CHAPTER EIGHT

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CHAPTER EIGHT

• South Asia

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South Asia
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I. THE GEOGRAPHIC SETTING

• Easy region to define
• Indian Ocean to east, south, and west
• Himalaya Mountains to the north
• 1/5 the land area of Africa
• 2x the population of Africa
• Unified through village culture common
  experience with British colonialism

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A. Physical Patterns

• Landforms
• 60 million years ago Indian-Australian Plate
  collides with Eurasian Plate
• Himalayas formed from crumpling of both plates
• Lots of earthquakes
• South of Himalayas are Indus and Ganga river
  basins
• South of river basins is the Deccan Plateau,
  flanked by Eastern and Western Ghats

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A. Physical Patterns

• Climate
• Monsoons summertime winds bringing rain from the
  Indian Ocean
• Amplified by ITCZ, orographic effect
• Dry season caused by winds blowing out from
  Central Asia
• Indus, Ganga, and Brahmaputra Rivers
• Flow from meltwater in the Himalayas
• Eroding the Himalayas and depositing silt
  throughout lowland areas

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Monsoons
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Climate Zones
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B. Human Patterns Over Time

• The Indus Valley Civilization
• First settled agricultural communities in region
• Indus River valley and Saraswati River
• Traded with Mesopotamia and eastern Africa
• Technologically advanced
• Agricultural system save monsoon surplus for dry
  season
• Culture and biological traits survive among
  Dravidians of South India

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B. Human Patterns Over Time

• A Series of Invasions
• Aryans invaders from Central and SW Asia 3500
  years ago
• Instituted caste system, developed Hinduism
• Other influences Persians, Macedonians, Arab
  traders
• Mughals Turkic Persians from Central Asia
• Controlled northern and central South Asia
• Introduced Islam
• Replaced by British rule

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Great Fortress at Agra
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B. Human Patterns Over Time

• The Legacies of Colonial Rule
• British colonized South Asia from 1830s to 1947
• Afghanistan never directly ruled
• Nepal nominally independent
• Bhutan protectorate of British India
• Destruction of South Asian manufacturing
• Land taxes led to consolidation under major
  landowners

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British Indian Empire, 1860-1920
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B. Human Patterns Over Time

• Economic Influence
• Cotton, jute, tea, sugar, and indigo exported to
  supply Britain and its colonies
• Focus on agriculture led to increased family size
• Trading cities boomed, growth of railroads
• Mumbai, Kolkata, Chennai
• Many British institutions remain in place
• Bureaucratic, but generally successful
• Democracy in India

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B. Human Patterns Over Time

• Independence and Partition
• Gandhi brought civil disobedience to undermine
  British authority
• 1947 independence, partition of British India
  into India (Hindu) and Pakistan (Muslim)?
• Done to appease Muslim leaders
• Two parts to Pakistan, split by India
• Result of divide-and-rule tactics used by British

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Independence and Partition
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B. Human Patterns Over Time

• Since Independence
• India worlds most populous democracy
• Dismantling oppressive caste and gender barriers
• Growth of industry and services
• Still, poorest region after sub-Saharan Africa
• Conflict
• East Pakistan (Bangladesh) vs. West Pakistan
• Civil wars in Sri Lanka, Afghanistan
• Nuclear showdown between India and Pakistan

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C. Population Patterns

• One of most densely populated regions in the
  world
• Only 30 urban
• Several of worlds largest cities (Mumbai,
  Kolkata, Delhi, Dhaka)?
• Urban migration enhanced by
• Business opportunities
• Fewer caste restrictions
• Agricultural modernization

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Population Distribution
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C. Population Patterns

• India expected to become most populous country in
  the world in 2020
• 1 billion per year on population control
• 1/3 of South Asias people are under age 15
• Demographic momentum
• High birth rate related to
• Need for children to support parents in old age
• Lack of gender equity
• Preference for male children

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Declining Fertility Rates
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Population Pyramids
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II.CURRENT GEOGRAPHIC ISSUES

• Despite few countries, tremendous diversity
• Can be overwhelming to outsiders seeking to
  understand
• Many cultural characteristics touch all lives
• Vary in practice throughout the region

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A. Sociocultural Issues

• Village Life
• Public spaces often dominated by men
• Purdah seclusion of women from non-family male
  gazes
• Linked to status
• 70 of South Asians live in villages
• Traditional trips by urbanites back to ancestral
  villages

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Material Culture of Purdah
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A. Sociocultural Issues

• Urban Life
• Portrayed as chaotic, crowded, dilapidated
• Beyond main streets, compact neighborhoods
  functioning as villages
• Multicultural, educated populations

