This book collects ten essays from the five volumes of Subaltern Studies that have so far appeared. The aim of the studies is to 'promote a systematic and informed discussion of subaltern themes in the field of South Asian studies, and thus help to rectify the elitist bias characteristic of much research and academic work in this particular area. The contributors...focus attention on what Gramsci called the subaltern classes and their condition, and also re-examine well-known events and themes in the new, more rounded perspective. The contributors encompass history, politics, economics and sociology; attitudes, ideologies, and belief systems.' Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak's essay 'Subaltern Studies: Deconstructing Historiography' introduces the volume and Edward Said, Professor of English and Comparative Literature at Columbia has provided a foreword.