The City Of Djinns - Delhi

The City Of Djinns - Delhi

In City of Djinns William Dalrymple takes on an interesting project. He picks up a reality of present-day Delhi, and then rewinds back by several thousand years to observe how that reality had featured in the historical time period. The book thus tells a story of historical transition---of continuity and change. What has changed over time and what do you think has remained enduring in this historical city?

Westerners have been traveling to India and returning with incredible tales of a mysterious and exotic land, for over 2,000 years. Many of the early descriptions came from adventurers who were also splendid storytellers, fond of weaving fascinating and fantasy-filled accounts of their exploits and experiences. Since that time, a rich and varied fabric of narratives and interpretations has been stitched together to form the legacy of Indian studies. One of the most formidable tasks for one seeking to understand an academic survey of Indian history, culture, and religion is the investigation and comprehension of the various threads that constitute this creation, so that they may be more accurately used in any contemporary study of the land and her people. In this context, the path resembles that of the ancient Indian sages who filled their days seeking to discriminate the real from the unreal. It must be remembered that the concept of objective recording and analysis by dispassionate observers, foundational in an academic study, is a relatively recent phenomenon, itself possessing a decidedly subjective quality. A serious reflection on both the process of humanities research and the psychological nature of humankind, however, makes it apparent that objectivity is an exceedingly relative concept, existing more as an orientation than as an absolute. We all bring into our data collection, record keeping, and research not only our knowledge and understanding but also our preconceptions, preferences, and prejudices. These all play vital roles in the processes of observation, information gathering, analysis, and interpretation. This is as true for the native informant as it is for the academic and the historian. Thus, the more we, as researchers are able to understand the general predispositions that have led to what we accept as sources, the more clearly we can utilize them in our own work. In reflecting on his years of field research in India, Harold Gould notes that the observer is inevitably a “biased mechanism” whose perception is conditioned by personal and intellectual biases (Lamb, 2010).

India's capital is one of the oldest cities of India, indeed of the world, if you believe mythology. It began as Indraprastha probably around 5,000 BC, grew through seven other cities into New Delhi. Among the metros, Delhi is certainly the only one old enough to have a tradition of water conservation and management that developed indigenously and was not imposed by the British (Jackson, 1907). Delhi lies at the tail end of the Aravali hills, where they merge with the Indo-Gangetic Plains. The Aravalis taper down from the southern to the northern ...