The macro-region of South Asia – including Bangladesh, India, Nepal, Pakistan, and Sri Lanka – today supports one of the world’s greatest concentrations of cities, but as James Heitzman argues in the first comprehensive treatment of urban South Asia, this has been the case for at least 5,000 years. With a strong emphasis on the production of space and periodic excursions into literature, art and architecture, religion and public culture, this interdisciplinary study is a valuable text for students and scholars interested in comparative history, urban studies, and the social sciences.
Globalisation has long historical roots in South Asia, but economic liberalisation has led to uniquely rapid urban growth in South Asia during the past decade. This book brings together a multidisciplinary collection of chapters on contemporary and historical themes explaining this recent explosive growth and transformations on-going in the cities of this region. The essays in this volume attempt to shed light on the historical roots of these cities and the traditions that are increasingly placed under strain by modernity, as well as exploring the lived experience of a new generation of city dwellers and their indelible impact on those who live at the city’s margins. The book discusses that previously, cities such as Mumbai grew by accumulating a vast hinterland of slum-dwellers who depressed wages and supplied cheap labour to the city’s industrial economy. However, it goes on to show that the new growth of cities such as Bangalore, Hyderabad, and Madras in south India, or Delhi and Calcutta in the north of India, is more capital-intensive, export-driven, and oriented towards the information technology and service sectors. The book explains that these cities have attracted a new elite of young, educated workers, with money to spend and an outlook on life that is often a complex mix of modern ideas and conservative tradition. It goes on to cover topics such as the politics of town planning, consumer culture, and the struggles among multiple identities in the city. By tracing the genealogies of cities, it gives a useful insight into the historical conditioning that determines how cities negotiate new changes and influences. There will soon be more mega cities in South Asia than anywhere else in the world, and this book provides an in-depth analysis of this growth. It will be of interest to students and scholars of South Asian History, Politics and Anthropology, as well as those working in the fields of urbanisation and globalisation.
This book provides an important account of how the city in South Asia is produced, lived and contested. It examines the diverse lived experiences of urban South Asia through a focus on contestations over urban space, resources and habitation, bringing together accounts from India, Pakistan, Nepal and Sri Lanka. In contrast to accounts that attribute urban transformation mainly to neoliberal globalisation, this book vividly demonstrates how neoliberalism functions as one of the many drivers of urban change. This edited volume brings together an interdisciplinary and international range of established and emerging scholars working on the city in South Asia. To date, South Asian urban studies privilege a handful of cities, particularly in India, overlooking the great diversity, as well as commonalities, of urban experiences spanning the region. Thus, in addition to chapters on New Delhi, Mumbai and Bangalore, this volume contains critical urban chapters on less-studied cities such as Lahore, Islamabad, Kathmandu, Colombo and Dhaka. The volume insists that a fresh look at contemporary changes in cities in South Asia requires careful consideration of the specificity of the city, as well as a comparative perspective. It provides a sense not only of the new forms of urbanism emerging in contemporary South Asia, but also sheds light on new theoretical possibilities and directions to make sense of transnational processes and urban change.
This book explores religion in various spatial constellations in South Asian cities, including religious centres such as Varanasi, Madurai and Nanded, and cities not readily associated with religion, such as Mumbai and Delhi. Contributors from different disciplines discuss a large variety of urban spaces: physical and imagined, institutional and residential, built and landscaped, virtual and mediatised, historical and contemporary. In doing so, the book addresses a wide range of issues concerning the role of religion in the dynamic interplay of factors which characterise complex urban social spaces. Chapters incorporate varying degrees and forms of the religious/spiritual, ranging from invisible and incorporeal to material and explicit, embedded in and expressed as spatial politics, works of fiction, mission, pilgrimage, festivals and everyday life. Topics examined include conflictual situations involving places of worship in Delhi, inclusive religious practices in Kanpur, American Protestant mission in Madurai, the celebration of the Prophet’s birthday in Lahore, gardens as imaginative spaces, the politics of religion in Varanasi and many others. Illustrating and analysing ways and forms in which religion persists in South Asian urban contexts, this book will be of interest to researchers and students in the fields of cultural studies, the study of religions, urban studies and South Asian studies.
