Get Free Shipping on orders over $49
Ruling Devotion : The Hindu Temple in the British Imperial Imagination - Deborah Sutton

Ruling Devotion

The Hindu Temple in the British Imperial Imagination

By: Deborah Sutton

Hardcover | 1 September 2024

At a Glance

Hardcover


$245.75

or 4 interest-free payments of $61.44 with

 or 

Ships in 10 to 15 business days

Combines historical, literary, art historical, and archaeological perspectives to explore the idea of the Hindu temple in the British colonial imagination.

A History Today''s 2024 Book of the Year

From 1800 onwards, the Hindu temple occupied a fragile and uneasy proximity to Imperial governance in India. The colonial state sought to regulate and extract the wealth of large temples. Imperial scholars classified the extraordinary diversity of architectural forms from across India, and selected temples were defined as monuments and brought into the custody of Imperial archaeology. Over time, the Imperial literary imagination transformed the Hindu temple from a place of worship and devotion into a space of wealth, sensuality, and violence. However, the Hindu temple also tested the Imperial state. Devotees and trustees manipulated and rejected attempts at governance, and the Hindu temple became a site at which the authority of the state was persistently modified or curtailed. Ruling Devotion combines historical, literary, art historical, and archaeological perspectives to explore the idea of the temple in particular localities, through the formation of pan-British-Indian policy and in the broadest of transnational realms of Imperial culture. Drawing on a huge range and diversity of archival materials, the book explores the preoccupations and frailties of the colonial state in India.

Industry Reviews

"In a post-Babri Masjid demolition world, Sutton's contribution is a nuanced history that shows us how the idea of a temple came to be what it is today. It is an important resource for historians, art historians, and scholars of religious studies. It is also an excellent resource for introducing undergraduate students to the intersection of historiography and colonial power." - American Historical Review

"a fascinating exploration of the intricacies of British imperial engagement with the Hindu temple from the emergence through to the end of colonial rule in India. Sutton takes us on a journey of bureaucratic and legal entanglements, destruction and resistance as the colonial state sought to define, control and subjugate this central site of devotion in Indian society." - History Today

"Deborah Sutton's pathbreaking study Ruling Devotion: The Hindu Temple in the British Imperial Imagination offers a new understanding of the modern history of the Hindu temple in India." - The Wire

More in General & World History

Castles : A Fortified History of the World - Dan Jones

RRP $36.99

$29.75

20%
OFF
The Most Interesting People You've Never Heard Of - Riley Knight
Plunder - Max Hastings

Paperback

RRP $39.99

$31.75

21%
OFF
1942 : The Crux of War - Jonathan Parshall

$71.99

The Rape of Nanking : The Forgotten Holocaust of World War II - Iris Chang
Nationalism : A World History - Eric Storm

RRP $49.99

$40.75

18%
OFF
Lessons of History - Will Durant

RRP $32.99

$20.75

37%
OFF
Homo Deus : A Brief History of Tomorrow - Yuval Noah Harari

RRP $26.99

$22.99

15%
OFF
The New Silk Roads : Present and Future of the World - Peter Frankopan
Say Nothing : True Story Of Murder and Memory In Northern Ireland - Patrick Radden Keefe
Dominion : Making of the Western Mind - Tom Holland

RRP $26.99

$22.99

15%
OFF
The Children of Ash and Elm : A History of the Vikings - Neil Price
The Dawn of Everything : A New History of Humanity - David Graeber
Colditz : Prisoners of the Castle - Ben Macintyre

RRP $26.99

$22.99

15%
OFF
The Happiest Man on Earth - Eddie Jaku

RRP $32.99

$26.99

18%
OFF

This product is categorised by