{"product_id":"merchants-of-virtue-divya-cherian-9780520390058","title":"Merchants of Virtue: Hindus, Muslims, and Untouchables in Eighteenth-Century South Asia","description":"A free ebook version of this title is available through Luminos, University of California Press's Open Access publishing program. Visit www.luminosoa.org to learn more. \u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e Winner of the 2022 Joseph W. Elder Prize in the Indian Social Sciences \u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003ci\u003eMerchants of Virtue \u003c\/i\u003eexplores the question of what it meant to be Hindu in precolonial South Asia. Divya Cherian presents a fine-grained study of everyday life and local politics in the kingdom of Marwar in eighteenth-century western India to uncover how merchants enforced their caste ideals of vegetarianism and bodily austerity as universal markers of Hindu identity. Using legal strategies and alliances with elites, these merchants successfully remade the category of \"Hindu,\" setting it in contrast to \"Untouchable\" in a process that reconfigured Hinduism in caste terms. In a history pertinent to understanding India today, Cherian establishes the centrality of caste to the early-modern Hindu self and to its imagination of inadmissible others.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eAuthor:\u003c\/b\u003e Divya Cherian\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eISBN-10:\u003c\/b\u003e 0520390059\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eISBN-13:\u003c\/b\u003e 9780520390058\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003ePublisher:\u003c\/b\u003e University of California Press\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eLanguage:\u003c\/b\u003e English\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003ePublished:\u003c\/b\u003e 12\/27\/2022\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003ePages:\u003c\/b\u003e 284\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eFormat:\u003c\/b\u003e Paperback\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eWeight:\u003c\/b\u003e 0.95lbs\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eSize:\u003c\/b\u003e 8.90h x 6.00w x 0.80d","brand":"Divya Cherian","offers":[{"title":"Paperback","offer_id":44079165538559,"sku":"9780520390058","price":34.95,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0662\/2982\/9887\/files\/img_47e1dfdc-618b-4bfc-a80c-74ff6bf42209.jpg?v=1685479672","url":"https:\/\/www.whiterainbookhouse.com\/products\/merchants-of-virtue-divya-cherian-9780520390058","provider":"WR Book House","version":"1.0","type":"link"}