South and Southeast Asian Studies 24, Section 1
Gandhi's Non-violence (LG)
Professor Vasudha Dalmia
Tuesday 4:00-6:00, 223 Dwinelle Hall, CCN: 83112Gandhi's non-violence is intimately linked to satya or truth as it is lived in everyday life and in political struggle. Agraha comes from the Sanskrit root, grah, to grasp, to hold on to, in later usage also with the meaning, to insist. The phrase satyagraha was coined after the movement came into being in South Africa in the early twentieth century. Initially, for the want of a more adequate phrase, the term passive resistance was used to designate the movement. But there was an unwelcome association with passivity. Gandhi saw himself compelled to establish the great and fundamental difference, as he called it, between the two. In this seminar, we shall read and discuss Hindi Swaraj, Gandhi's radical critique of modern civilization, and his autobiography, The Story of My Experiments with Truth, in an attempt to grasp the relevance of Gandhi's concepts of truth and non-violence today. This seminar will meet for ten weeks beginning in the second week of instruction and ending in the eleventh week. Enrollment is limited to fifteen students.
Vasudha Dalmia is Professor of Hindi and Chair of the Department of South and Southeast Asian Studies. She has researched and published widely on Hinduism, colonial and post-colonial Hindi literature, medieval Indian religiosity, and modern Indian theatre.
