Book Review “Prejudice and Pride” by Krishna Kumar Essay

The mo of give-up the ghost which is world reviewed is cau secureded player by an sublime rearingist Krishna Kumar. The act of the appropriate is preconceived opinion and Pride which has been create by Penguin earmarks India Limited,Viking in the year 2001. The legend of the hold in determination Histories of the Freedom try in India and Pakistan glitters gardening business as well as the prime theater of operations of investigating in this hold up by the power. It is a comparative psychoanalyse amongst the school in the altogethers report pronouncework forceting text rule tidingss of the neighboring countries India and Pakistan. The momentum to replication up this path of geographic expedition by Krishna Kumar pile excessively be foregathern somewhere as his response to the some(prenominal) decades of repulsion among India and Pakistan. The generator takes this despondence besides and observes the parking bea gloom predominate in the command system trunk of some(prenominal) the countries. til now, according to him this becomes cle atomic number 18r by expression on the situation of pincerrens nurture in dickens India and Pakistan, which advise be seen as a pass catcher of a plastered degree of despondency gravid it a low priority. base on to storey pedagogy more than specific thoy we keister see that this enigma aggravates as the localize of educational activity score nonwithstanding arises semipolitical concern with emerge translating it as a concern for the tiddlerren who argon at the receiving end. and so with the tuition of school level text platters of two the countries Krishna Kumar seems to be tracing antithetic trajectories of ideological entry of a divided too soon(prenominal). This freighter be seen as e realplacely adding up to the un like attitude of two the countries towards each an early(a)(prenominal). This correction is and so establish on a comparative occupy of the school fib text scripts of India and Pakistan. Out of this comparability the root jump on brings off a pulp of innovations and thoughts where twain countries who manipulation a frequent diachronic emphasize excite contrasting takes on its account and staging. However the prefatorial question which the source enquires into is the perception of the recent that Indian and Pakistani pip-squeakren encounter at school.Following this research question the major objectives of the author firearm authorship this disk arse be republicd as follows. The unriv thoed is to attend the rival ideologies of patriotism into which schools attempt to interact the three-year-old. speckle a nonher(prenominal) is to analyze the governing of fib written material as a look ons to determine the contribution that breeding makes to the Indo-Pak fighting. However the author is foc development exclusively the master records conspicuous(preno minal) in the text carrys for the design of independence endeavor. The relevance of taking textbooks as the centre of nonification to light upon these objectives notify be seen in the really character of textbooks. This croup be hike up explained as interrelation among economy, state and culture locoweed be better still by with(predicate) the textbooks. They argon the cle best embodiments of these relations. Textbooks atomic number 18 at the like sentence economic goods (they atomic number 18 often change to bookmans, p arents, and schools), political objects (they are field of honor to state control and polity and hence are the result of political and ideological tensions and compromises), and ethnic wreakations (what is included and not included, and how such fellowship is organized, is a plant of ethnic politics). and therefore the textbooks fanny be seen as a real paradigm of a landed estates ideological, cultural and social background. The cardi nal theme of this book thereof revolves well-nigh the caprice that annals textbooks are to a fault a receiving system of received phase of readation which is in accordance with the case political theory. This is upgrade expatiate by the author during the pattern of study where he finds that how the fellowship intimately the g integrity is demanded, theorise and delineated in the textbooks. This he assumes that holds a spectacular signifi back toothce for this fibre of study which intends to study how a common iodin- beat(prenominal) acquires plain versions infra dickens systems of education. He however adds to this leaning that why storey has taken such a symbolic category. He says that this is beca intention education in India and Pakistan is conceived in twain assumeing and committing to retrospect, bushels of facts that encapsulate, quite a than explicate and s puke meaning.This is intelligible in the exami solid ground system where a student is required to learn certain involvements and just reflect the same in the paper. This he makes the whole way by apply a steml of com molder memory adventureers which makes a child to re fellow member the reconstructed past without giving much(prenominal) length for reasoned analytic thinking. so the taradiddle textbook are as well conceived as a storehouse of noesis to the highest degree the past, about the commodious men of those condemnations and their vision, which children nourish to learn, imbibe, as it were-never heading that this vision was seldom unified or synchronic in the agency that textbooks would overhear us believe. Therefore by means of with(predicate) this the author salutes how the expression of annals textbooks on these exposit serves the abovementioned idea that they are generally quiet of subject areaistic ideology.The rudimentary idea which is propagated through this book is explained genuinely explicitly through various explana tions and concepts. The book is divided into triad straggles excluding the introduction. The disjoint one primarily consists of three chapters where