South Asia in Motion

South Asia is on the move. People, goods, ideas, aesthetic forms, institutional designs, and political dynamics originating in South Asia have been increasingly important across the globe throughout the 20th century. Today, seismic social, economic, and cultural shifts across the region undermine old certainties, unsettle long established social hierarchies and patterns of life, transforming the lives of hundreds of millions of people. While the elite and middle classes across the region clamor for global recognition, their social standing and political dominance are severely challenged by multiple cultural and social minorities, and by the large majorities that are still waiting for the wages of postcolonial freedom and self-determination. This series foregrounds scholarly work that critically and imaginatively explores these vast and deep transformations and the complex historical conditions that made them possible. The series is focused on contemporary issues and distinctly modern and colonial investigations grounded in strong empirical, ethnographic, and archival work. Speaking to multiple audiences in the social sciences disciplines, including Anthropology, History, Sociology, Political Science, Cultural Studies, and South Asian studies (among others), books in this series go beyond well-established theoretical and political paradigms. They critically explore questions arising from enduring public and political conflict—the legitimacy of democratic politics, questions of caste and social hierarchy, gender and public morality, the transformation of domestic life, informal economies, ideas of culpability and punishment, cultural-religious difference, and the demotic meanings of the secular—just to name a few. Moreover, South Asia in Motion, publishes works that address larger analytical questions from the vantage point of one or several of the region’s rich vernacular public cultures, works that bring the texture and nuance of vibrant public and academic debates across the region to bear on how national and global issues are framed and understood. These three qualities, an interdisciplinary approach, a focus on issues of longstanding contestation, and attention to larger frameworks, are hallmarks of the series. Stanford University Press proposal guidelines are available online. The South Asia in Motion series editors request two sample chapters in addition to a book proposal and CV. Editorial Board: Sanjib Baruah, Anne Blackburn, Satish Deshpande, Faisal Devji, Christophe Jaffrelot, Naveeda Khan, Stacey Leigh Pigg, Mrinalini Sinha, Ravi Vasudevan Series Editor: Thomas Blom Hansen SUP Editor: Marcela Maxfield