This book maps the intersections between sociology and feminism in the Indian context. It retrieves the lives and work of women pioneers of and in sociology, asking crucial questions of their feminisms and their sociologies. The chapters address the experiential realities of women in the field, pedagogical issues, methodological frameworks, mentoring processes and artistic engagements with academic work. The volume’s strength lies in bringing together Indian scholars from diverse social backgrounds and regions, reflecting on the specificity of the Indian social sciences. The chapters cover a range of key areas, including sexuality, law, environment, science and medicine. This volume will greatly interest students, teachers, researchers and practitioners of sociology, women’s studies, gender studies and feminism, politics and postcolonial studies.

This handbook makes available to students a comprehensive resource reference in the field of sociology and social anthropology.

This book is a comprehensive study of historical sociology and its development, especially in the Indian context. It looks at the works of Indian sociologists and analyses their approaches in terms of book-view (normative) and field-view (descriptive) history. The volume: critically appraises reports of empirical surveys conducted during early colonial rule including those by H. T. Colebrooke, Francis Buchanan, William Adam; engages with the works of sociologists such as M. N. Srinivas, Ramkrishna Mukherjee, Louis Dumont, Nicholas Dirks, Bernard Cohn, Yogendra Singh, D. N. Dhanagare, A. M Shah, T. K. Oommen, among others; and shows how historical perspective has been adopted in understanding aspects of Indian society villages, castes, traditions, socio-cultural change, education, peasants and their movements, etc.Presenting an alternative idea of social reality, this book will deeply interest students and scholars of sociology, social theory, and social history.

This book grew out of a need to examine the practice the teaching and research of sociology in India. This need was, in turn, prompted by the experience of the contributors as students and teachers, of the problems of understanding/communicating the connections between sociology and the society in which one lives, and between sociological theory and empirical studies.

The revision comes 10 years after the first edition and completely overhauls the text not only in terms of look and feel but also content which is now contemporary while also being timeless. A large number of words are explained with the help of examples and their lineage which helps the reader understand their individual usage and the ways to use them on the correct occasion.

This important volume on the history of sociology in India locates scholars, scholarship, theories, perspectives, and practices of the discipline in different cities and regions of the country over a century. It argues that this history is enmeshed in political projects of constructing a ‘society’, which took place as a result of colonialism and dominant nationalism. The book affirms the existence of both strong and weak traditions of scholarship in India and underscores three processes that have aided this development at various points of time: reflexive interrogation of received scholarship; probing ideal types of theories within classrooms; and questioning existing debates on society and its language by the public.

Focused on the theme of the sociology of religion, this volume brings together essays by well-known scholars which examine the resurgence of religious identities in the Indian context. The contributors question many received notions, address critical problems, and raise important issues surrounding various current debates./-//-/The papers are divided into four sections. The first deals with religion, society and national identity. The next section is devoted to sects, cults, shrines and the making of traditions. The third section discusses religious conversion, while the last section provides a comparative perspective drawn from Pakistan, Bangladesh, Trinidad and Tobago, and the United States. /-//-/Tackling a subject of immense contemporary importance and demonstrating a sensitivity to the shifts and changes brought about in faith, identity and tradition, this volume will be of considerable interest to students of sociology, anthropology, religion, politics and history./-//-/This book is one of the Indian Sociological Society: Golden Jubilee Volumes.