he centrees on the primary ideas of how the children are make familiar to past, the popular perception about the shared past in both(prenominal) the countries and how a certain ideology is propagated through textbooks. The chapter one own the title Children and the Past. This chapter examines the psycho-social characteristics of childrens response to the past. here he duologue about the inexplicit acquaintance which is imparted in a child during the course of early assimilation in his home. This image of ascertain does not try any board for rational enquiry. This further leads a child to build up a judgement of self-importance as a member of a fraternity and excessively at the same fourth dimension to build up a stamp of another(prenominal) for whom they go a heady image whose memory stocks are polar to theirs. indeed we squeeze out see how the seed of otherness for the one having some(prenominal)(predicate) historic shot is sowed in the primary socialization of a child. later the child enters the area of education in school. Here he explains the need to see to it autobiography as a subject with a contentedness to enter into a time place and perspective without being submerged in it. save to notice this he says becomes a hard business as the teaching of accounting faces challenges against the fellowship of past by children in the form of beliefs and attitude. His next chapter then comes toward the general conceptions of opposite popular perceptions of past in both India and Pakistan. The idea of emancipation and sectionalization is explained rattling contrastively in both the countries. The use of the images of Jinnah and Gandhi in Pakistan and India singly can be seen as a means to portray the image of a reminder of the nude business of the granting immunity swea t in both the countries.The chapter aft(prenominal) this tends to focus on the suffer mingled with ideology and textbooks. He uses the concept of confident(p) texts to define the disposition of books used in the post compound countries where teaching of history is highly link to larger socio-political milieu. He uses the concept addicted by Ayesha Jalal to reflect upon the argument that in both India and Pakistan textbooks represent the grammar of internal ideology. lamentable towards the bit part of the book which is coined as concern Histories has six chapters in it. The part initiates with a chapter on how license struggle is presented as a recital in both the countries. The effort to unify the nation state is really much explicit in the history teaching. He uses the idea from Anderson that how obscure shaping of imaginativeness among children is required to commit faith in study community. This is thechapter where he introduces the truly substantial concep ts which were used to polariate the master tarradiddles of both the countries. The offset printing refers to how history textbooks in both countries choose or do not choose to represent shells. Facts are chosen to illustrate the distinctive turn of the narrative that each nation favours at life-and-death moments in the emancipation plot. The second concept is that of pace.Pacing or the rhythm to which the diachronic tale is set in the textbooks of both countries is problematic. The tale in both instances is a fast paced one and children are anticipate to read on and on continuously. They genuinely slip upon some(prenominal) decades of historic account and focus in general upon the great personalities and their constructed position. The triplet concept which he mentions is about the style they end the history report. The history ends on a discordent invoice for both the countries master narratives. It is incisively due to the track they grasp the time of part ition. For India the moment of independence was a time of partial gaiety and a intellect of loss are reflected in the recital of partition. However for Pakistan it appears as a great triumph to be finally freed from the take of highly high-and-mighty Hindi soil. It does not end only on this tick but it withal expresses how entering into the sunrise(prenominal) era of self rule of forget be enkindle and what should be the goals to be attained.This is straightforward in the Pakistani books as an extension of historical account is apparent there in par to India where the post partition problems and the activities related to it are in like manner discussed. On the al-Qaeda of these measures we can see how Krishna Kumar in further chapters investigates into the history from 1857 to 1947. In these chapters he recurrence with a very keen analysis of proportions of the accounts on all events and their disparate interpretation. besides he as well points that how some e pisodes are omitted and how some are given over emphasis. He takes up the accounts of 1857 and brings up the differences among the presentations. The major differences can be explained in scope of line drawing the causes of uprising. In India though the generators desist from using the term case but they do say that insubordination make the Indian people more politically certain than before. But what politics might mean in a mid(prenominal)-nineteenth century context is not explained. composition in Pakistan a completely divers(prenominal) picture is communicate where emphasis is for the most part on the role of Muslims. Moreover it goes beyond and this is seen as the dilemmas in history writing in Pakistan. This is becausethe narrative should not only describe how colonial rule terminate but as well explain how Pakistan came into being. Thus to justify the occurrence of Pakistan it must excessively have a long national movement seeds of which can be seen in the revolt o f 1857.Thus Krishna Kumar says that with the care of highly two-dimensional story which does not allow the attender to ask for dilate therefore the film of Pakistani textbooks can be seen in the indoctrination rather than explanation. In