Pandemic India : from cholera to Covid-19 / David Arnold.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Arnold, David, 1933- author.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Social medicine.

Physical Description:

1 online resource (xv, 322 pages) : illustrations

Place of Publication:

New York, NY : Oxford University Press, [2022]

Summary:

Covid-19 has given renewed, urgent attention to'the pandemic'as a devastating, recurrent global phenomenon. Today the term is freely and widely used-but in reality, it has a long and contested history, centred on South Asia. Pandemic India is an innovative enquiry into the emergence of the idea and changing meaning of pandemics, exploring the pivotal role played by-or assigned to-India over the past 200 years. Using the perspectives of the social historian and the historian of medicine, and a wide range of sources, it explains how and why past pandemics were so closely identified with South Asia; the factors behind outbreaks'exceptional destructiveness in India; responses from society and the state, both during and since the colonial era; and how such collective catastrophes have changed lives and been remembered. Giving a'long history'to India's current pandemic, the book offers comparisons with earlier epidemics of cholera, plague and influenza. David Arnold assesses the distinctive characteristics and legacies of each episode, tracking the evolution of public health strategies and containment measures. This is a historian's reflection on time as seen through the pandemic prism, and on the ways the past is used--or misused--to serve the present.

Contents:

1. What is a Pandemic? 2. The Time of Cholera 3. A Modern Plague 4. War Fever 5. Orphans of the Storm 6. In the Time of the Nation 7. Coronavirus and the Uses of History Conclusion A Note on Place Name Changes Notes Bibliography.

Notes:

Description based on print version record.

Includes bibliographical references and index.

ISBN:

0-19-768348-7

0-19-767455-0