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Elementary Aspects of Peasant Insurgency in Colonial India
Foreword by James Scott This classic work in subaltern studies explores the common elements present in rebel consciousness during the Indian colonial period. Ranajit Guha—intellectual founder of the groundbreaking and influential Subaltern Studies Group—describes from the peasants’ viewpoint the relations of dominance and subordination in rural India from 1783 to 1900.
Challenging the idea that peasants were powerless agents who rebelled blindly against British imperialist oppression and local landlord exploitation, Guha emphasizes their awareness and will to effect political change. He suggests that the rebellions represented the birth of a theoretical consciousness and asserts that India’s long subaltern tradition lent power to the landmark insurgence led by Mahatma Gandhi. Yet as long as landlord authority remains dominant in a ruling culture, Guha claims, all mass struggles will tend to model themselves after the unfinished projects documented in this book.
Students and scholars will welcome this paperback edition of Guha’s 1983 original, which was distributed on a limited scale in the United States. It will influence new generations studying colonialism, postcolonialism, subaltern studies, historiography, anthropology, and Indian, Asian, and Latin American history.
Challenging the idea that peasants were powerless agents who rebelled blindly against British imperialist oppression and local landlord exploitation, Guha emphasizes their awareness and will to effect political change. He suggests that the rebellions represented the birth of a theoretical consciousness and asserts that India’s long subaltern tradition lent power to the landmark insurgence led by Mahatma Gandhi. Yet as long as landlord authority remains dominant in a ruling culture, Guha claims, all mass struggles will tend to model themselves after the unfinished projects documented in this book.
Students and scholars will welcome this paperback edition of Guha’s 1983 original, which was distributed on a limited scale in the United States. It will influence new generations studying colonialism, postcolonialism, subaltern studies, historiography, anthropology, and Indian, Asian, and Latin American history.
384 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1984
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About the author
Ranajit Guha
34 books59 followersRanajit Guha was a historian of South Asia who was greatly influential in the Subaltern Studies group, and was the editor of several of the group's early anthologies. He migrated from India to the UK in 1959, and currently lives in Vienna, Austria.
His Elementary Aspects of Peasant Insurgency in Colonial India is widely considered to be a classic. Aside from this, his founding statement in the first volume of Subaltern Studies set the agenda for the Subaltern Studies group, defining the "subaltern" as "the demographic difference between the total Indian population and all those whom we have described as the ‘elite’."
His Elementary Aspects of Peasant Insurgency in Colonial India is widely considered to be a classic. Aside from this, his founding statement in the first volume of Subaltern Studies set the agenda for the Subaltern Studies group, defining the "subaltern" as "the demographic difference between the total Indian population and all those whom we have described as the ‘elite’."
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Displaying 1 - 5 of 5 reviews
September 6, 2010
Guha, a structuralist, situates himself into a continuum that includes Gramsci, Hobsbawm (the classical Marxist from whom he is departing significantly), and E.P. Thompson. Surprisingly well written ... really polished and persuasive.
Guha attempts to understand the political consciousness of subaltern groups within the context of general insurgency. He rejects Hobsbawm's understanding of rebels as somehow "pre-political" and rather extends to them "varieties of political action" :
"The peasant obviously knew what he was doing when he rose in revolt. The fact that this was designed primarily to destroy the authority of the superordinate elite and carried no elaborate blueprint for its replacement does not put it outside the realm of politics. On the contrary, insurgency affirmed its political character precisely by its negative and inversive procedure. By trying to force a mutual substitution of the dominate and the dominated in the power structure it left nothing to doubt about its own identity as a project of power."
Perhaps most refreshing about this work is its attitude -- subaltern studies seems driven to enfranchise the marginalised. Its scope isn't limited to India, as Guha draws examples from rebellions across time and space. All and all, a very reasonable blend of Marx and Tocqueville. Guha restores to the peasants their essential political orientation, while retaining a sufficient Marxist orientation with respect to class struggle.
Guha attempts to understand the political consciousness of subaltern groups within the context of general insurgency. He rejects Hobsbawm's understanding of rebels as somehow "pre-political" and rather extends to them "varieties of political action" :
"The peasant obviously knew what he was doing when he rose in revolt. The fact that this was designed primarily to destroy the authority of the superordinate elite and carried no elaborate blueprint for its replacement does not put it outside the realm of politics. On the contrary, insurgency affirmed its political character precisely by its negative and inversive procedure. By trying to force a mutual substitution of the dominate and the dominated in the power structure it left nothing to doubt about its own identity as a project of power."
Perhaps most refreshing about this work is its attitude -- subaltern studies seems driven to enfranchise the marginalised. Its scope isn't limited to India, as Guha draws examples from rebellions across time and space. All and all, a very reasonable blend of Marx and Tocqueville. Guha restores to the peasants their essential political orientation, while retaining a sufficient Marxist orientation with respect to class struggle.
August 30, 2022
Foundational for a reason ! Can really see how it was central to the paradigm shift of subaltern studies. Great for learning about subaltern resistance in general, not just the Indian context.
October 8, 2023
“It is not by insurgency alone that the peasant comes to know himself. In colonial India a sense of identity was imposed on him by those who had power over him by virtue of their class, caste and official standing. It was they who made him aware of his place in society as a measure of distance from themselves – a distance expressed in differentials of wealth, status and culture. His identity amounted to the rum of his subalternity. In other words, he learnt to recognize himself not by the properties and attributes of his own social being but by a diminution, if not negation, of those of his superiors.” (18)
January 19, 2023
After I have read this book, my perception wouldn't the same again.
Displaying 1 - 5 of 5 reviews