how others
plain, naïvely with hindsight, that ethnographic see the world as working.
fieldwork had given me a good overview of the At the most general level, anthropology has
region, and we could also think of this tacit or become a discipline for which things are contex-
background knowledge as part of the “triangu- tual, in-the-making, hybrid, illusive, and ambig-
lation” process. uous. In part, of course, the origins of this style
The original spokesman came again with lie with the “crisis of representation” and the
another sadhu in 2013, this time carrying 110 “self-reflexive turn” in anthropology (attributed
printed pages of objection. In my 2004 chap- to Clifford and Marcus 1986). At another level, it
ter, there were four pages about the activities is underpinned by the organizing ideas current
of BAPS (Simpson 2004: 154–158; they also within the discipline: discourses make realties,
comment briefly on 2008). Their document is power lies between the cracks, uncertainties
titled “BAPS response to Dr Edward Simpson’s produce realities, ideas have histories which are
works.” The first section sets out their case and contingent and can be taken apart, and so forth.
runs through at great length a matter on which Moving closer to the subject of my own 2004
there is no disagreement, although our conclu- chapter, works by Scott (1999) and Ferguson
sions vary. The second carefully outlines the (1990) have convinced us of how the state really
policies and procedures through which village works. For many such authors, bureaucracy, for
adoption and design took place. The third sec- example, has come to be thought of as a form
tion is an attempt to demonstrate that BAPS of negotiation and competition rather than an
has no favorable relationship with the state in uncontested process (Hull 2012). The state and
Gujarat and no links with any political form of other organizations have been shown to work
Hinduism. within discursive realms, which mean they act
The document presumes the existence of quite at odds with how other people think they
“facts” that can be accurately presented irre- should act. Charisma, authority, and history
spective of methodology, discipline, or polit- drown even the possibility of planning deci-
ical positioning. It reads and is structured like sions and bureaucratic procedures, as they exist
a legal case. What strikes me most, however, on paper, actually determining how things are
is the straightforward nature of the world they done in any straightforward sense. Humanitar-
describe: government policy determines how ianism can be deconstructed and historicized
things happen; regulations regulate; building (Fassin 2012). Development projects can be
codes produce concrete realities; BAPS simply shown to act according to their own institutional
Is anthropology legal? | 119

culture rather than in the interests of those they As the research went on in Gujarat it became
are supposed to serve (Mosse 2005). In sum, the increasingly obvious that most of what is known
certainties on which current anthropology is about disasters is produced by those who have a
based have become most “unscientific” (in the stake in presenting reconstruction as a success.
common usage of the world). The science of an- The reasons for this might be many, but to name
thropology, if it can be thought of in that way, a few: to preserve a mandate, satisfy auditors,
is about complexity, ambiguity, partiality, and or to demonstrate that stated aims have been
shades thereof. fulfilled. The hundreds of reports produced by
My own work too is framed by a twist of re- organizations such as BAPS, development agen-
ality which I think, in part, led the sadhus to cies, and governments about the earthquake
understand what I had written in the way that are not about failure, any more than they are
they did. about the lives of ordinary people. As Foucault
aptly words it: “discourses are practices which
systematically form the objects of which they
Research in Gujarat speak” (1972: 49). The types of discourse or gen-
eral knowledge that emerge about natural di-
I had conducted research in Gujarat before the sasters serve particular ends and actively make
earthquake of 2001. Partially because of this, my disasters appear in particular ways.
