This is one of the earliest books to present a collection of writings on the effects of globalization on India and Indian society. The very concept of globalization needs critical examination, and one productive approach is to focus specifically on the local impacts of globalization in its various guises through comparative ethnographic investigations. Such research also permits examination of the relative significance of globalization, as opposed to national, regional or local factors of change that may actually be more salient. Assayag and Fuller have assembled a team of eminent academics, who present a series of critical discussions about important issues of economy and agriculture, education and language, and culture and religion, based on ethnographic case studies from different localities in India. This challenging collection also includes a major study of the history of globalization and India that sets current trends in perspective.

Jackie Assayag is Senior Research Fellow at the National Centre of Scientific Research (CNRS), Maison française, Oxford, UK, and affiliated to the Centre for Indian and South Asian Studies at EHESS, Paris.

Chris Fuller is Professor of Anthropology at London School of Economics.

Anthem South Asian Studies

List of Contributors; Acknowledgements; 1. Introduction; Part One: Economy and Agriculture: 2. On the History of Globalization and India: Concepts; Measures and Debates; 3. In Search of 'Basmatisthan': Agro-nationalism and Globalization; 4. Seeds of Wrath: Agriculture, Biotechnology and Globalization; 5. Weaving for IKEA in South India: Subcontracting, Labour Markets and Gender Relations in a Global Value Chain; Part Two: Education and Language: 6. 'Children are Capital, Grandchildren are Interest': Changing Educational Strategies and Parenting in Caclcutta's Middle-class Families; 7. Of Languages, Passions and Interests: Education, Regionalism and Globalization in Maharashtra, 1800-2000; Part Three: Culture and Religion: 8. Maps of Audiences: Bombay Films, the French Territory and the Making of an 'Oblique' Market, 9. Malabar Gods, Nation-Building and World-Culture: Our Perceptions of the Lcoal and the Global; 10. Globalizing Hinduism: A 'Traditional' Guru and Modern Businessmen in Chennai