On Names in South Asia: Iteration, (Im)propriety and Dissimulation

Discussions that take reference to be the primary issue in naming elide certain important questions. The essays in this volume draw from both ethnographies of names and naming practices in South Asia and theories of names embedded in literary texts, rules of grammar, or in aesthetics to open up other aspects of names. For instance, do names carry existential meanings for those who give or receive them? In what way do social conventions of naming or prohibitions and taboos on names make name-words into containers of emotion? While names function as social designators of say, religion, caste, gender, race, do they also embody the experience of being this kind of person in this kind of social milieu? Instead of drawing sharp boundaries between theory and ethnography, or between discussions in Western philosophy and Indian texts, the essays demonstrate how concepts emerge in the intersection of these formations and provide us a way of thinking of names that provides a lens with which to understand important processes of self-making and everyday violence in South Asia. At the same time, the essays raise questions that contribute to ongoing debates about names and broader processes of signification.

Includes essays by Jonah Steinberg, Deepak Mehta, Luke Heslop, William Mazzarella, Aditya Bharadwaj, Veena Das, Sean Dowdy, Gregory Maxwell Bruce, Vaibhav Saria and Alexander Henn.