initial attention was drawn to my friends who It is against this backdrop that I eventually
survived. When I first visited after the earth- attempted to describe the aftermath of a natu-
quake in the second half of that year, it was ob- ral disaster from the point of view of those who
vious that the prevailing worry of those I knew were affected by external interventions (Simp-
was uncertainty about what was to come next. son 2013). If we take this naïve perspective se-
They were struggling to interact with and un- riously, then quite often humanitarians appear
derstand the many organizations who had come as strangers and trespassers. Their actions, gifts,
as humanitarians in the aftermath. Many of and ideas of a better future no longer seem rou-
those who came to intervene saw the subjects tinely sensible or so morally untouchable. On
of their humanitarianism as victims in a dou- the contrary, humanitarianism may well appear
ble sense: victims of tragedy and victims of im- as a form of self-interest when viewed from the
poverished cultural and religious regimes. The perspective of those who are affected by it. Of
public-private partnership apparatus, filtered course, this is not how humanitarians under-
through the state government as a condition of stand their role—it cannot be; but that is the
loans from development banks, allowed those very point I have attempted to make in my work.
intervening to gift new forms of understanding. My framing of post-earthquake reconstruc-
State sanction allowed these interventionists to tion was not what the sadhus expected social
build villages imbued with particular ideologies, science to be, let alone a good account of human-
some possibly with longer-term collaborative itarian reason. The argument was not intended
goals in mind. The desire to help those who are simply as a criticism of humanitarianism inspired
suffering usually appears as an unquestionable by religious and organizational values but rather
moral imperative. It is then a delicate matter to as an analysis of the interplay of post-earthquake
critically engage or question the “good works” reconstruction initiatives, policies, and institu-
of humanitarians.2 I do not think for one mo- tions. The example of the village at the core of this
ment that “good work” is inherently bad, but it dispute was an exploration of a general theme
is never neutral or innocent as the document that characterized the landscape of post-earth-
the sadhus prepared claims. From the perspec- quake reconstruction in a broader sense; indeed,
tive of critical anthropology, “good work” can other parts of the 2004 chapter told similar sto-
only be a form of politics and intention. ries about the consequences of the intervention
120 | Edward Simpson

of other organizations. This was not a story about of. However, the persistent and conspicuous
the interventions of a particular religious move- nature of this distancing claim in the literature
ment; rather, it was a story about a world in which and web presence of the movement is curious.
there was an advancing tide of a distinct nation- I know people in India and London who reg-
alist politics within which there were multiple ularly attend the movement’s temples and have
points of view and truths. views that could not readily be mistaken for
The account I wrote focused on people who anything other than those of hard-line Hindu
lived outside and beyond planned interventions, nationalists. It is as if the lack of official affilia-
as well as on those who were directly affected tion or membership card is sufficient evidence
by them. These people introduced distracting to sustain the claim that a religious movement
and unpleasant details that are at odds with the is apolitical.
hermetic description of the world an institution It is difficult to translate the claim “apoliti-
might provide. My method refused, deliberately, cal” back into the language of anthropology: no
to explain the outcomes of post-earthquake in- word exists with currency. In the conventions
terventions in the language of the development of the discipline we should render it apolitical,
organizations. In short, I was writing from out- as we do with terms from other languages that
side the paradigms through which institutions do not translate well into the languages in which
see and understand their own interventions. anthropology is written. It is not just that the
This approach was meant to be unsettling and realm of the political has spread like a slick into
challenging, but not to produce high dudgeon. all areas of social life, the very claim to being
“apolitical” can itself only be a political contriv-
ance. From the perspective of critical anthropol-
Putting air back into the vacuum ogy, the kind of Hindu sociality the movement
promotes—its ideas about history, exclusivity,
The bruising document presented to me at SOAS and everyday morality—resonate strongly with
is also concerned with discrediting my research. the interests of the Hindu political right; con-
In this respect, I began to read both the docu- sequently, while the management of movement
ment and the mechanisms through which it had may be formally “apolitical,” many of the sect’s
been brought into SOAS as part of a greater at- followers are not. This in turn gives the sect
tempt to police and manufacture the boundaries considerable clout in local political setups and
of a discursive realm of transnational political reflects what social scientists in the Weberian
Hinduism. In other words, there were politics tradition would call a strong “elective affinity”
and intentions in the objection, which spoke to with the political organizations of the Hindu
ideas and debates far beyond the content of my right. Such affiliations are, of course, a routine
anthropology. Other scholars have shown that part of the democratic process, in which lobby-
it is part of the intellectual project of the Hindu ists, interest groups, and so forth combine to ex-
right, of which they see BAPS to be a part, to ert greater pressure.
