Different Nationalisms

Description

The period between the partition of Bengal in 1905 and the Partition of India in 1947 was witness to a unique experience of ‘imagining’ nations in Bengal. With neither the Bengali Muslims nor the Bengali Hindus envisioning homogenous ideas about nationhood, many contesting and alternative visions emerged, both within and between the two communities. These ‘other’ nationalisms were not ‘anti-national’, but creeds of either a ‘federal Indian nation’ with ‘regional autonomy’, or a ‘regional nation’ on its own strength. In Different Nationalisms, Semanti Ghosh goes beyond the Muslim–Hindu and nationalism–communalism binaries to reveal an unfamiliar terrain of hidden contestations over the concept of nation in colonial Bengal. For several of these competing ideologies, Partition, rather than being an expected or even desired outcome, was an anti-climax in their long-drawn battle for a nation.

About the Author

Semanti Ghosh is Senior Assistant Editor at Anandabazar Patrika in Kolkata, India. She earned her PhD in Modern South Asian History from Tufts University, Cambridge, USA. She has edited and authored books on partition and nationalism in Bengali.

Table of contents

List of Abbreviations
Acknowledgements
Introduction

Chapter One: Unity and Difference in a Divided Homeland, 1905–11
Chapter Two: Promises and Politics of a New Nation, 1912–25
Chapter Three: Politics of Enumeration and the Changing Nation, 1926–36
Chapter Four: Two Coalitions and Three Moments of Failure, 1937–45
Chapter Five: Pakistan, Partition, and the Province, 1946–7
Conclusion

Bibliography
Index
About the Author