Social Science in India: (Re) Searching for a Vision

Social Science in India: (Re) Searching for a Vision

[Citation: Gaurang R. Sahay, Social Science in India: (Re) Searching for a Vision (2011, Unpublished)]

The story of social sciences has two different parts which are located differently at highly unequal levels. In the West, social sciences freely emerged within the Western context of modernity, whereas in India and most of the non-Western countries, they were brought from outside and institutionalized as an important constituent of western colonial enterprise. That is why, social sciences in India before Independence, particularly during the nineteenth century, acted, by and large, as an instrument of colonial rule. Their main purpose was to generate data about the economic, social and cultural life of the native population for colonial administration. During the freedom struggle, the nature and position of social sciences led by scholars like Radhakamal Mukherjee, D. P. Mukherjee, D. N. Majumdar, Iravati Karve, G. S. Ghurye and N. K. Bose changed a bit owing to their critical reflections on the colonial rule and indigenous culture and society. This period proved quite creative in the academia and outside though there was no fund available for research. After Independence, they went through a sea-change in terms of objective, content and priority. They became part and parcel of the modernization/development project of the governments. In this context, they have contributed immensely to the nation-building and to the growth of knowledge about every aspect of our society and culture. All this is a welcoming development and hugely good for both society and system of knowledge in our nation-state, however, there are many issues pertaining to social sciences in India that require our immediate and serious attention for the sake of making them more meaningful and relevant in contemporary times. By focusing predominantly on the contemporary state of affairs (teaching and research) in sociology in India, this paper tries to raise some of those issues.

Before Independence, sociology as a social science discipline was not much favoured by the colonial administration in India. It was taught as a subject in only four universities located at Bombay, Lucknow, Mysore and Hyderabad. Out of them, only university of Bombay had a separate department devoted to higher teaching and research. However, in independent India, the acceptance of sociology as a basic social science in the academic institutions is an uncontested fact. Every university has a department of sociology and the subject is taught in the most of our colleges. For a long time, it has been a widely taught course of study, both at the under-graduate and post-graduate levels. Sociologists have been occupying positions of member or consultant in organizations designing and promoting development in the country. Sociology is one of the most preferred subjects for the candidates appearing for the public services examinations. There has been greater recognition of the works by Indian sociologists. Their works are published by reputed publishers and cited and referred across the world. Sociological organizations are running successfully with regular publication of high quality journals. To quote N. Jayaram, “As a profession sociology has grown considerably over the last 50 years. The life membership of Indian Sociological Society, the sole and undisputed all India professional body of sociologists in the country, has increased manifold. Besides, several state level and even university level sociological societies have emerged”.¹

The enormous development of the practice of sociology (teaching and research) in India does not stop us observing that the discipline needs a critical look at itself for augmenting its own meaningfulness and relevance. Indian sociology lacks a tradition of self-reflexive interrogation of its own past formation and present location. It is one of the important reasons behind its lack of concerns with contemporary social issues. Critiquing of the discipline in the realm of knowledge requires more urgency at the moment because contemporary Indian society including its knowledge system is passing through a structural crisis caused by both indigenous and exogenous (global) forces. There is a need to remind ourselves that knowledge for the sake of knowledge should not be the aim of a science including sociology. The discipline must be cultivated in such a way that can be used for the development of society including its knowledge system. This paper has raised some issues pertaining to the nature of sociology in India. It is believed that comprehensive addressing of those issues and the concomitant problems through teaching and research will chart out a significant course and a new vision for the discipline in this age of globalization and its structural ramifications.

          From the very beginning, sociology in India, due to its western colonial background, is steadfastly dug into the rock of theories and concepts which are not rooted in indigenous reality and which are more often than not derived from an a priori view of knowledge. Therefore, the theoretical body of sociological knowledge in India is, by and large, given. For most of us, the task at hand is to learn what is given. Our competence is measured by the level of our knowledge of given facts. Such a disaggregated approach raises questions about the sociology of curriculum making, our mode of teaching and our gross insensitivity to traverse the gap between the text and the pupil that makes the text such an alien, distant and fearful object². It creates a situation in which we express our complete inability in making connections between what we teach or learn in one class and another, or between what is happening around us and what we learn from sociology texts. For example, sociologists in India were/are found discussing social order, cohesion, system, consensus (structural functionalism) and developing symbolic models (structuralism) even when societies in which they live face crisis, experience conflict, violence, mobilization, poverty, hunger, suicide, etc. Anand Giri has rightly observed that from the very beginning the practice of sociology in India has not really cared to create a curriculum which takes seriously our own cultural predicament and the Indian point of view³. There has not been enough effort to detach Sociology in India from its colonial legacies and reconstitute its nature and programme in response to social crisis, movement and change taking place in our society. The colonial context of Indian sociology is still determining the academic practice of Indian sociologists to a great extent. They have not been able to shrug off a legacy of colonial division of labour in the realm of academics that deems it fit that the west provides theory and models and the east (India) furnish the empirical data⁴. Most of them have received and used western theories enthusiastically and uncritically⁵. To quote M. N. Srinivas and M. N. Panini, “Sociology in India has been hospitable to divergent stream of thought. However, an approach or point of view characteristic of Indian sociologists has not yet emerged that may indeed be a sign of its openness … Sociology has to go native if it has to be creative”⁶. This academic apathy to critically redefine and recast the theoretical foundation of Indian sociology in emerging reality is still continuing. Such a situation leads to the state of terrible meaninglessness and irrelevance particularly among students or learners of Indian sociology.

