Masks of Conquest: Literary Study and British Rule in India

by Gauri Viswanathan

Overview

A classic work in postcolonial studies, Masks of Conquest describes the introduction of English studies in India under British rule and illuminates the discipline's transcontinental movements and derivations, showing that the origins of English studies are as diverse and diffuse as its future shape. In her new preface, Gauri Viswanathan argues forcefully that the curricular study of English can no longer be understood innocently of or inattentively to the imperial contexts in which the discipline first articulated its mission.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780231171694
Publisher:	Columbia University Press
Publication date:	12/16/2014
Edition description:	Twenty-fifth Anniversary Edition
Pages:	240
Product dimensions:	5.90(w) x 8.90(h) x 0.70(d)
Age Range:	18 Years

About the Author

Gauri Viswanathan is Class of 1933 Professor in the Humanities at Columbia University. She is also the author of Outside the Fold: Conversion, Modernity, and Belief, which won the Harry Levin Prize awarded by the American Comparative Literature Association, the James Russell Lowell Prize awarded by the Modern Language Association of America, and the Ananda K. Coomaraswamy Prize awarded by the Association for Asian Studies. She coedits the series South Asia Across the Disciplines, published jointly by the university presses of Columbia, Chicago, and California.

Table of Contents

Preface to the Twenty-Fifth Anniversary Edition
Acknowledgments
Introduction
1. The Beginnings of English Literary Study
2. Praeparatio Evangelica
3. "One Power, One Mind"
4. Rewriting English
5. Lessons of History
6. The Failure of English
7. Conclusion: Empire and the Western Canon
Notes
Select Bibliography
Index

Editorial Reviews

Brilliantly working out in local detail a conception of literary education as a 'strategy of containment,' Masks of Conquest adds significantly both to the history of English education in relation to literary representation, and to the ongoing critical revaluation of the role of 'Literature' in modern culture.

Papers in Language and Literature

The great merit of Viswanathan's closely argued and admirably researched book is to show that the exigencies of managing an empire played a far more important role than has hitherto been recognized in the emergence of the discipline as a social practice.

History of European Ideas

A compelling account of the relationship between power and culture and an indictment of the exploitative tendencies of ruling class interests.

Modern Fiction Studies

A remarkable feat of interpretation for the unity of its argument and the unification of the extensive evidence on which the argument is based.

Journal of Asian and African Studies

Fascinating.... Viswanathan pursues [this thesis] with verve, insight, and a thorough grounding in nineteenth century and modern sources.

Victorian Studies

A thought-provoking statement on the relations between culture and power.

Indian Literature

This brilliantly argued work, which is both first-class history and first-class theory, is an important book for the general reader as well as for humanists, educators, and policymakers.

Choice

A revision of the author's Ph.D thesis (Columbia U.) in which she examines the history of English literature instruction in India, how English studies became an instrument of political control, and the continuing implications of the uses to which literary works were put in the service of British imperialism. Originally published (cloth) in 1989. Annotation c. Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com)

Booknews

"Will make a significant contribution to the field."—Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak, Columbia University

"Intellectually lively and well written."—Richard Fox, Duke University

From the Publisher