Truth and Falsity in Indian History and Politics

Contemporary India finds itself at the intersection of the trajectories of a number of widely varying notions of truth, falsity, authenticity and illegitimacy. The variation in these trajectories—in their cultural origins and in their content—can make their crossings unpredictable and explosive and often unintelligible. This course will explore with students the claims and negotiations that are fundamental to some of the critical debates in Indian history and politics over the past two centuries. In particular it will aim to alert students to the possibility that underlying these contentious events, ideas and processes are contending claims to truth and authenticity. The course will focus on a set of truth claims that constitute the interface of cultural interactions within India and between Indian cultures and the rest of the world: stereotypes, stories, histories, myths, corruption and claims to authenticity and ethnicity. Such a study of India, by facilitating the study of cultural interactions through the prism of different configurations of truth and falsity, rather than the prism of power, will also encourage students to think more broadly and deeply about the interplay between notions of truth.