A related but slightly different form of disjunction is experienced between sociological theories and Indian sociology courses in our universities. To quote Beteille, “The most acute pedagogical problem in university departments of sociology in India is to integrate what is taught under sociological theory and what is taught under the sociology of India”^7. This raises questions about meaningfulness and relevance of sociological theories and brackets the framing of Indian sociology courses. Students are required to memorize names of books and authors, theories, concept and definitions without contextualizing them into the historical or spatio-temporal specificities and referring to the politics underlying their uncontested universal and value-neutral character. This apart, Indian sociology courses, following the tradition of orientalism, are highly indological (Brahminical) in which we do not find equitable space for the writings by and on social revolutionaries such as Phule, Ambedkar, Periyar and Jayaprakash Narayan. Further, the courses make a dichotomous distinction among castes and ethnic and religious communities. For example, in the courses we invariably find modules such as ‘Muslim marriages are contracts whereas Hindu marriages are sacraments’.

Western rooting of Indian sociology in terms of theories, methods and concepts has jargonized its language. Jargons are used to describe even the self-evident. M. N. Srinivas and M. N. Panini opine that without shedding jargons which sits more heavily on sociology than on other social sciences we will neither be aware of the relevance of Indian sociology for popular education nor make clear to laymen the importance of their discipline for citizenship⁸. Pierre Bourdieu has written in the context of French Universities: “Many university students are unable to cope with the technical and scholastic demands made on their use of language as students. They cannot define the terms which they hear in lectures or which they themselves use”⁹. Bourdieu’s remarks are also fittingly applicable to the teaching and learning of Indian sociology in Indian universities.

We have recently felt two major obstacles in teaching sociology in our universities. First, as Avijit Pathak writes, “For many students, sociological knowledge is not relevant; it is not valued and appreciated in the practical world of work”¹⁰. Students do not find immediate/visible relationship between the domain of knowledge and the sphere of work. Second, students think that sociology is a ‘soft’ discipline. It does not have much cognitive power. Therefore, it is not fundamentally different from common sense. Hence, no special skill or effort is required to learn sociology. Such problems have come up because the interests that guide the knowledge system including sociology and its dissemination in India are much more utilitarian and technical and sufficiently immunized from broader social concerns and anxieties. Pathak argues that there is an urgent need to sensitize sociology students to the principle of domination written into science and to make them aware that disinterested cognition or value neutrality is myth. Such an effort will help in making sociology emancipatory¹¹.

Utilitarianism and a much greater demand of ‘hard’ sciences in the knowledge market has also caused a decline in the academic quality of research work in Indian sociology. Veena Das writes that “A discipline that has been nourished by such eminent scholars as Radhakamal Mukherjee, G.S.Ghurye, N.K.Bose, D.N.Majumdar, and M.N.Srinivas now stands in a position where there may not be a next generation”¹². Elaborating on it, Andre Beteille observes that works of the most of younger sociologists in India is characterized by a ‘frantic search for novelty’. Most of the younger sociologists in India have been trying frantically for novelty or newness without following the principle that “newness would amount to little if did not arise from a careful, detailed and methodical scrutiny of existing knowledge – its concepts, methods and theories”¹³. There is an urgent need to remember that “the amnesia and the failure to innovate are two sides of the same coin”¹⁴. There is a need for a proper appreciation of the relation between tradition and individual talent in Indian sociology.

There are some major areas of concern that require serious thinking and research in the domain of Indian sociology or social science. One of such areas is social movement. Social science teaching and research do seem to have accounted for the phenomenal growth of social movements in India. Drawing upon multiple intellectual traditions of politics and resistance and mobilizing a cross-section of the rural and urban population, building on tradition as well as use of new technology they have had a decisive impact on politics, policy and the social imagination. Undertaking a comprehensive review of literature over a decade ago Ghanshyam Shah indicted historians, political scientists and sociologists for not paying enough attention to social movements.¹⁵ And a similar exercise that he carried out in 2004 revealed much the same gaps—social science research had produced very few theoretical studies of movements and movement dynamics, especially in areas such as leadership, organizational forms and social movement ideology and huge gaps remain in the collection and analysis of both qualitative and quantitative data related to social movements.¹⁶

Another major area of concern is that intersection between law, State and society. Social science research is yet to map effectively the ever expanding construction of illegality whether of the urban poor, the ‘illegal’ migrant or the project displaced. The demolition of slums, eviction of ‘illegal’ migrants and displacement in the name of development are firmly rooted in a nexus between law, public policy and elitist discourse that needs careful and repeated exculpation, not mere documentation. Indeed the criticism that Indian social scientists do not engage seriously with policy critique and advocacy is not new. As far back as 1979 Myron Weiner noted that with the exception of economists policy was not a matter of serious debate amongst the social scientists of the day.¹⁷ While this has changed somewhat with NGOs and academic institutions increasingly working together it is however true that the visibility of social scientists in policy debates still leaves much to be desired.

