Resisting Regimes Myth, Memory and the Shaping of a Muslim Identity

by Mayaram, Shail

• ISBN13: 9780195639551
• ISBN10: 0195639553
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 1997-05-15
• Publisher: Oxford University Press

Summary

This study examines the contests over, and reshaping of, the identity of the Meos, a group located between Hinduism and Islam. The theoretical issues discussed relate to kingship, religion, nationalism, violence, ethnicity and identity, and proselytization and resistance.

Table of Contents

Note on Transcription and Transliteration	xi	(2)
Abbreviations	xiii
1 Introduction	1	(25)
Map 1	2	(1)
Map 2	3	(2)
Nationalism, Kingship and the Other	5	(5)
State, Sovereignty and Violence	10	(7)
on Ethnic Conflict	17	(9)
2 The Meos of Mewat	26	(27)
Myth, Memory and Silence	31	(5)
Identity and Liminality	36	(17)
3 The Institution of the Modern State: The Princely States of Alwar and Bharatpur	53	(40)
Monarchical Assertion under Jai Singh of Alwar and Kishan Singh of Bharatpur	54	(5)
The Politics of Ritual and Nationalism	59	(5)
Pan Indian Networks: The Arya Samaj, the Hindi Language and Cow Movements	64	(7)
Communal Riot in Alwar City	71	(4)
State versus Community: Claims to Land, Surplus, Forests and Pastures	75	(18)
4 Constructions of the Meo Movement: The Written Record	93	(33)
The Historiography of the Meo Movement	94	(2)
The Meo Question	96	(2)
Constructions of Time	98	(4)
The Princely State Perspective	102	(5)
The British Perspective	107	(3)
The Meo Perspective	110	(16)
5 Contested History and Cultural Reproduction: Myth and Memory of Resistance	126	(36)
Collective Representations of Resistance	127	(19)
Individual Representations of Resistance	146	(6)
Communal Politics, Tabligh, and Meo Narrative in the Post-revolt Period	152	(10)
6 Partition and Violence in Mewat: Rites of Territorial and Political Passage	162	(59)
Politics in the Princely States of Bharatpur and Alwar	164	(11)
Representations of Violence in the Media	175	(3)
Silences in the Representation of the State	178	(7)
The Organization of Violence	185	(7)
Violence and the Community: Myth and Memory of Victimhood and Resistance	192	(11)
Land and Re-territorialization: The Rehabilitation of `Refugees' and the Displacement of `Evacuees'	203	(18)
7 The Tablighi Jama`at: The Making of a Transnational Religious Regime	221	(34)
On the `Jahil Mewatis'	224	(3)
The Institutional Network	227	(3)
Ideology: The Intra-Islamic Debate between the Barelwis, Deobandis and Sufis	230	(4)
Tablighi Jama`at, Jamiat ulama-i Hind and the Indian National Congress: Some Implications	234	(21)
8 Myth and Ritual: The Cultural Construction of Contemporary Meo Identity and Community	255	(15)
Conclusion	270	(13)
Glossary	283	(4)
Index	287