In the last decade, there has been an increasing internationalisation in the structure of research and academic institutions in the west. This has been accompanied by much greater visibility for Third World scholars in locations within the ‘developed’ world. The greater presence of these scholars in Western institutions has helped alter the international division of social science labour. This book, comprising a blend of autobiography and intellectual history by some of South Asia’s foremost contemporary historians and sociologists, shows that the postcolonial scholar’s presence in the West is a phenomenon worthy of analysis. In particular, the questions asked here relate to the impact of the intellectual diaspora on research, both in the West and in South Asia. While considering nomadic theories in an age of globalisation, this book documents the complexities of the relationship between culture, knowledge, and the individual. It highlights the importance of singular as well as collective migrations today, alongside the circulation of lived experiences and knowledges across vast geographical spaces. In showing how the intervention of scholars of South Asian descent in Western academic institutions has reconstituted the debate on postcolonialism, imperialism, globalisation, capitalism, and national traditions, this book is quite unusual in being simultaneously entertaining, informative, and thought-provoking about the whole history of South Asia’s scholarly transactions with the West.
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