The Other India: View From Below

Book Details
• Publisher: SAHITYA AKADEMI
• Author: Udaya Narayana Singh & Rajarshi Singh
• Language: English
• Pages: 350
• Cover: Paperback
• Dimensions: 21.5 cm x 14 cm (8.50 X 5.50 inch)
• Weight: 450 gm
• Edition: 2022
• ISBN: 9789391494285

Book Description

About the Book
This volume, spread across fifteen chapters written by two authors, argues that while growth is often viewed as a top-down approach, any attempt at shaping languages, culture, and education must follow a bottom-up procedure. The central idea is to adopt a plan based on a collective project of Utopography to create a speculative landscape that not only escapes time, death, and judgment, but also outlines a society that becomes a synthetic construction. The chapters explore the two perspectives on the heterogeneous space dotted by linguistic and cultural majorities and minorities living together for a long time. The book discusses the competition between majority and minority linguistic groups, considering whether there has been any significant change in India after 1947, and the driving forces behind these changes.

The book also touches upon the failure of universal education, arguing that the quick-fix solutions to all divergences and the over-emphasis on a uniform Westernization model led to the 'breakdowns of modernization' in developing countries such as India. While this depressing situation needs reform, the book offers a positive outlook, encouraging a plural ethos in the planning for education now, through a series of organized state interventions.

About the Author

Udaya Narayana Singh (1951), a Sahitya Akademi awardee poet, playwright, and critic in Maithili and Bangla, is also a linguist and translation theoretician. He currently serves as a Chair-Professor and Dean (Arts) at Amity University Haryana. Singh has previously been the Director of CIIL, Mysore, and the Pro-Vice-Chancellor of Visva-Bharati, Santiniketan. He established the National Translation Mission and has taught at several prominent universities in India. He is the author of seven collections of poems in Maithili and Bangla, six essays, and twelve plays, and has translated numerous works. He has published over 250 research papers and created 545 documentaries on language, literature, and culture. He was a poet-invitee at the Frankfurt Book Fair (2006), London Book Fair (2009), and the Leader of the Cultural Delegation of Writers to China (2007).

Rajarshi Singh (1984) is currently the Director of Programs at the People's Action for Learning (PAL) Network, based in Kenya. He specializes in leveraging data to improve the outcomes, designs, and processes of development programs. He has managed Monitoring and Evaluation and research projects related to education, agriculture, sanitation, governance, and women's empowerment across Kenya, Sierra Leone, Nepal, and India, working with organizations such as the World Bank, INGOs, governments, and USAID. His interests also lie in social and cultural research regarding education and creative writing. Rajarshi has published six creative works (including poetry collections and screenplays), two book chapters, and several articles in international journals. He holds a Ph.D. in computational mechanics from Carnegie Mellon University, Pittsburgh, USA, and completed his undergraduate studies at the University of Arizona, Tucson, USA.