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Village Within Mumbai
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A. Sociocultural Issues

• Language and Ethnicity
• Everyone is a minority in South Asia
• 18 official languages in India, hundreds of
  others
• Invasions, migrations result in complex map of
  ethnicity
• Austro-Asiatic languages from oldest settlers
• Dravidian languages southern India, Indus River
  valley
• Indo-European languages date from Aryan invasion
• Urdu, Hindi major language, different scripts

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Languages
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A. Sociocultural Issues

• Hinduism
• 800 million of the worlds 900 million Hindus
  live in India
• Complex set of beliefs, often contradictory local
  traditions
• All gods are illusory manifestations of the
  ultimate divinity
• Caste rooted in religion, dietary rules
• Reincarnation everything that wishes will be
  reborn after death

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A. Sociocultural Issues

• Geographic Patterns in Religious Beliefs
• Hindus most numerous, mostly in India
• Ganga plain is hearth
• Buddhism began in South Asia as a reform movement
• 1 of South Asia is today Buddhist (Sri Lanka,
  Bhutan)?
• Most Buddhists found east of the region now
• Muslim majority in Afghanistan, Pakistan,
  Bangladesh, Maldives
• Muslim minority in India (120 million people)?

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A. Sociocultural Issues

• Geographic Patterns in Religious Beliefs
• Sikhism Draws from Hinduism and Islam
• Found mostly in Punjab and in diaspora outside
  India
• Jainism Another reform movement of Hinduism
• Found in western India and urban areas
• Parsi Modern form of Zoroastrianism
• Found in western Indian cities
• Also, Christian and Jewish populations

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Religions
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A. Sociocultural Issues

• The Hindu-Muslim Relationship
• Often closely linked within communities
• However, Islam often linked to low-status castes
  within Hinduism
• Run slaughterhouses, which is offensive to
  Hinduism
• Some Hindus convert to try to escape caste system
• Communal conflict name for inter-religious
  conflict

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A. Sociocultural Issues

• Caste Hindu system of dividing society into
  hereditary hierarchical categories
• Incorporated to a degree by other religious
  groups in South Asia
• 4 main varna (divisions)?
• Brahmins priestly caste
• Kshatriyas warriors and rulers
• Vaishyas landowning farmers and merchants
• Sudras laborers and artisans
• 2 other groups Harijans (too low for a caste)
  and Adivasis (descendents of aboriginal Indians)?

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A. Sociocultural Issues

• Jatis subcastes associated with specific
  occupations (less true in todays economy)?
• Still, common culture and spatiality to a jati
• Hierarchy of jatis often a source of conflict
• Caste and class no longer strictly connected
• Effort to end discrimination
• Successful in urban areas, less so in rural
• Only 5 of marriages cross jati lines

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Protest Against Quotas for Lower-Status Castes
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A. Sociocultural Issues

• Geographic Patterns in the Status of Women
• Gender inequity worst in belt from Afghanistan to
  Bangladesh
• Gender equity best in eastern, central, southern
  India and Sri Lanka
• Upper caste women more restricted
• Urban women less restricted
• Muslim women have lower standard of living than
  other women
• Oppression in Afghanistan under Taliban

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A. Sociocultural Issues

• Purdah seclusion of women during reproductive
  years
• Strongest in northwest and Indo-Gangetic Plain
• Veiling of women even in Hindu communities
• Arranged marriage brides family pays dowry to
  grooms family
• Bride becomes labor for mother-in-law
• Childbirth path to autonomy

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A. Sociocultural Issues

• Bride Burning and Female Infanticide
• History of killing wives in accidents to enable
  male remarriage, new dowry
• 7026 murders in 2005
• Because of future dowry, many newborn girls
  killed
• Until recently, grooms family would pay bride
  price to marry
• Dowry technically illegal
• Still, prestige and money skewed toward males

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A. Sociocultural Issues

• End of purdah, other oppressions might lower
  birth rate and encourage economic growth
• End of Taliban rule has led to some progress in
  Afghanistan
• Womens bazaar in Mazar-e-Sharif
• Poor representation by women in Indian
  legislature (9)?
• Quotas in place for Pakistan, Nepal, and
  Bangladesh legislatures

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Female Literacy in India, 2005
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B. Economic and Political Issues

• Economic Issues
• Startling economic contrasts
• India 100s of millions of poor as well as a
  high-tech sector and space program
• Most wealth disparity results from
  post-independence governance
• Agriculture basis for most regional economies
• Growth of industry and services
• IT in India

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B. Economic and Political Issues

