Colonial Modernity and Methodological Nationalism: The Structuring of Sociological Traditions of India

Abstract

This article traces traditions of sociological thinking in India and suggests that in order to write the disciplines’ history, it is important to identify the episteme that governs these traditions. It suggests that there are two broad epistemes that have defined sociology as a discipline in India—colonial modernity and methodological nationalism—and it argues that they organise theories, perspectives, methodologies and methods, teaching and research practices of the discipline. The history of the imprint of these epistemes is investigated at four levels: first, in the way one or both defined the discipline’s identity and, thus, organised its characteristic mode of thinking methodologically; second, in the way this identity defined its theoretical direction and the theories that it borrowed, adapted to and reframed; third, in the way the first two organised its professional orientation and made it choose its identity as an academic discipline whose main role is restricted to teaching and research within academic institutions at an expense of a public orientation; and fourth, the way the aforementioned three defined its geographical compass, limiting its queries to national concerns wherein the macro became reduced to the micro abjuring discussions on global debates. This article suggests that today there is a crisis in the received epistemes, and in this context, it becomes imperative to take command to define a new episteme which intersects the local, regional, national and global concerns, is theoretical and methodologically eclectic and is comparative in nature.

Sociology’s encounter with the decolonial: The problematique of indigenous vs that of coloniality, extraversion and colonial modernity

“…https://orcid.org/0000-0002-6785-5981 Notes 1. This article draws on my earlier work (Patel, 2006(Patel, , 2010(Patel, , 2013(Patel, , 2015(Patel, , 2017(Patel, , 2019. 2.…”

“…As a consequence the economic and political were deleted from the discipline which now postulated that India was a traditional society, steeped in its past rather than a society confronting capitalism as institutionalized by the power and domination of colonialism. Indigenous social sciences reproduced 'the rule of colonial difference' in interesting and novel ways (Patel, 2006(Patel, , 2017.…”

“…The project of indigenous sociology has paradoxically, I have argued, reproduced the language of colonialism (Patel, 2006(Patel, , 2017(Patel, , 2018. As a consequence, the episteme of colonial modernity has become part of the 'background understandings' and 'beliefs' of doing anthropology and sociology in India (Patel, 2017).…”

“…The project of indigenous sociology has paradoxically, I have argued, reproduced the language of colonialism (Patel, 2006(Patel, , 2017(Patel, , 2018. As a consequence, the episteme of colonial modernity has become part of the 'background understandings' and 'beliefs' of doing anthropology and sociology in India (Patel, 2017). In turn, this perception directed the way research and teaching was organized, wherein not only the nature of Indian modernity was not explored but sociologists more often than not refrained from studying the social and political dimensions of power and its relationship with the caste, class and patriarchal orientation of the contemporary nation-state.…”

From Deficiency to Affluence: Dynamics of Kandyan Peasantries and the Rise Of Rural Caste Elite In Sri Lanka

“…However, developing countries had no choice except complying with the colonial administration in order to seek the nation's development. Therefore, colonization can be considered as the predecessor of all phenomenal causes of social change including globalization, urbanization, modernization and liberalization (McLeod, 2010;Patel, 2017).…”