Colonial Discourse and the Suffering of Indian American Children Book Cover.webp

In this book, we analyze the psycho-social consequences faced by Indian American children after exposure to the school textbook discourse on Hinduism and ancient India. We demonstrate that there is an intimate connection—an almost exact correspondence—between James Mill’s colonial-racist discourse (Mill was the head of the British East India Company) and the current school textbook discourse. This racist discourse, camouflaged under the cover of political correctness, produces the same psychological impacts on Indian American children that racism typically causes: shame, inferiority, embarrassment, identity confusion, assimilation, and a phenomenon akin to racelessness, where children dissociate from the traditions and culture of their ancestors.


This book is the result of four years of rigorous research and academic peer-review, reflecting our ongoing commitment at Hindupedia to challenge the representation of Hindu Dharma within academia.

Talk:Prof. Ashwini Tambe

From Hindupedia, the Hindu Encyclopedia

By Sachi Anjunkar


Ashwini Tambe is a Professor Emertia, The Harriet Tubman Department of Women, Gender, and Sexuality Studies at University of Maryland[1] as of April 2024. According to she profile, her research interests are Citizenship, Decolonial Feminisms, Girlhood, Interdisciplinarity, Postcolonial Feminisms, South Asia, State Theory and Transnational Feminisms.

She has published no books, papers, or research pertaining to Hindus, the Indus Civilization, or caste.

In 2016, she signed a letter[2] addressed to the State Board of Education, California Department of Education, dated May 17, 2016. The letter stated the following:

  1. "There is no established connection between Hinduism and the Indus Civilization. The Rg Veda contains numerous mentions of horses and chariots but there is no conclusive material or fossil evidence for either at any Indus valley archeological site."
  2. "It is inappropriate to remove mention of the connection of caste to Hinduism."

Publications related to India[edit]

  1. Tambe, Ashwini. Defining Girlhood in India: A Transnational History of Sexual Maturity Laws. University of Illinois Press, 2019.
  2. Tambe, Ashwini. Codes of Misconduct: Regulating Prostitution in Late Colonial Bombay. University of Minnesota Press, 2009.
  3. Tambe, Ashwini, and Millie Thayer, editors. Transnational Feminist Itineraries. Duke University Press, forthcoming.
  4. Tambe, Ashwini, and others, editors. The Limits of British Colonial Control in South Asia. Routledge, 2008.

References[edit]