The higher education system has pretended as if the ‘second democratic upsurge’ post Mandal never happened. Let alone research its impact, no meaningful attempt has been made to even understand the social, political and pedagogic dynamics within universities as a result of the large numbers of Dalit-Bahujan entering universities and the higher education system over the past decade and a half. The same is perhaps true with respect to issues of sexual orientation and identity, another area which social science research in India has barely explored even though civil society organizations and community activists are increasingly engaged with the issue.

The crisis in governance—a common refrain of everyday conversation as well as academic research—is actually in effect a political crisis within Indian society. It is seems that social science research is yet to take note of the fact that politics in India is raising a ‘fundamental question about the ‘nature of the state’ itself, since some groups with large electoral support, appear unreconciled to the principles on which political institutions in free India have been based.’¹⁸

         Nicholas Dirks pointed out more than a decade ago ‘the Indian state is barely visible to comparative sociology’¹⁹. The lack of attention in social science research to the diversity of traditions in political organizing of social life and State formation in general in pre-colonial India lies at the root of the gaps in the Sociology of State in India. At the same time there is a strong case for social science research in India to turn towards a more political study of Indian society in particular caste and religion, their interplay and relationship with institutions such as political parties. It is a telling comment that some of the most significant work in these areas has, at least in the recent past tended to come from foreign scholars or those located abroad.²⁰

This however seems to be trend that dominates disciplines such as Sociology and History as a whole. A study on social science research in South Asia conducted for the Social Science Research Council, New York revealed that nearly half of all articles in two leading Indian journals of Sociology came from scholars located abroad. In the case of History the proportion was almost one third and more or less the same pattern was visible in the case of survey of books published by four leading social science publishers in south Asia.

Notes and References

1 Jayaram, N. Challenges in Indian Sociology in Sociological Bulletin, 47 (2), September
   1998, pp. 238.

2 Chaudhuri, M. ‘Introduction’ in M. Chaudhuri (ed.) The Practice of Sociology. New Delhi:
   Orient Longman, 2003, pp. 12.

3 Giri, A. ‘Creating a Community of Discourse in Sociology in India’ in Economic and
   Political Weekly, 27 (29 – 30), 17 July 1993.

4 Nadarajah, M. ‘Notes on the Teaching of Sociology’ in Sociological Bulletin, 45 (2),

   September 1996.

5 Madan, T. N. ‘For a Sociology of India’ in Contributions to Indian Sociology, 9,
   December1966

6 Srinivas, M. N. and Panini, M. N. ‘The Development of Sociology and Social Anthropology’
    in M. N. Srinivas Collected Works. New Delhi: Oxford University Press, 2004, pp. 506 –
    07.

7 Beteille, A. Sociology and Common Sense in Economic and Political Weekly, Special No.,

   September 1996, pp. 2362.

8 Srinivas, M. N. and Panini, M. N. ‘The Development of Sociology and Social Anthropology’
   in M. N. Srinivas Collected Works. New Delhi: Oxford University Press, 2004, pp. 510 – 11.

9 Bourdieu, p. Academic Discourse: Linguistic Misunderstanding and Professional Power. 

   Cambridge: Polity Press, 1994, pp. 4.

10 Pathak, A. ‘Teaching Sociology: Reflections on Method, Truth and Knowledge’ in M. 

     Chaudhuri (ed.) The Practice of Sociology. New Delhi: Orient Longman, 2003, pp. 56.

11 Ibid

12 Das, V. Sociological Research in India: The State of Crisis in Economic and Political 

     Weekly, 28 (23), 5 June 1993, pp. 1960 – 61.

13 Beteille, A. ‘Newness in Sociological Inquiry’ in M. Chaudhuri (ed.) The Practice of 

     Sociology. New Delhi: Orient Longman, 2003, pp. 403.

14 Ibid, pp. 405.

15 Shah, Ghanshyam Social Movements in India, A review of Literarure, Sage, New Delhi
     1990. pp 210-215

16 Shah, Ghanshyam Social Movements in India, A review of Literarure, Revised Edition, 
     Sage, New Delhi 2004.

17 Weiner, Myron, Economic and Political Weekly, September 15^th, 1979

18 Kaviraj, Sudipto (ed) Politics in India, Oxford University Press, 2000. pp 369

19 Dirks, Nicholas The Hollow Crown, University of Michigan Press, Ann Arbor, Michigan,
     1993. pp 3

20 With some notable exceptions including Dipankar Gupta, Zoya Hasan, Yogendra Yadav, 
     Satish Saberwal this area is largely dominated by the likes of Christophe Jaffrelot, Bruce
     Graham, Nicholas Dirks, Paul Brass, Eleanor Zelliot, James Manor, Myron Weiner, David
     Morse and Francine Frankel.