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Ideologies of the Raj (The New Cambridge History of India)
by Thomas R. Metcalf
Product Group: Book
Publisher: Cambridge University Press (1995-03-31)
ISBN: 052139547X
EAN: 9780521395472
Dewy Decimal #: 954.03
Hardcover: 260 pages
SKU: 07080138
Condition: New New
Comments: Hardcover. New book. Cover, text and dustjacket all pristine. Book appears never read. Gift quality beautiful book.
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Editorial Reviews
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Product Description
Thomas Metcalf's fascinating study examines the ways the British sought to legitimate their rule over India. He demonstrates that the principles the British devised incorporated contradictory visions of India, yet together they made the authority of the Raj lawful. Students of modern India and the British Empire will find this book relevant and accessible.
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Customer Reviews
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Discourse of Difference
Rating  (4)
Date: 2000-05-18
17 out of 17 customers found this reveiw helpful
The original Cambridge History of India published between 1922 and 1937 did much to formulate a chronology for Indian history and describe the administrative structures of government in India. The New Cambridge History of India series, to which Thomas R. Metcalf's book belongs, is designed to take full account of recent scholarship and changing conceptions of South Asia's historical development. Ideologies of the Raj examines the ways in which the British sought to justify and thus legitimate their rule over India. Thomas Metcalf demonstrates eloquently that the British devised two divergent strategies to justify their authority: one defined essential characteristics which the Indians shared with the British themselves, while the other emphasized the presumed qualities of enduring 'difference'. Overtime, however, it was the differences - differences of history, race, gender and society -which embedded themselves most deeply in the British idea of India, and so became predominant. Since the British constructed few explicit ideologies of empire, the author explores the workings of the Raj through a study of its underlying assumptions as revealed in policies and writings. This timely book fills an enormous gap in scholarship as the author, drawing from his own research as well as from the writings of younger scholars in India and elsewhere, provides us with a synthetic view of the ideologies of the Raj during the years of uncontested British supremacy from 1858 to 1918.In short this is an excellent book, well argued and well written that will be useful for students and to the educated reader.
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