shift the basis of ethical judgments, insert the Other scholars have also noted the con-
trope of “Hindu hurt” within British politics, certed efforts BAPS makes to distance itself
and reconfigure the nature of political identities from the institutions of the organized political
(Mukta 2000). This essentially seems to me to be right (Anderson 2010; Dwyer 1996). In 2005 a
what sections of the sadhus’ document attempt UK parliamentary commission investigated the
to do. links between the BAPS’s temple in London
The third part of their document makes the and “international terrorism” (Denham 2005).
strong claim that BAPS has no formal links The use of the word “terrorism” was misguided
with the Hindu right. Indeed, there are no un- and must have served as a useful foil to ob-
derground tunnels or charters that I am aware scure rather more routine connections with the
Is anthropology legal? | 121

Hindu right. Inevitably, given the terms of its hosts figures from the Hindu political right in
engagement, the commission concluded that no North London and has made public pronounce-
evidence existed to link the temple to terrorism. ments in support of some of the key aims of the
In the course of the evidence, nothing how- formal nationalist movement.
ever was presented to show that BAPS and the Prior to the parliamentary investigation of
political organizations of the Hindu right do not 2005, there had been other allegations about
have routine connections, such as overlapping the use of public funds from Britain to further
bases of support and interests in common; nor the cause of the Hindu right in the aftermath
was there any discussion of the relationship be- of the earthquake in Gujarat. One fund-raising
tween the BJP and the making of the grassroots initiative that came in for close scrutiny was
support for the party and movement. There SEWA International, an offshoot of the Hindu
was no account of BAPS’s plan for becoming Swayamsevak Sangh (HSS), an organization that
a national movement in India, which accord- is in turn modeled on the Rashtriya Swayam-
ing to Raymond Williams (2001: 233) includes sevak Sangh (RSS). The RSS is the organization
emphasizing “all-India” aspects of Hinduism most associated with the promotion the Hindu
and stressing the close association of national cause in India. A report also published in 2004
identity and Hindu “culture.” It also includes by the activist organization South Asia Watch
building temples in key political and symbolic Limited claimed that more than two million
cities in the country, such as Delhi and Ayodhya pounds raised by SEWA International in the UK
(Anderson 2010). Furthermore, there was no had gone directly to funding the Hindu right
public exploration of the movement’s designs on in India.3 A senior UK politician disassociated
the Gujarati diaspora and no analysis of its ex- himself from the organization as a consequence.
tremely particular presentation of religion and Investigators from the Charity Commission were
history, which some scholars have likened di- refused visas to visit India. Ultimately, SEWA
rectly to Hindu nationalism (Mukta 2000). International was cleared of financial wrong-
The suggestion that BAPS had links to the doing in the UK, but investigations laid bare the
Hindu right in India in my 2004 chapter seemed connections, modes of operation, and the ethos
unequivocal at the time. In 2001 Narendra Modi of the organization.
was shoehorned into government never having In 2012 the same SEWA International opened
faced an election. In February and March 2002, a rural training center adjacent to the BAPS’s
he was chief minister while there was mass kill- temple in the village mentioned in my 2004
ing in the name of religion in many parts of chapter. At that time, I had suggested BAPS was
Gujarat. His government has consistently been furthering a broader agenda. “No,” the sadhus
found by various investigative committees as had said. Narendra Modi himself landed on the
somewhere between supine and complicit in the village’s new helipad to inaugurate the building.
