HT Picks; New Reads
This week’s pick of interesting reads includes a book on the Indian village and its many shifts over the course of the nation’s history, another on Indian women wildlife biologists, and the memoir of an academic and activist
Memoir of a concerned social scientist
“I believe that we should have a sense of history. In a sense, an autobiography is history. It has in it traces of geography as well. Each new place, the sights they offer, the people we meet and the moments we spend with them, do not leave us that easily or completely. They influence our thoughts and actions thereafter, even if unconsciously.” – K Saradamoni
K Saradamoni (1928-2021) who retired as an economist from the Indian Statistical Institute, Delhi, spent her childhood and young adulthood in Kollam. Spinning khadi or taking Hindi lessons were all small efforts to contribute to the growing national movement around her. Deciding to study economics also arose from this desire to make a difference. This book takes us through her journey both in the world of economics, her disenchantment with its obsession with model-building and the process through which she becomes a “concerned social- scientist”. Using simple language, her student days in Kerala, Madras and later Paris are described along with her academic work on caste, class, land, labour, gender and agriculture. Her travels both for work and leisure in India, the United States, Africa, parts of Asia and Latin America make for fascinating reading. Saradamoni draws upon her life as an academic and activist to narrate a gripping story told with keen observation and insight.*
India’s Most Brilliant Women Wildlife Biologists
How many Indian wildlife biologists can you name?How many Indian women wildlife biologists can you name?There are several, and their lives and work have been extraordinary.This is the story of these women and their journeys across the length and breadth of India’s wild spaces – forests, rivers, oceans, mountains – and, more importantly, through the glass ceiling.
Among them are “Turtle Girl” J Vijaya, one of India’s first female herpetologists whose research into the killing of olive ridley turtles led to Indira Gandhi banning the turtle trade; Jamal Ara, India’s mysterious “Birdwoman”; Divya Mudappa, a biologist rewilding fragments of the shola grasslands of the Western Ghats; and Uma Ramakrishnan, whose work is helping us understand the science behind tiger populations.*
Rural Lives in the 21st Century
“India lives in its villages.”
This statement popularized by Mahatma Gandhi is often referred to in discussions about the country, its past, and its possible future. But what exactly is the Indian village? In the most basic sense, the “village” is a kind of human settlement, always standing in contrast to the “town” or “city”. Yet, it is also an idea, one which has undergone myriad shifts over the course of our nation’s history.
In The Indian Village: Rural Lives in the 21st Century, award-winning sociologist Surinder S Jodhka critically examines the changing nature of the village in India, both as an idea and as a lived reality. Reflecting on the colonial construction of India as a land of village republics, a representation that was turned on its head in different ways by Indian nationalists in the early twentieth century, and the post-liberalization nation, this book provides a detailed account of how rural lives have been transformed in India through the decades. The book also looks at India’s modern villages to showcase the current diversity within agrarian and rural realities with specific focus on the processes of development and democracy in rural areas.*
*All copy from book flap.
