The Punjab Borderland

Mobility, Materiality and Militancy, 1947-1987

Inbunden, Engelska, 2022

Av Ilyas Chattha, Pakistan) Chattha, Ilyas (Lahore University of Management Sciences

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The Punjab Borderland offers a fascinating insight into how the new international boundary between India and Pakistan was made, subverted, and transformed. Dispelling the established historiographical narratives of an increasingly militarised border that presents as the epitome of animosity and a classic example of inter-state tension, this book offers a corrective to these accounts by bringing out narratives of border crossings and social relations built on mutual benefit and trust. It conceptualises the making of the vast contraband as an analytical tool, not merely as borderland societies' modes for evading the state imposition of a partitioned geography on their local lifeworld, but as a catalyst for enabling social mobility and political empowerment for the population involved and a thriving market for consumption in the urban centres. It reveals a 'bottom-up' history of the Punjab border and the invention of the borderland society, narrating a story with local meanings and transnational dimensions.

Produktinformation

Utgivningsdatum2022-06-16
Mått158 x 236 x 25 mm
Vikt570 g
FormatInbunden
SpråkEngelska
Antal sidor334
FörlagCambridge University Press
ISBN9781316517956

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List of Maps and Photographs; List of Tables; List of Abbreviations; Glossary; Note on Transliteration; Preface and Acknowledgements; Introduction; 1. Making of the Border; 2. Cross-Border Flows; 3. Illicit Cities: Contraband Trade between Lahore and Amritsar; 4. Illicit Global Gold Trade and Wagah – Attari Crossing; 5. The Making of Contraband Culture: People and Poetics; 6. The Regulation of Cross-Border Flows, and State Patronage; 7. Guns, Drugs, and the End of the 'Good Old Days'; Conclusion: Between Open and Closed Borders; Selected Bibliography; Index.

'This path breaking research presents the world from the Punjab borderland, straddling the states of India and Pakistan. Ilyas Chattha offers us a view from the borderland, where state institutions are malleable to the needs of trade and movement is considered a right, not a concession. From village courtyards to Gold Souks in Dubai and small shops in Birmingham, this book takes us on a journey that confounds, enlightens, and ultimately illuminates, the shady world of border life. Drawing upon border folklore, poetry and on linguistic skills to access local vernacular archives, this research presents a major challenge to any simple understanding of Partition as an event that took place in 1947, rather the evolution of a border and the challenges to its fixity are presented over a period of sixty years.' Virinder S. Kalra, Chairperson, Department of Sociology, University of Warwick