This volume forms a part of the Critical Discourses in South Asia series which deals with schools, movements and discursive practices in major South Asian languages. It offers crucial insights into the making of the Punjabi language and literature, and its critical tradition across a century. The book brings together English translation of major writings of influential figures dealing with literary criticism and theory, aesthetic and performative traditions and re-interpretations of primary concepts and categories in Punjabi. It presents 30 key texts in literary and cultural studies from Punjab from the beginning of development of Punjabi language to its present form, with most of them translated for the first time into English. These seminal essays cover interconnections with socio-historical events in the medieval, colonial and post-independence period in Punjab. They discuss themes such as spiritual and aesthetic visions, poetic and literary forms, modernism, progressivism, feminism, Dalit literature, power structures and social struggles, ideological values, cultural renovations, and humanism. Comprehensive and authoritative, this volume offers an overview of the history of critical thought in Punjabi literature in South Asia. It will be essential for scholars and researchers of Punjabi language and literature, literary criticism, literary theory, comparative literature, Indian literature, cultural studies, art and aesthetics, performance studies, history, sociology, regional studies and South Asian studies. It will also interest the Punjabi-speaking diaspora and those working on the intellectual history of Punjab and conservation of languages and culture.

The question of subjectivity occupies the centre of the Indian literary scene today due to rapid cultural changes, driven mainly by globalisation and the increasing popularity of media and information technologies. Girish Karnad, the great Indian playwright, poet, actor, director, critic and translator addresses the problematic of subjectivity in his plays in his own distinctive way. The issue is approached in his works from diverse but mutually complementary points of view, revealing the various facets of contemporary Indian subjectivity. The present book undertakes a study of five plays of Karnad in order to explore the emergence of a composite conception of contemporary Indian subjectivity. The book also examines the nature of this subjectivity and its cultural-political implications.