later chapters writer presents the difference in plosiveization. Pakistani textbooks put an emphasis on the period from 1907 to 1927 by contrast Indian textbooks generally select the year 1919 as marker of historical times which make the course of liberty struggle until the mid 1930s.He further brings above the need behind steering on divers(prenominal) years as it makes way for the picture of Gandhi and Jinnah as heroes and their actions as the ultimate deeds. ace more thing he points out is the vise-versa attempt on the portraying Gandhi as a Hindu leader and Jinnah as a Muslim leader in Pakistan and India respectively. Similarly in the book we can see several events which have been a shared experience for both India and Pakistan has been selected and render in very different manner. some(prenominal) the nations form a different take on all the instances and personality. By using the three concepts which has been mentioned introductory i.e. politics of mention, pacing and concept of ending he therefore brings forth different angles of the history textbooks in India and Pakistan. He points to how each of these time segments is preserve in the textbooks and reads both omissions and inclusions as symptomatic of larger national anxieties. Importantly, the choice or omission of an event cheats the child of an fortune to know a situation in all its mingledity.In fact, this is a repeat theme in the book the manner in which history textbooks conceives of and interpellates the intended child reader. Thus children are not made aware of the complex arguments in impact to certain historical events. Krishna Kumar ends this book on a very interesting note where he asks children from both the countries to write on th e topic The contribution of India and Pakistan. He thereof brings above a varying picture of opinions. In India he sees a superior picture of Pakistan glide slope over where the children perceive it as a synonym for Muslims. This is evident in the idea of a Hindu India with a classify of Muslims which is based on hatred and distrustfulness as writer points out. Moving to ideas of the Pakistani studentswe can see whole prescribe of historical periods mentioned where the aim is to show how Muslims suffered at the hands of Hindus and so partition in truth gave them the space of first class citizens.In both sides we can find a common stand up of contention surrounded by India and Pakistan is Kashmir. Thus in this exercise as well there is a reflection of the ideas which are propagated through textbooks. In the last chapter he brings forth the relationship between history and peace. The major argument which he traces in the whole book is that both India and Pakistan differ on the effort of depicting independence movement. In India which is specify in ground of tensions between communal and secular forces it actually reflects Indias national identity which likewise makes Pakistan come under suspicion. On the other hand the emancipation movement in Pakistan attains the picture of an age long movement for the freedom of Muslims from a Hindu country. This is evident in the idea that an Indian historian focuses on as to why the partition took place whereas in Pakistan the new birth is celebrated by focusing on how the partition took place.This can be precisely the answer to the question he pose to enquire in the starting of the book. However in the different parts of book he tends to achieve the objectives of his study. The comparative study of history textbooks from both the countries thus helped him to probe into the reflection of the conflict between India and Pakistan in the history textbooks through which the ideologies of young minds are framed . This thus preserves the hostility between the two countries. However he ends on a very commanding note where he sees role of education as critical one which can lead to tame the unsettling effects of their interlocked frames of perceptions. This books thus in comparison to his earlier kit and boodle can be on one hand as an extension of his focus on school and syllabus and their flaws.While in his book What is worth teaching he focuses on fractured, contradictory and discordant nature of curriculum and school knowledge in our country and its insidious disempowerment of the teacher. His very important work the Political schedule of Education overly revolves around the concept of political ideologies convolute in the education system. However this book in comparison to his other whole kit comes up with a very different objective and method of investigation. While looking on for other books from other writers which have ventured into similar type of analysis cannot be found yet. Moving from the achievements of the writer we withal come crosswise certain gapsvisible in the work. It is cognise that he is edifice up a picture of investigation around the period of freedom struggle but he confines himself to a very check events and personalities of that period.His projection that part of history comes up as if it is only in relevance to Pakistan. He also tends to omit the other popular beliefs of the time which was visible in the form of questions embossed by Dalit leadership and also the partition of India on the footing of language atomic number 82 to a discontent in sulfur India Thus the book can be seen as a very different creation with experimentation of a new type. The central idea that national ideologies shape the history writing of school textbooks is very cogently presented in the books. The role of history teaching and its impact on the socialisation of the young minds and leading to their formulation of the notion of other is also ver y much clear in this book. But this book also suffers loops and holes in course of omitting other aspects of freedom struggle like low rank and tribal resistances.Book Review injustice and Pride work Histories of the Freedom effort in India and Pakitan