Week 10: Gandhi's Printing Press
Seminar Questions
- How did Gandhi’s use of print reflect his political philosophy?
- How did the South African context of publication shape Hind Swaraj?
- Who is the imagined reader of Hind Swaraj?
- Why did the Government of India ban Hind Swaraj?
Seminar Readings
* Hofmeyr, Isabel, Gandhi’s Printing Press: Experiments in Slow Reading (Harvard, MA, 2013), 1-29
Note: I suggest you use the Cambridge University Press edition of Hind Swaraj edited by Anthony Parel, which is available as an eBook through Warwick University Library and has a wealth of helpful footnotes. Page numbers are taken from that edition which corresponds to the first English edition, published in 1910 in Natal.
Additional Readings
Primary
Gandhi, Mohandas, Satyagraha in South Africa (Madras, 1928)
Gandhi, Mohandas, An Autobiography, or The Story of My Experiments with Truth (Ahmedabad, 1940), trans. Mahadev Desai, particularly Part II which describes Gandhi’s time in South Africa
Gandhi’s writings, including the original newspaper and book editions of Hind Swaraj, as well as his Collected Works, can be found at: www.gandhiheritageportal.org
You can find out more about Gandhi’s time in South Africa at: gandhi.southafrica.net
Secondary
Guha, Ramachandra, Gandhi Before India (London, 2013)
Hofmeyr, Isabel, ‘The Idea of “Africa” in Indian Nationalism: Reporting the Diaspora in The Modern Review 1907–1929’, South African Historical Journal, 57 (2007)
Hofmeyr, Isabel, ‘Violent Texts, Vulnerable Readers: Hind Swaraj and Its South African Audiences’, Public Culture, 23 (2011)
Hofmeyr, Isabel, Gandhi’s Printing Press: Experiments in Slow Reading (Harvard, MA, 2013)
Hyslop, Jonathan, ‘Gandhi 1869-1915: The Transnational Emergence of a Public Figure’ in Judith Brown and Anthony Parel (eds), The Cambridge Companion to Gandhi (Cambridge, 2011)
Khan, Yasmin, ‘Gandhi’s World’, in Judith Brown and Anthony Parel (eds), The Cambridge Companion to Gandhi (Cambridge, 2011)
Lahiri, Madhumita, ‘Gandhian Fictions: Rereading Satyagraha in South Africa’, Social Dynamics, 38, (2012)
Mesthrie, Uma Shashikant, ‘From Advocacy to Mobilisation: Indian Opinion, 1903–1913’ in Les Switzer (ed.) South Africa’s Alternative Press: Voices of Protest and Resistance, 1880s-1960s (Cambridge, 1997)
Parel, Anthony, ‘Editor’s Introduction to the 1997 Edition’ in Anthony Parel (ed.), 'Hind Swaraj' and Other Writings (Cambridge, 2009)
Parel, Anthony, ‘Editor’s Introduction to the Centenary Edition’ in Anthony Parel (ed.), 'Hind Swaraj' and Other Writings (Cambridge, 2009)
Suhrud, Tridip, ‘Gandhi’s Key Writings’ in Judith Brown and Anthony Parel (eds), The Cambridge Companion to Gandhi (Cambridge, 2011).