FLUID TEMPORALITIES

SAIYID AHMAD KHAN AND THE CONCEPT OF MODERNITY

Margrit Pernau

History and Theory 58, no. 4 (2019)

This article investigates the language the great Indian Muslim reformer of the nineteenth century, Saiyid Ahmad Khan, uses to conceive of temporalities. The attention is directed toward the way he imagined the relationship between the present and the past, on the one hand, and the future, on the other hand, and toward the changes these configurations underwent in the course of his lifetime. The article will follow up these questions in three sections, focusing on three phases of Saiyid Ahmad Khan's life: first, his early years as a colonial officer and scholar (1840s–1860s); second, the period when the comparative gaze became crucial, leading to the establishment of a scientific society and to a voyage to London (1860–1871); and finally, the time when the Aligarh College occupied the center stage of his life (1871–1898).

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