Indology and Indologist: Conceiving India during Eighteenth and Nineteenth Centuries

Abstract

This research paper is about the brief introduction of the major names in the field of Indology in the specified centuries of eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. Further focus is on the inclusion of only British indologist to make it more precise in its subject matter. It would be argued that Indology as a discourse emerged with the change in policies by the authorities of East India Company and British Government. Earlier one genre of indologist comprised those missionary personalities, which were in India with missionary purpose and for that purpose; they had studied the languages and culture of India to familiarize with the proselytizing needs. In the swift next period another genre came into front with the newly acquired understanding of India as a land of those Hindus who had been noble savages and needs to be freed from the clutches of in-between invasion which had corrupted their soul. Then, the main exponents of indologist came into who propagated the immaculate justification of colonialism with scientific and comprehensible study of Indian subcontinent. All those different types of indologist were confined to the late eighth and nineteenth centuries. Thus, this research paper would try to present the life and works of only those indologist who fell in those described categories.