{"title":"殖民地的机器:早期机械化时代的技术、政治和Devanagari的排版","authors":"V. Singh","doi":"10.1163/24519197-12340051","DOIUrl":null,"url":null,"abstract":"\nThe decades of the 1930s and 40s, in which India’s struggle against British rule gained momentum, also ushered in critical technological change in the way texts in many Indian languages were materially produced and represented in print. The foremost facilitators of this change were third parties precariously placed in the colonial equation. Focusing on the dilemmas and contradictions of one such concern, the New York-based Mergenthaler Linotype Company and its program for the Devanagari script, this essay examines the mechanics of the power struggle embodied in the process of technological and typographical change. Against the backdrop of India’s independence movement, in deeply contested territories of language and script, the examination of typographical networks that formulated and realized this project throws new light on the richly ambivalent ideological negotiations involved—between popular and academic aspirations, altruistic and commercial enterprises, communal agendas and nationalist politics, and between imperial administration and colonial subjects.","PeriodicalId":36525,"journal":{"name":"Philological Encounters","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.3000,"publicationDate":"2018-11-27","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://sci-hub-pdf.com/10.1163/24519197-12340051","citationCount":"3","resultStr":"{\"title\":\"The Machine in the Colony: Technology, Politics, and the Typography of Devanagari in the Early Years of Mechanization\",\"authors\":\"V. Singh\",\"doi\":\"10.1163/24519197-12340051\",\"DOIUrl\":null,\"url\":null,\"abstract\":\"\\nThe decades of the 1930s and 40s, in which India’s struggle against British rule gained momentum, also ushered in critical technological change in the way texts in many Indian languages were materially produced and represented in print. The foremost facilitators of this change were third parties precariously placed in the colonial equation. Focusing on the dilemmas and contradictions of one such concern, the New York-based Mergenthaler Linotype Company and its program for the Devanagari script, this essay examines the mechanics of the power struggle embodied in the process of technological and typographical change. Against the backdrop of India’s independence movement, in deeply contested territories of language and script, the examination of typographical networks that formulated and realized this project throws new light on the richly ambivalent ideological negotiations involved—between popular and academic aspirations, altruistic and commercial enterprises, communal agendas and nationalist politics, and between imperial administration and colonial subjects.\",\"PeriodicalId\":36525,\"journal\":{\"name\":\"Philological Encounters\",\"volume\":\" \",\"pages\":\"\"},\"PeriodicalIF\":0.3000,\"publicationDate\":\"2018-11-27\",\"publicationTypes\":\"Journal Article\",\"fieldsOfStudy\":null,\"isOpenAccess\":false,\"openAccessPdf\":\"https://sci-hub-pdf.com/10.1163/24519197-12340051\",\"citationCount\":\"3\",\"resultStr\":null,\"platform\":\"Semanticscholar\",\"paperid\":null,\"PeriodicalName\":\"Philological Encounters\",\"FirstCategoryId\":\"1085\",\"ListUrlMain\":\"https://doi.org/10.1163/24519197-12340051\",\"RegionNum\":0,\"RegionCategory\":null,\"ArticlePicture\":[],\"TitleCN\":null,\"AbstractTextCN\":null,\"PMCID\":null,\"EPubDate\":\"\",\"PubModel\":\"\",\"JCR\":\"0\",\"JCRName\":\"LANGUAGE & LINGUISTICS\",\"Score\":null,\"Total\":0}","platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":null,"PeriodicalName":"Philological Encounters","FirstCategoryId":"1085","ListUrlMain":"https://doi.org/10.1163/24519197-12340051","RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":null,"ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":null,"EPubDate":"","PubModel":"","JCR":"0","JCRName":"LANGUAGE & LINGUISTICS","Score":null,"Total":0}
The Machine in the Colony: Technology, Politics, and the Typography of Devanagari in the Early Years of Mechanization
The decades of the 1930s and 40s, in which India’s struggle against British rule gained momentum, also ushered in critical technological change in the way texts in many Indian languages were materially produced and represented in print. The foremost facilitators of this change were third parties precariously placed in the colonial equation. Focusing on the dilemmas and contradictions of one such concern, the New York-based Mergenthaler Linotype Company and its program for the Devanagari script, this essay examines the mechanics of the power struggle embodied in the process of technological and typographical change. Against the backdrop of India’s independence movement, in deeply contested territories of language and script, the examination of typographical networks that formulated and realized this project throws new light on the richly ambivalent ideological negotiations involved—between popular and academic aspirations, altruistic and commercial enterprises, communal agendas and nationalist politics, and between imperial administration and colonial subjects.