• Agriculture and the Green Revolution
• 60 of regions labor, but only 25 of GDP
• Dramatic increases in productivity, still least
  efficient sector of the economy
• Double-cropping common (dry season/wet season)?
• Green Revolution new agricultural tools and
  techniques (beginning in late 1960s)?
• New seeds, fertilizers, etc.
• New dams created water for irrigation, as well as
  hydroelectric power for industry

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Agriculture in South Asia
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B. Economic and Political Issues

• Agriculture and the Green Revolution
• India still not self-sufficient in food
• Climate change, declining soil fertility
• Led to consolidation of land holdings, many poor
  farmers forced into wage labor
• Increased food productivity leads to more
  exports, not more food in South Asia
• Agroecology traditional methods of fertilizing
  crops and using natural predators to control pests

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B. Economic and Political Issues

• Industry over Agriculture A Vision of
  Self-Sufficiency
• Early nationalization of industry had poor
  results
• Inefficient, ignored market incentives
• Focused on big-ticket items most South Asians
  could not afford
• Only impacted a small percentage of industrial
  workers (still only 12 of Indian labor)?

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B. Economic and Political Issues

• Economic Reform Achieving Global Competitiveness
• 1990s India institutes market reforms
• Not result of SAPs, but similar disparity
• Indian growth not predicated on cheap labor, but
  on skilled labor
• Pakistan and Bangladesh also growing, but less
  industrial
• Services over 50 of regional GDP
• Trade, transport, storage, communication

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Per Capita Income and Industrial/IT Centers
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B. Economic and Political Issues

• Differing Views of Globalization
• Rise of service sector and IT foretells
  increasing globalization of South Asia
• Pros New high-paying jobs, higher standards of
  living, increasing demand for local goods and
  services
• Cons Increasing economic degradation, cultural
  contamination, disruption of traditional economies

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Training for the Service Economy
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B. Economic and Political Issues

• Economic Development and Poverty Rates
• Poverty still declining in South Asia as a
• Not in overall numbers because of population
  growth
• Innovative Help for the Poor
• Microcredit small loans to help poor
  entrepreneurs (Grameen Bank)?
• Collective collateral
• 98 repayment rate

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Microcredit in Action
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B. Economic and Political Issues

• Political Issues
• India beacon of democracy to the developing
  world
• However
• Growth of corruption, demagoguery, violence
• Increased tension between castes
• Heightened religious nationalism

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B. Economic and Political Issues

• Caste and Democracy in India
• Locally, political parties appeal to jati
  loyalties
• Infrastructure for community
• Nationally, major parties deny caste loyalties
• Increasingly overt appeals
• Indian government works to undercut caste
  discrimination

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B. Economic and Political Issues

• Religious Nationalism
• Linkage of a religion to a particular territory
• Both India and Pakistan officially secular
• But created for particular religious groups
• Hindu nationalism supported by middle and
  upper-caste urban men afraid of the loss of caste
  privilege

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Religious Nationalism
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B. Economic and Political Issues

• Conflict in Punjab
• Punjab home Sikhs, divided between Pakistan and
  India during Partition
• Sikhs feel alienated from national government of
  India
• 1980s independence movement radicalized the Sikh
  population
• 30,000 deaths since 1980s

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B. Economic and Political Issues

• Conflict in Kashmir
• Muslim-dominated part of India
• Waiting on UN decision on border, divided between
  India, Pakistan, China
• 500,000 Indian troops in area
• Since 1947 60,000-100,000 deaths
• Role of mujahedeen Islamists inflaming conflict
• Many Kashmiris support independence
• India and Pakistan nuclear powers

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Regional Conflicts in South Asia
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B. Economic and Political Issues

• War and Reconstruction in Afghanistan
• Urban elites allied with Soviets to prevent
  export of Islamism to Central Asia
• Mujahedeen allied w/USA, Pakistan against USSR
• After USSR left, mujahedeen splintered and
  Taliban came to power
• Taliban conservative rural Islamists
• Following 9/11/01 USA intervenes against Taliban
• Difficulty ensuring security, meeting human needs

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Reconstruction in Afghanistan
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B. Economic and Political Issues

• The Future of Democracy
• Status of democracy varies
• Indian democracy new focus on reducing
  corruption and providing opportunities for women
• Sri Lanka solid democracy but civil war between
  Sinhalese and Tamils
• Pakistan quasi-democratic, but functioning as a
  dictatorship
• Bangladesh recent democracy, with corruption
• Bhutan constitutional monarchy
• Nepal just concluded civil war

