Book Review – Developmental Modernity in Kerala: Narayana Guru, SNDP Yogam and Social Reform

P. Chandramohan, Developmental Modernity in Kerala: Narayana Guru, SNDP Yogam and Social Reform,

New Delhi: Tulika Books, 2016, xiv + 260 pages, Rs 750

The question of modernity and the theoretical approaches that are used to describe and explain it are crucial to any understanding of our contemporary social realities. The usual method of treating modernity as an all-encompassing structure that has replaced ‘traditional’ structures makes it impossible to conceive of the existence of various intersecting and perhaps even contradictory levels of social practices. Therefore, it is important to work with approaches in framing modernity that are different from the usual. A conceptualisation of modernity that takes into account historical differences thus becomes crucial. This approach might explain the structural preconditions to modernity that allow people to do things and interact differently from traditional practices without necessarily replacing the same. Also, this might make it possible to consider the existences of ‘other’ forms of the social in the contemporary.