The concept of cosmopolitanism in Bombay is commonly associated with communal tension, religious tolerance and violence to point to a post-colonial decline of cosmopolitanism as crystallized by the riots of the 1990s . However, MacFarlane posits that "claims that the city has undergone a general social transformation since the 1990s need to be tempered by the multiple forms of cosmopolitan imaginations and practices that exist in the city" .
Moreover, MacFarlane suggests that from a historiography perspective, the debate regarding cosmopolitanism in present Bombay centers on the argument that the city's move to cosmopolitanism correlates to the social transformation since the 1990s .
[...] Studying the multitudes and fates of pavement dwellers in Bombay, a city crowded with empty buildings, would enable us to grasp a new kind of endangered cosmopolitanism already coded in the recent rectification of names.[16]” This again supports the argument that cosmopolitanism is intrinsically influenced by the interrelationship between circumstance and socio- political backdrop and correlates to Prakash's idea of Bombay as a parallel city of cultures and class as opposed to a cosmopolitan multicultural city[17]. Moreover, if specifically consider Bombay within this context, Breckenridge highlights how its history was began as a set of fishing villages named after local goddesses linked by bridges and causeways, which was then transformed into a colonial centre of Western India under the British[18]. [...]
[...] Accordingly, the above analysis demonstrates that the concept of cosmopolitanism is intrinsically dependent on the context and the nature of socio-political events shaping cultural identity and cultural relations within communities. As such, the historiography of cosmopolitanism in Bombay exemplifies this proposition. For example, the changing concept of self in the post colonial Indian identity has resulted in a fragmentation of cultural relations in Bombay, which supports Prakash's model of Bombay as the multicultural paradox of two parallel cities[27]. Bibliography Breckenridge, C. (1995). Consuming Modernity: Public Culture in a South Asian World. University of Minnesota Press. Breckenridge, C. (2002). Cosmopolitanism. [...]
[...] Additionally, Masselos refers to the fact that postcolonial India has resulted in the various cultural and ethnic groups in Bombay and India as a whole focusing on their ethno-centric identity, which has fuelled cultural divides in India. As a result Bombay personifies the fragmentation of Indian society from the immediate aftermath of independence to now[12]. As such, this supports the argument in this paper that the cosmopolitanism in Bombay is inherently related to the socio-political backdrop and continues to evolve. Moreover, the historiography of cosmopolitanism in Bombay reiterates the importance of understanding the definition of cosmopolitanism. Indeed, Breckenridge highlights the point that in considering cosmopolitanism in Bombay, it is imperative to understand the definition of cosmopolitanism[13]. [...]
[...] Duke University Press MacFarlane, C. (2008). Postcolonial Bombay: decline of a cosmopolitan city? Environment and planning Society and space pp.480-499. Masselos, J., & Patel, S. (2006). Bombay and Mumbai; the City in Transition. New Delhi Press. Prakash, G. (2006). The Idea of Bombay. The American Scholar 88-99. [1]MacFarlane, C. [...]
APA Style reference
For your bibliographyOnline reading
with our online readerContent validated
by our reading committee
