South Asia • EU and Morocco • Review of North Africa & SW Asia • Questions • South Asia – Scope and Features – Major Qualities
Dec 18, 2015
South Asia
• EU and Morocco
• Review of North Africa & SW Asia
• Questions
• South Asia– Scope and Features– Major Qualities
Major Geographic Qualities of South Asia
• Well defined physiographically– Monsoon climate
• The world’s second largest population cluster– 1.4 billion
• Grinding poverty– 22% of world’s population, 3% of land area
• Population concentrated in villages – North Indian Plain – Uttar Pradesh
• British colonial legacy, India, a federal state• Religion and nationalism• Boundary issues
– Kashmir
MONSOONS
• Monsoon– India is the ‘textbook example’– 50% of arable land irrigated by monsoon– Over half world’s population is in monsoonal
regions– It is a wind, not the rain
• Seasonal reversal of winds • General onshore movement in summer• General offshore flow in winter
Impact of the Monsoon
• Regional variation• Vital to rice production in India• But:
– Widespread flooding and property damage• Transportation• Housing
– Erosion and destruction of agricultural land– Disease– Malnutrition– Death
• Impact exacerbated by deforestation
Culture
• Religion– Islam is dominant in Pakistan and
Bangladesh.• But 150 million Muslims in India
– Hinduism is dominant in India.
– Sikhism in northern India, Punjab
– Buddhism is dominant in Sri Lanka.
Culture Hearth: The Indus River
• Early agriculture & hydraulic civilizations
• Arts and trade routes emerged from isolated tribes and villages to towns and beyond. – Hinduism emerged from the beliefs and practices
brought to India by the Indo-Europeans c. 600 BC
– Buddhism – Prince Siddhartha 300 BC
– Diffusion of Islam 700-1600 CE
HINDUISM
• The world’s oldest religion
• Culture hearth of the Indus River Valley
• Diffused south and east down the Ganges
HINDUISM
• Intricate web of religious, philosophical, social, economic, and artistic elements
• No common creed
• No single doctrine
• No direct divine revelation
• No rigid narrow moral code
• Caste system: rigid social stratification
Colonial Transformation 1
• East India Company – 1599– Benefits from factionalization
• Warring principalities
• Islam-Hinduism-Buddhism
– Drives out French, Dutch and Spanish rivals– Indian Mutiny (Sepoy Rebellion) of 1856– British Viceroy assumes control 1857-1947
Colonial Transformation 2
• Benefits of Colonial Era– British civil service and public administration– Centralization of political control of rival states– Railway network– Irrigation canal network– Discouraged suttee, infanticide, child marriage
• Costs of colonial era– Dependency and indignity– Resources extracted for Britain’s benefit
• Independence and partition, 1947