A Popular Account of the Manners and Customs of India

Acland, Charles, -1845Project Gutenberg · United StatesDec 2019

Rating 3.0
Word count
350K words
Chapters
35

Tags

English Originals Culture Human GeographySocial ObservationPopular NarrativeExotic CultureFolk CustomsCross-Cultural View

Summary

Project Gutenberg was the first provider of free electronic books, or eBooks. Michael Hart, founder of Project Gutenberg, invented eBooks in 1971 and his memory continues to inspire the creation of eBooks and related technologies today.A Popular Account of the Manners and Customs of India by Charles AclandAuthor: Acland, Charles, -1845,Language: English, Class: DS: History: General and Eastern Hemisphere: Asia, Release Date: Aug 28, 2013

Editor's review

This is Charles Acland's popular account of the manners and customs of India, classified under Asian history and made available as a free ebook by Project Gutenberg. Its appeal lies in presenting, in the guise of a "popular account," the daily life and customs of India as seen by a foreign observer in the early nineteenth century; the narrative leans toward anecdotal record and is highly readable, making it suitable as first-hand corroborating material for understanding the social landscape of colonial India. Readers should note that the author's identity and the standpoint of his era impose the limitations of an observer's perspective; the book should not be taken as a comprehensive guide to contemporary Indian culture but understood within its historical context. Those interested in South Asian history, colonial history, or cross-cultural observational writing may read it alongside later scholarship to distinguish description from judgment. The public-domain English text is easy to search and cite, making it suitable for course materials or writing sources, but it is not for readers seeking practical information for contemporary travel in India.

Who it's for

A good fit for

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Reading tips

  1. Before reading, learn about the author's era and place the account within the nineteenth-century colonial context.
  2. Read alongside a modern work on Indian history or cultural studies to identify the observer's standpoint and limitations.
  3. Excerpt descriptions of customs by theme and take notes for cross-comparison with other historical sources.
  4. There is no need to read every chapter in order; start with chapters of interest such as marriage customs, food, or festivals.

About the publisher

Project Gutenberg United States · Founded in 1971

Project Gutenberg is a digital publishing project focused on public-domain ebooks. Its publishing direction centers on classic literary works whose copyright has expired, covering genres such as poetry, drama, fiction, and epic. Representative books include Lyrical Ballads by Wordsworth and Coleridge, Proust's Du côté de chez Swann, Shakespeare's Macbeth and The Complete Works of William Shakespeare, Homer's The Iliad, Dante's La Divina Comèdia: Purgatòri, Cervantes's The History of Don Quixote, Volume 2, and Grahame's The Wind in the Willows. Its author resources consist mainly of classic Western writers such as Wordsworth, Proust, Shakespeare, Homer, Dante, Cervantes, Grahame, and Tolstoy. Its publishing feature is the provision of freely accessible ebooks in EPUB and Kindle formats; it is not a traditional publisher, and publicly available information is limited.

Contents

  1. 1
  2. 2
  3. 3
  4. 4
  5. 5
  6. 6
  7. 7
  8. 8
  9. 9
  10. 10
  11. 11
  12. 12
  13. 13
  14. 14
  15. 15
  16. 16
  17. 17
  18. 18
  19. 19
  20. 20
  21. 21
  22. 22
  23. 23
  24. 24
  25. 25
  26. 26
  27. 27
  28. 28
  29. 29
  30. 30
  31. 31
  32. 32
  33. 33
  34. 34
  35. 35

FAQ

Can this book serve as a guide to Indian culture? Not really. It is a popular account by an early nineteenth-century observer, reflecting what was seen and heard in a particular era and from a particular perspective, not a comprehensive introduction to contemporary Indian culture. Using it as a cultural guide risks mistaking historical description for present reality; it is best read alongside modern scholarship.
Are the accounts in the book objective? The source material does not specify the author's exact identity and standpoint, but given the period of composition, it is an early foreign observer's record of what was seen and heard and inevitably carries the prejudices and personal judgments of its time. Readers should separate description from judgment and cross-check with other historical sources rather than accepting it wholesale.
Is it suitable as reference material for a history class? It can be used as supplementary material, especially when discussing how Westerners in the colonial period wrote about Indian society, since the book offers an analyzable textual sample. But it is not a systematic research monograph; teachers should guide students to note its perspectival limitations and use it alongside academic works.
Does one need to read it from beginning to end in order? No. This is a popular anecdotal account whose chapters are relatively independent; readers can start with topics of interest such as marriage customs, food, or festivals. For research purposes, it is better to excerpt by theme and compare with other historical sources than to read linearly.

This site is an index: you start “Search all sources” in your browser, and the entries it lists all point to third-party sites; please judge their availability yourself.

About the author

Acland, Charles, -1845 Author

Charles Acland (Acland, Charles, -1845) was an English author of the first half of the nineteenth century. Publicly available information about his life is very limited: his year of birth, nationality and professional background cannot be reliably established, and it is known only that he died in 1845. As far as surviving works go, he left one title, A Popular Account of the Manners and Customs of India, a descriptive work on customs written for a general readership. Books of this kind were common in Britain at the time; they were usually based on residence abroad and second-hand reports, clearly organized and plainly written, and aimed to introduce readers who had never been to India to local etiquette, festivals, food, clothing, housing and social customs. The book's value lies mainly in reflecting a popular nineteenth-century Western perspective on India, and it may serve as a reference for the study of travel and customs writing and cross-cultural observation. As for the author's own experience and the sources behind his writing, publicly available information is limited, and no further inference should be made.