bloodshed. The BAPS’s village was inaugurated Not many villages in India have helipads, and
by him in May of the same year, and given press this one had presumably been built to facilitate
coverage, at the height of the communal surge the arrival of spiritual and political leaders from
in the state. Similarly, the temple in North Lon- faraway urban centers. On this occasion, Modi
don was inaugurated in 1995 by L.K. Advani, paid homage to Dr. Hedgewar, the founder of
who was then the firebrand leader of the BJP the RSS.4 In his speech, he confused (with a
in India. The inauguration of religious spaces smile) the actual name of the village with the
by political figures who are well known in India spiritual leader of BAPS, calling it “Pramukh
to represent strong forms of Hindu nationalist Swami’s Village” (nagar). Perhaps, I thought,
ideas suggests an active relationship and identi- while watching Modi’s speech on the Internet,
fication between the movement and politics. As with 110 pages BAPS simply doth protest too
Anderson (2010) has also documented, BAPS much.
122 | Edward Simpson

The publisher’s take To be clear, against the strongest fieldwork


and methodological injunctions of the day (Be-
Varying in form and intensity, this story has har 2003; Borneman and Hammoudi 2009), the
been with me for most of this century. As var- accumulated sense of things anthropologists
ious other institutions and publishers became gain from long-term research and participant
involved, their reactions began to make me sus- observation in the field were inadmissible—
pect that most anthropology has a precarious unpublishable in this context. I had written an
legal status. At the time I was first presented anthropological monograph, and now I was be-
with the document objecting to my anthropol- ing asked to refine and streamline sections of
ogy, I was working on a book about the earth- it and phrase it in the recorded words of other
quake. As part of my immediate response to the people. What about being there? What about
document I wrote a long and detailed chapter participant observation and apprenticeships in
based on a conventional range of anthropologi- ways of being, as in Bourdieu’s “reflexive sociol-
cal source material about the various roles BAPS ogy” (2008)? What about the apprenticeship of
had played in post-earthquake reconstruction. learning to see things from a different perspec-
The manuscript got stuck with the publisher. tive? What about fieldnotes, surveys, and dia-
Academic reviewers saw no problems with it— ries? What about the unexpected but influential
one wondered why I did not just use the term conversation, the seminal error of judgment, or
“fascists” for the general political turn I was de- the moment mistrust became friendship? What
scribing in Gujarat; or, more carefully, as “pro- about the hunches, sensations, inclinations, the
moters of neo-corporatism in the classic form.” moment of a doubtful glance, or tension and
However, the pragmatic publisher knew better. embarrassment of an obviously overstated re-
He pointed to the ways in which colonial and assurance? The publisher was suggesting in no
postcolonial history has allowed Hinduism to uncertain terms that the methods and materi-
appear as “innocent” and “truthful” in the United als from which anthropology is traditionally
Kingdom, and how the growing narrative of constructed were insufficient to withstand legal
“Hindu hurt” was finding an increasing place in scrutiny should it come to that.
the media. He also suggested that if an Islamic I ask you as interested readers, how much of
organization had turned up in a university and your research would make print if everything
made similar claims against an academic, then had also to be supported by recordings?
the story would make the national newspapers
as a story of intimidation rather than rival truth
claims. Research ethics from
After considerable discussion, he insisted that the black-and-white era
nothing was to appear in the chapter of which I
did not have a recorded interview. Should mat- In recent years, many scholars of India have
ters turn toward a court or the threat of legal been harassed in the name of religious national-
costs, then we would stand a chance. In a stroke, ism. My own treatment has been tame in com-
his clear censure suggested to me that most parison to others. The accusations leveled against
written anthropology can probably be made to me were about the representativeness and accu-
appear illegal. Most of what anthropologists pre- racy of my research, rather than my moral or
sent as evidence would be treated by the courts as sexual character. In the context of South Asia
hearsay, defamation, and/or slander. The pub- and its diasporas, objection to anthropology
lisher added that there was no point in hiding often builds on the same gendered and nation-
behind “allegedly” or “insinuation” or “parody,” alistic arguments scholars are critical of, which
as these devices would not withstand scrutiny makes constructive dialogue difficult; neither
either. party is shaken from its conviction. In fact, if
Is anthropology legal? | 123

anything, the sequence and nature of these en- tions could be seen more as contributions and
counters only seems to strengthen the original welcomed rather than taken badly or as affront;
belief or attitude, in a way that simply intro- however, in my experience this was never an
ducing greater analytical humility will not re- option; therefore, the previous suggestion is a
solve. In other contexts, objection could be an possibility but not an injunction.
