The conception of modernity as a radical rupture from the past runs parallel to the conception of Europe as the primary locus of global history. The essays in this volume contest the temporal and spatial divisions-between past and present, modernity and tradition, and Europe's progress and Asia's stasis-which the conventional narrative of modernity creates. Drawing on early modern Chinese and Indian history and culture instead, the authors of the book explore the provenance of modernity beyond the west to see it in a transcultural and pluralistic light. The central argument of this volume is that modernity does not have a singular core or essence-a causal centre. Its key features need to be disaggregated and new configurations and combinations imagined. By studying the Bhakti movement, Confucian democracy, and the maritime and agrarian economies of China and India, this book enlarges the terms of debate and revisits devalued terms and concepts like tradition, religion, authority, and rural as resources for modernity. This book will be of great interest to researchers and academicians working in the areas of history, Sociology, Cultural Studies, literature, geopolitics, South Asian and East Asian Studies.

The conception of modernity as a radical rupture from the past runs parallel to the conception of Europe as the primary locus of global history. The essays in this volume contest the temporal and spatial divisions-between past and present, modernity and tradition, and Europe's progress and Asia's stasis-which the conventional narrative of modernity creates. Drawing on early modern Chinese and Indian history and culture instead, the authors of the book explore the provenance of modernity beyond the west to see it in a transcultural and pluralistic light. The central argument of this volume is that modernity does not have a singular core or essence-a causal centre. Its key features need to be disaggregated and new configurations and combinations imagined. By studying the Bhakti movement, Confucian democracy, and the maritime and agrarian economies of China and India, this book enlarges the terms of debate and revisits devalued terms and concepts like tradition, religion, authority, and rural as resources for modernity. This book will be of great interest to researchers and academicians working in the areas of history, Sociology, Cultural Studies, literature, geopolitics, South Asian and East Asian Studies.

At the core of postmodern thought, especially in literary theory, is the belief that such ideals as truth, reason, and objectivity are social constructs that have no universal or trans-historical validity. In exploring this constructivist view, Satya P. Mohanty examines its underlying epistemological claims and their social and political implications. His book points the way toward a critical alternative to the epistemological and cultural relativisms.Mohanty grounds his critique in readings of some of the major figures of postmodernism, including Paul de Man, Louis Althusser, Fredric Jameson, and Jacques Derrida and analyzes the views of Mikhail Bakhtin, C. S. Peirce, Hilary Putnam, and Richard Rorty, particularly their notions of language and referentiality. Mohanty defends a post-positivist realist conception of objectivity as a legitimate ideal of all inquiry. He outlines a realist theory of social identity and multicultural politics which sees radical moral universalism and cultural diversity as complementary not competing ideals."