A carefully crafted selection of essays from international experts, this book explores the effect of colonial architecture and space on the societies involved both the colonizer and the colonized.
Focusing on British India and Ceylon, the essays explore the discursive tensions between the various different scales and dimensions of such 'empire-building' practices and constructions. Providing a thorough exploration of these tensions, Colonial Modernities challenges the traditional literature on the architecture and infrastructure of the former European empires, not least that of the British Indian 'Raj'.
Illustrated with seventy-five halftone images, it is a fascinating and thoroughly grounded exposition of the societal impact of colonial architecture and engineering.
Author(s): Peter Scriver; Vikramaditya Prakash
Edition: Paperback
Publisher: Routledge
Year: 2007
Language: English
Pages: 287
Part 1: Frames of Discourse 1. Between Materiality and Representation: Framing an Architectural Critique of Colonial South Asia Peter Scriver and Vikramaditya Prakash 2. Stones and Texts: The Architectural Historiography of Colonial India and its Colonial-Modern Contexts Peter Scriver 3. The Stone Books of Orientalism Stephen Cairns Part 2: Institutional Frameworks 4. Empire-Building and Thinking in the Public Works Department of British India Peter Scriver 5. 'Strangers within the Gate': Artisanry as Supplement of Labour in the Crafting of Colonial India Arindam Dutta 6. Between Copying and Creation: The Jeypore Portfolio of Architectural Details Vikramaditya Prakash 7. Institutional Audiences and Architectural Style: The Napier Museum Paul Walker Part 3: Domestic Frames of Practice 8. A Tomb of One’s Own: The Governor’s House, Lahore Sylvia Shorto 9. The Other Face of Primitive Accumulation: The Garden House in British Colonial Bengal Swati Chattopadhyay 10. The Trouser Under the Cloth: Personal Space in De-Colonization, Ceylon 1815-1948 Anoma Pieris 11. Negotiated Modernities: Symbolic Terrains of Housing in Delhi Jyoti Hosagrahar