63
C. Environmental Issues

• Deforestation
• Clearing of western forests 3000 years ago
  contributed to desertification
• Forests still being cleared for commercial
  logging and village needs
• Leads to erosion, landslides
• Social forestry (Chipko) movement encouraging
  local control of tree resources
• Substantial environmental movement in the region

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Human Impact on South Asia
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C. Environmental Issues

• 20 of world pop. but 4 of fresh water
• Conflict over Ganga River water
• India controls flow of river has diverted to its
  purposes in past
• Bangladesh deprived of water coastline
  modification
• Water purity in decline
• Disposal of bodies in Ganga
• Industrial waste and sewage

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Pollution of the Ganga
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C. Environmental Issues

• Industrial Pollution
• Vehicles and coal-burning power plants
• Delhis air equivalent to 20 cigarettes a day
• Acid rain destroys good farmland
• Pesticide plant explosion in Bhopal (1984)?
• U.S.-owned Union Carbide
• Killed 3000 people, hurt 30,000 more

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D. Measures of Human Well-Being

• Low GDP per capita
• Almost as low as sub-Saharan Africa
• Thriftiness leads to higher standard of living
  than statistics indicate
• Medium HDI rankings
• Instability in Afghanistan
• Low GDI rankings
• Lack of health care, education, and earning power
  for women

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Human Well-being Rankings
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III. Subregions of South Asia
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A. Afghanistan and Pakistan

• Mountainous, arid countries
• Influenced by invaders
• Muslim and rural
• Home to conservative Islamist movements
• Afghanistan poorer than Pakistan
• 30 years of conflict

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Pamir Mountains
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A. Afghanistan and Pakistan

• Afghanistan
• Wheat, fruit, nuts, and opium production in
  semi-arid areas
• 30 million people, 45 younger than age 15
• Life expectancy 42 years (down from 47 in 2003)?
• Population growing by 2.6 per year
• Low literacy rates
• Ethnic groups Turkmen, Uzbek, Tajik, Hazara,
  Pashtun, Baluch
• Kabul 3 million people, degraded infrastructure

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Language and Ethnicity in Afghanistan
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A. Afghanistan and Pakistan

• Pakistan
• 5x population of Afghanistan
• Indus River critical to agriculture
• GDP growth rate of 6 per year
• 2/3 of population lives on under 2 per day
• Substantial military commitment

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Cottage Industries in Pakistan
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B. Himalayan Country

• Descend in altitude from north to south
• Very rural
• Muslim in west, Hindu and Buddhist in center and
  east
• Economies based on trade
• Quite poor
• Tourism adding to limited agriculture

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Arunachal Pradesh
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C. Northwestern India

• Dry, yet fertile and wealthy
• Irrigated from Ganga
• Rajastan arid, poor
• Punjab provides 2/3 of Indias food reserves
• Corn, potatoes, sugarcane, peas, beans, onions,
  mustard
• Delhi region industrial, home of capital
• 15 million people, 4th most polluted city in the
  world

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Camel Grazing
81
D. Northeastern South Asia

• Wet tropical climate, fertile land
• Dense populations
• Ganga-Brahmaputra delta largest on earth
• Shifting and eroding landscapes
• West Bengal population swelling with refugees
• 75 agricultural labor force, only 35 of GDP
• Kolkata first British capital, now full of
  poverty

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D. Northeastern South Asia

• Assam Large indigenous populations
• Assamese, Tibeto-Burmese
• Agriculture, tea production, forestry, oil
• Bangladesh One of regions poorest countries
  most densely populated in world
• 144 million people in space of Alabama
• Dropping poverty rates, increasing literacy
• Growth of textiles industry

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Living Root Bridge, NE India
84
E. Central India

• Gujarat and Maharashtra strong service and
  industrial sectors
• Mumbai 20 million people, Indias most
  prosperous city
• Stock exchange, central bank
• 40 of Indias trade revenue
• Bollywood Center of Hindi cinema production

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Two Sides of Mumbai
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F. Southern South Asia

• More educated than rest of India
• Advanced technology sector
• Bangalore, Chennai
• Election of communists, religious pluralism
• Kerala
• Environmentalism
• Gender equality
• Dravidian culture and languages

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Microsoft Technology Center in Bangalore
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F. Southern South Asia

• Sri Lanka island off SE coast
• Rice, nuts, spices, tea, coconuts
• Rainfall Lush forests, hydroelectric power
• Ethnic groups 74 Singhalese (Buddhism) and 18
  Tamils (Hindu)?
• Civil war results from conflict between
  ethnicities (government dominated by Singhalese)?
• 1 million refugees, economic decline

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Colombo, Sri Lanka