EXPLORATIONS IN INDIAN SOCIOLINGUISTICS.Rajendra Singh, Probal Dasgupta, and Jayant K. Lele (Eds.). Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications, 1995. Pp. 258. $23.95 cloth.

Abstract

This book is dedicated to “all those working for the liquidation of sociolinguistics as we know it” (p. 6). One of the dominant themes of this book is a conservative skepticism about institutional claims to a knowledge of Indian sociolinguistics—western scholars and their “Indian cohorts” (p. 31, and passim) claiming to know the multilingual complexities of India. The nine essays, most previously published, are assembled in an attempt to deconstruct some of the established paradigms of Indian sociolinguistics, especially those that authors believe are guided by western models. The authors' dissatisfaction with the use of western parameters in interpreting the social realities of India is shared by most, if not all, linguists active in research in Indian linguistics; this book presents, in one volume, critiques of the works done in the past. After reading the book, whether or not one agrees with its stated agenda or its reinterpretation of the data, it is a brilliantly provocative, sometimes polemic, revisionist account of the multilingual realities of South Asia. The first nine essays offer critiques of studies in both micro- and macro-sociolinguistic traditions. The last two essays review two books: Gumperz's (1982) Language and social identity, and Bhatia's (1987) A history of the Hindi grammatical tradition.