Hindu Nationalism in India and the Politics of Fear [Hardcover]

The representation of the Muslims as threatening to India's body politic is central to the Hindu nationalist project of organizing a political movement and normalizing anti-minority violence. Adopting a critical ethnographic approach, this book identifies the poetics and politics of fear and violence engendered within Hindu nationalism.Introduction Hindu Nation under Seige 'The Muslim' as the Threatening Other Awakening the Hindu Body and the Hindu Mind Awakening the Hindu Body Politic The Awakened Hindu Nation Ayodhya and Gujarat Hindu Nationalism and Politics of (In)Security

How is fear created, spread and updated? In this revelatory book, Dibyesh Anand takes us deep into the multi-stranded fear-engendering strategies employed by India's contemporary Hindu nationalists. With a sharp feminist eye for exactly how both femininities and masculinities are wielded, he provides lessons for all of us concerned about the mobilization of ethnic hatreds and militarized nationalisms. - Cynthia Enloe, author of Nimo's War, Emma's War: Making Feminist Sense of the Iraq War Dibyesh Anand s book offers a sustained, innovative analysis of a central aspect of Hindu nationalist collective imaginings: the production of anti-Other fear. It is a must-read for anyone interested in right-wing social and political movements and in the local-to-transnational conflict in which they are engaged.

- Paola Bacchetta, professor, University of California, Berkeley

DIBYESH ANAND?is?Reader in International Relations at the Centre for the Study of Democracy, University of Westminster, UK.