Indian reformers never rejected English, wanting it only as epistemic access

Evidence

It is of course true, in some partial way, that English was an imposition, but the more remarkable fact is that in the entire history of Indian reformism, from Rammohun to Vivekanand to Sir Syed to Tilak and Gandhi, there is always an attachment to and a competence in one or two Indian languages, but never any rejection of English as such; virtually all of them wanted it, nor as a literary language but as a window on the most advanced knowledges of the world, mainly in the physical and social sciences, in historiography, in the technical fields. — Aijaz Ahmad, In Theory, 1177

Categorization

• XREF: Connects to the reader’s materialist-vs-discourse critique: Ahmad here dismantles the discourse-determinist claim that English literature was centrally imposed, fitting the pattern that postcolonial theory misreads colony as discourse/text when it was administration and material knowledges. — connects to: Indian reformers embraced English as a scientific window, not a literary imposition — Aijaz Ahmad, In Theory: Nations, Classes, Literatures, 519; Even Gandhi’s anti-modern nationalism never rejected English as such — Aijaz Ahmad, In Theory: Nations, Classes, Literatures, 519
• SEED: Essay angle: ‘the cognitive not the literary’ — colonial modernization was sought by the colonized through material/technical knowledges, which pressures the common postcolonial narrative that elites internalized aesthetic-cultural inferiority.

Broader Connections

• Indian reformers embraced English as a scientific window, not a literary imposition #corroborates (0.92) — Aijaz Ahmad, In Theory, 519
• Even Gandhi’s anti-modern nationalism never rejected English as such #corroborates (0.80) — Aijaz Ahmad, In Theory, 519