Urbanization occurs in tandem with development. Countries in Southeast Asia need to build - individually and collectively - the capacity of their cities and towns to promote economic growth and development, to make urban development more sustainable, to mitigate and adapt to climate change, and to ensure that all groups in society share in the development. This book is a result of a series of regional discussions by experts and practitioners involved in the urban and planning of their countries. It highlights urbanization issues that have implications for regional - including ASEAN - cooperation, and provides practical recommendations for policymakers. It is a first step towards assisting governments in the region to take advantage of existing collaborative partnerships to address the urban transformation that Southeast Asia is experiencing today.
The study of urbanization in Southeast Asia has been a growing field of research over the past decades. The Routledge Handbook of Urbanization in Southeast Asia offers a collection of the major streams and themes in the studies of the cities in the region. A focus on the urbanization process rather than the city as an object opens the topic more broadly to bring together different perspectives. This timely handbook presents these diverse views to build a clearer understanding of theoretical contributions of urban studies in Southeast Asia and to provide a complete collection of scholarly works that are thematically structured and a useful tool for teaching urbanization in Southeast Asia. Following the introduction by the editor, the handbook is structured along central, emerging themes. It contains six parts, which are each introduced by the editor: Theorizing Urbanization in Southeast Asia Migration, Networks and Identities Development and Discontents Environmental Governance The Social Production of the Urban Fabric Social Change and Alternative Development This handbook will be an essential reference work for scholars interested in Urban Studies, cities and urbanization in Asia, and Southeast Asian Studies.
This volume examines urban South Asia through the ideas of neighbourhood and neighbourliness. With a focus on the affective socio-spatial and sensorial experiences of non-metropolitan, small and intermediate cities, the chapters in the volume look at neighbourhoods as a key to exploring the textures of urban life. Bringing together scholars from a variety of disciplines including sociology, anthropology, urban studies, planning, and social history, the book highlights urban heterogeneity and contemporary transformations in South Asia. It discusses the linkages between urban lived spaces and social life; memory, migration, and exile; and the city and its society through practices of everyday life in neighbourhoods. With studies from Sri Lanka, Nepal, Afghanistan, Bangladesh, and India, the volume addresses a wide range of issues pertaining to urban experiences in their regional specificities and in a broader context of the Global South. This book will be useful to scholars and researchers of urban sociology, anthropology, urban studies, planning and development, social history, political studies, cultural studies, geography, and South Asian studies. It will also interest practitioners and policymakers, architects, planners, civil society organisations, and thinktanks.
Now updated: An “eminently readable, highly engaging” anthology about the lives of ordinary citizens in India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Nepal, and Sri Lanka (Margaret Mills, Ohio State University). For the second edition of this popular textbook, readings have been updated and new essays added. The result is a timely collection that explores key themes in understanding the region, including gender, caste, class, religion, globalization, economic liberalization, nationalism, and emerging modernities. New readings focus attention on the experiences of the middle classes, migrant workers, and IT professionals, and on media, consumerism, and youth culture. Clear and engaging writing makes this text particularly valuable for general and student readers, while the range of new and classic scholarship provides a useful resource for specialists.
This book looks at the typologies of cities and ideas of urbanity. Focusing specifically on cities in South Asia, it analyses the unique planning concepts, archaeology, art, culture, life, and philosophy of various cities of ancient and modern South Asia. The book explores the concept of urbanity and the idea of an ideal city; it interrogates general notions of urbanity by juxtaposing city life in various periods and geographies of South Asia. By analysing the demography, architecture, rituals, and culture of various cities, it looks at the different spatialities of these places in terms of their size, population, commerce, and philosophy as well as the reasons behind the transformation of these places into urban centres. Drawing from various archeological and literary sources, the volume includes rich details about heterogeneity, rituals, festivals, social stratification, penal systems, famines, and insurrections in ancient cities as well as modern cities like Lahore, Dhaka, and Calcutta, among many others in South Asia. This book will be of interest to researchers and students of ancient and modern history, archaeology, urban studies, urban and town planning, urban sociology, urban geography, cultural studies, post-colonial studies, ancient and medieval architecture, heritage studies, conservation studies, and South Asian studies.
