Querying the Medieval

Indologist Ronald Inden has in the past raised questions about the images of a "traditional" or "medieval" India deployed by colonial scholars and rulers—"Orientalists"—and has also argued that a history of "early medieval" India very different from both the colonial and nationalist accounts could be written. This volume is designed as an important first step towards that goal. The authors look closely at three genres of texts that have been crucial to therepresentations of precolonial India. All three essays challenge not only colonialist scholarship but the attempts by religious nationalists to identify Hinduism as the essence of national identity in India and Buddhism as the essence of nationality in Sri Lanka.

This volume is an important, groundbreaking work challenging how we read and understand texts. . . . This is must reading for those engaged in the struggle to understand the deeper past or disheartened by radical deconstruction of texts to the point that signifiers 'float,' meaning everything and nothing., The essays contribute to a wide range of debates and issues in Asian studies - broadly interpretative and specifically detailed - that demand attention, if not agreement, from scholars in many disciplines...They offer not only new readings but, crucially, new ways of reading and understanding texts and the history of practices in South Asia. I recommend the book...as a demanding yet stimulating contribution., This volume is an important, groundbreaking work challenging how we read and understand texts. . . . This is must reading for those engaged in the struggle to understand the deeper past or disheartened by radical deconstruction of texts to the point that signifiers 'float,' meaning everything and nothing.