opportunity to think differently and to engage In the United Kingdom there are few re-
in new forms of conversation. This was not my sources or guidelines for such engagement, or
experience, and neither do I think that was the established modes of writing that encourage or
intention of those who produced the arguments actively ask for contributions from others. There
against my scholarship. However, on the posi- is also little institutional support for academics
tive side, the experience has led me to think from either universities or research funders
harder about anthropology’s relationship with when the heat is turned up. At SOAS, the prin-
objection, especially when this implies criticism ciples of the Research Ethics Code are integrity,
and conflict. honesty, openness, confidentiality, voluntary
The question of perspective in research is an participation, avoidance of harm, independence
old one, perhaps addressed in most forthright and impartiality, and cultural sensitivity. Such
terms by Howard Becker (1967) who simply principles are softly framed versions of com-
asked: “whose side are we on?” I would rhetor- plex areas of law, which have histories, case
ically add to this: how and why? The “how” is precedents, and specialized legal practices. It is
intended to flag a methodological caution by therefore quite surprisingly straightforward for
drawing attention to the mechanics of taking research ethics matters to move from the uni-
sides in research and the epistemological impli- versity to the legal arena if someone so desires.
cations of doing so. The “why” raises an aware- These codes guide research undertaken in
ness of the origins and texture of our own the name of SOAS and are taught to all post-
pre-theoretical personal politics, which influ- graduate researchers with the aim of profes-
ences, consciously or not, which side we take sionalizing and focusing research practice. We
(what in ethics might be called “ordinary ethi- also teach with the Ethical Guidelines for Good
cal sense”). Such methodological concerns and Research Practice issued by the Association of
the influence of personal anthropology have, of Social Anthropologists of the United Kingdom
course, been discussed extensively within the and Commonwealth. This document forms a ba-
discipline. Still, I will claim to have been on the sis for professionalized and disciplinary-specific
side of ethnography, regardless of how incom- research ethics. Unlike the general SOAS code,
plete such a statement may be. However, the therefore, it is written specifically to anticipate
“whose,” “how,” and “why” of side-taking takes the sorts of issues that might arise during long-
on different complexion when ethnography is term field research when using participant ob-
written and made public, as I have shown. Who servation. However, these codes are only softly
is on whose side is a different matter entirely bent toward the discipline of anthropology from
when read by plural publics. This is an increas- their origins in medicine. They are also tinged
ingly significant area of concern and one that with what resembles postcolonial guilt.
remains insufficiently theorized, taught, and Despite recent revisions, these codifications
represented in ethical and procedural codifi- seem oddly out of step with global politics and
cations of disciplinary practice. We might per- the realities of the research that many anthro-
haps think of this as an ethics of engagement, pologists actually do. On the one hand, if the
the consequence of going public and engaging guidelines were followed loyally, it would be
with objections. Indeed, the actual challenge difficult to conduct any research at all. On the
here might be better conceived of as develop- other, if the general drift of the guidelines were
ing a method of openness through which objec- followed as a guide to methodology, the result
124 | Edward Simpson

would be completely out of kilter with what a gested, there is good self-interested reason to
small and independent publisher would con- do so, as much method and writing will not
sider printable. I would also argue, quite gen- withstand legal scrutiny, which is a mechanism
erally and in no particular order of importance, accessible to some objectors. In addition, in the
and with no disrespect to unnamed authors of UK context there is a tangle of other regulation
the codes of ethics, that the principles outlined and legislation that has a direct relationship to
assume greater power always to lie with the an- research practice: free speech, the contradic-
thropologist than with those being researched. tory tugs of the acts determining the freedom of
They are undergirded by the idea that people information and the protection of data, as well
and communities are what anthropologists re- as the requirement of many funding bodies for
search, rather than institutions, ideas, or horses. research materials to be placed in public reposi-
They have little to say about intellectual prop- tories. The amassed consequences of these regu-
erty rights. Perhaps unsurprisingly, but unusu- lations and requirements are poorly understood
ally, they place the burden of protection and and are only slowly finding a way into doctoral
duty of care solely upon the anthropologist. Any training programs, which is a discourtesy to a
form of informed consent or contracted agree- future generation of anthropologists and could
ment between researcher and researched makes lead to a severe crisis of representation or fines
no demands on the behavior of the researched and prison sentences.
