Description
Book SynopsisThe cultural politics of censorship, from colonial paintings to onscreen kisses and nuclear secrets
Trade Review"[T]his insightful volume on a neglected topic shows that means and modes of censorship have kept pace with the mediums of communication, on grounds not dissimilar to the justification offered during the Raj." —Contemporary South Asia
"Censorship in South Asia traces the genealogy of censorship through time to reveal its ever-contested presence in Indian cinema and beyond." —Maria Khan, Feminist Review
"This is an exciting and innovative volume that will become the standard reference in the field for some time to come." —Thomas Blom Hansen, author of The Saffron Wave: Democracy and Hindu Nationalism in Modern India
"The contributors to this volume investigate a wide range of cultural regulation, from cinema to painting, blasphemy to official secrecy and even advertising to nuclear culture. The essays enlighten readers and provide better understanding of the concept of censorship." —South Asia Research
"[The] compelling volume Censorship in South Asia steps away from the media spectacle and, with great insight and precision, places such contemporary cases of public agitation and regulation in their regional and historical context. To do so, the editors... expand the idea of censorship beyond juridical repression exercised in the quiet of the state's backrooms and instead place it within a larger domain of ‘cultural regulation’." —South Asia
Table of ContentsAcknowledgments
1. Between Sedition and Seduction: Thinking Censorship in South Asia
William Mazzarella and Raminder Kaur
2. Iatrogenic Religion and Politics
Christopher Pinney
3. Making Sense of the Cinema in Late Colonial India
William Mazzarella
4. The Limits of Decency and the Decency of Limits: Censorship and the Bombay Film Industry
Tejaswini Ganti
5. Anxiety, Failure, and Censorship in Indian Advertising
Angad Chowdhry
6. Nuclear Revelations
Raminder Kaur
7. Specters of Macaulay: Blasphemy, the Indian Penal Code, and Pakistan's Postcolonial Predicament
Asad Ali Ahmed
8. After the Massacre: Secrecy, Disbelief, and the Public Sphere in Nepal
Genevieve Lakier
List of Contributors
Index
