Shared infrastructures, informational asymmetries: Persians and Indians in Japan, c.1890–1930* | Journal of Global History | Cambridge Core (original) (raw)

Abstract

Drawing on primary materials in Persian, Urdu, and English, this article compares Persian and Indian travel accounts to assess the similarities and differences of contemporaneous encounters with Japan. By linking Persian and Urdu writings from either side of 1900 to the differential impact of industrial communications (vernacular printing, steam travel) on Persia and India, the article reconstructs the global connections and inter-Asian networks that suddenly rendered Japan an important touchstone for intellectuals in the Middle East no less than South Asia. By presenting a triangulated and comparative model of inter-Asian exchange, the article contributes to building robust material foundations for positioning Asia, and its Muslims in particular, within global intellectual history, and concludes by contrasting the sources of information generation that preceded ideological formation.

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References

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