whatsoever (which makes it a rare form of con- As I have said, the ethos of existing research
tract). More significantly, such guidelines rule ethics codes is paternalistic and oriented toward
out the possibility of research that is critical or geographies which have disappeared. Current
damaging to the ways of those who primarily guides encourage mindfulness of important is-
or secondarily informed it. Therefore, because sues but will not protect or guide anthropolo-
of the principle of nonmaleficence, no “study- gists in the fields of critical writing or objection.
ing up” or writing critically about deforesters, To a great extent, these codes assume anthro-
polluters, torturers, warmongers, or predatory pologists want to like and get to know those
humanitarians. they work amongst; they also assume that those
These codes are guides that help research- anthropologists work amongst will want to get
ers think through and anticipate problems in to know, like, and learn from the researcher,
research. Both research ethics codes/guides re- which seems like a form of complacency from
ferred to above are focused primarily on the con- the era when things were black and white. How
duct of research but can be sensibly stretched to then is the new normative anthropologist to be
include the writing as well. However, they say ethically recoded and positioned as a post-post-
nothing of the subsequent ethics of engagement, colonial being?
which strikes me as outmoded when univer-
sities and funding institutions currently place
strong emphasis on both the impact and the dis- Conclusion
semination of research. Furthermore, it is worth
pointing out that although the research ethics The blitzkreig worked. The sadhus set in motion
code might be seen as regulating, standardiz- a process that restricted what I could publish.
ing, and professionalizing research practice, one Along the way, although no one said it openly,
greater effect is to emolliate the institution, ren- it was obvious to me that for the most part aca-
dering the individual researcher accountable and demic institutions are not in a position to match
therefore potentially vulnerable. objections or threats from influential and nim-
The age of objection now necessitates some- ble transnational organizations. Having had a
thing more than explaining objection as the few years to consider the objections raised, I am
result of differing epistemologies. As I have sug- no closer to being persuaded that the perspec-
Is anthropology legal? | 125

tive they presented to me was sincere. In fact, I and with various publics, against the backdrop
find much of what they had to say to resemble of a broader context, specifically the racializa-
what other scholars have characterized as a de- tion of state discourse on immigration and se-
liberate and strategic attempt to control what is curity. He shows how policing has become an
publicly known about them. Having said that, enforcement of the social order. Police have
I joyfully acknowledge that they have pushed become subject to quantified objectives, which
my anthropology on. I had been trained in a lead them into roles far removed from their own
conservative and careful ethnographic tradition expectations; the result is violent and counter-
of British Social Anthropology, and I had paid productive policing.
insufficient attention to thinking about and re- Significantly, the resulting publications make
fining how that writing might be read; nor had a strong case for the importance of ethnography
I really come to terms with whom or what I was in public life. The struggles of power, race, and
writing for. representation he describes are in time with the
Anthropology as a discipline could probably world. He navigates the reluctance of institu-
carry on regardless. An objection piloted into tions to grant “access,” and chooses sides care-
the ivory tower is unlikely to bring the whole fully. He sides with the ethnography, loyalty to
edifice down. However, this experience gave me both the police he has known through profes-
the opportunity to see the consequences of the sional interaction and to those policed through
structures of anthropology more clearly than a general concern about social justice. Fassin
before. I do not think we should tear up the makes explicit and clear what I think many an-
canon and start from scratch. There is, however, thropologists do anyway: “I do not chose one
a need to develop more robust mechanisms for side—that of the youth—but being physically
explaining and defending what the discipline present on the other side—that of the police—I
is, what it does, and why this matters. Finally, I am in a position to observe what happens dur-
think we need to retire the figure of anthropolo- ing the encounters between the two and later
gist-as-Malinowski from our ethical codes. The relate these findings to the larger picture of state
style of anthropology he represents continues to interventions” (2013b: 641). The active focus
strongly inform the ways in which the anthro- of his research (police) is not the primary fo-
pologist is conceived as an ethical being. What cus of his interest (social justice). This method-
if the codes were reconceived using the frames, ological conjuring or displacement is entirely
tropes, and engagements of contemporary prac- absent from the way ethics codes are currently
tice within anthropology? conceived and research practice commonly
There are many figures to choose from, of articulated.
course, and a combination of figures would prob- An ethics rewritten around the structures,
ably be better than one, but imagine the conse- politics, and geographies of research informed
quences of replacing Malinowski with someone by ideas drawn from contemporary research
like Didier Fassin, for example. Fassin’s (2013a) practice would gently reorient the discipline.
research on policing in Paris might form part of Fassin’s research has also gone far beyond the
the basis for a more general rethink about the academy and has become part of a national
shape and direction of ethical engagement in debate in France about the structures of polic-
anthropology. He focuses on the everyday life ing and the racialization of public culture. In
of police patrols in neighborhoods mostly pop- the process, his writing theorizes the ways in
ulated by working-class families from North which ethnography can become a public good
and Sub-Saharan Africa. Using a method he de- and a way of creatively and openly exploring
scribes as “non-participant observation,” he fol- the moral sentiments of contentious processes.
lowed the everyday and mundane activities of In this way, using the practice of someone like
patrols, the relationships between police officers Fassin as a basis for refinement, the focus of re-
126 | Edward Simpson

search ethics could be broadened, or bumped European Research Council on road builders in
forward, to include engagement as part of “nor- South Asia.
mal” practice rather than as a scary and unan- E-mail: es7@soas.ac.uk
ticipated epilogue.
Leaving aside the restrictions placed on the
material I could include in some sections of Notes
the book I eventually wrote on the earthquake,
I would like to think that the content was pos- 1. Extracts of the speech given at the swearing in
itively influenced by the uneasy experiences of Modi as chief minister were posted on Redff.
recounted here. My firm intention was that a com on December 23, 2002, at 15:24 IST (from
reader would not have to be an anthropologist to PTI) under the title “BJP to replicate Gujarat ex-
perience: Venkaiah.”
understand my purpose. There remain critical
2. The English term “good work” is used in Guja-
sections oriented by ethnographic authority—
rat for the types of humanitarian intervention
but I wrote as myself, made all the more aware discussed here. The term captures the spirit in
of myself by the encounters with sadhus. I have which many organizations with clear religious
a line, but I try to make it clear how and why and political agendas chose to present their
I walk that line and not others. There are also activities.
views from different perspectives on a range of 3. 2004. “In bad faith? British charity and Hindu
post-earthquake issues. I have not tidied every- extremism report summary.” London: AZAAZ—
thing up and have left uncertainty to protrude South Asia Watch Ltd.
when that is what ethnographic encounters sug- 4. Sewa International, Annual Report: April 2012–
gested. Differing views of the disaster became March 2013.
one of the principal motifs, including the per-
spective the sadhus presented. However, when
the book was reviewed by the UK’s Financial References
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Is anthropology legal? | 127

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