Trust Matters Parsi Endowments in Mumbai and the Horoscope of a City
Produktdetaljer
Biografisk notat
Leilah Vevaina is Assistant Professor of Anthropology at the Chinese University of Hong Kong.Trust Matters Parsi Endowments in Mumbai and the Horoscope of a City
“This fascinating ethnography’s twinned focus on the charitable trust as a property form and on the Parsi community of Mumbai brings to light the tensions for both in maintaining a perpetual life. If trusts fix property and obligation, Leilah Vevaina shows how their perpetuity strains against community divisions, urban development, and global networks of philanthropic capital. This is a strikingly original and at times surprising book, with implications that stretch beyond Mumbai and toward rethinkings of unlikely modes of capital and forms of wealth that seem ‘forever.’” - Bill Maurer, Professor of Anthropology and Law, University of California, Irvine “Leilah Vevaina presents a fascinating array of processes, lives, and practices of the Parsi community in Mumbai across legal, spiritual, and material spaces to illuminate the dynamic workings of the public charitable trusts it operates throughout the city. This book makes important contributions to theoretical discussions in anthropology, law, and South Asian studies.” - Ritu Birla, author of (Stages of Capital: Law, Culture, and Market Governance in Late Colonial India)
Introduction: Inheritances 1
1. In Perpetuity: The Trust and Timely Obligations 27
2. Presents and Futures: The Trust and Obligation’s Asymmetries 52
3. No House, No Spouse: The Bombay Parsi Punchayet 75
4. The Beneficiary, the Law, and Sacred Space 105
5. From Excarnation to Ashes: Trust to Trust 128
6. Awakening the “Dead Hand”: Liquid and Solid Properties 146
Conclusion: An Unsettled (E)state 167
Notes 175
References 185
Index 201
“This fascinating ethnography’s twinned focus on the charitable trust as a property form and on the Parsi community of Mumbai brings to light the tensions for both in maintaining a perpetual life. If trusts fix property and obligation, Leilah Vevaina shows how their perpetuity strains against community divisions, urban development, and global networks of philanthropic capital. This is a strikingly original and at times surprising book, with implications that stretch beyond Mumbai and toward rethinkings of unlikely modes of capital and forms of wealth that seem ‘forever.’” - Bill Maurer, Professor of Anthropology and Law, University of California, Irvine “Leilah Vevaina presents a fascinating array of processes, lives, and practices of the Parsi community in Mumbai across legal, spiritual, and material spaces to illuminate the dynamic workings of the public charitable trusts it operates throughout the city. This book makes important contributions to theoretical discussions in anthropology, law, and South Asian studies.” - Ritu Birla, author of (Stages of Capital: Law, Culture, and Market Governance in Late Colonial India)
Introduction: Inheritances 1
1. In Perpetuity: The Trust and Timely Obligations 27
2. Presents and Futures: The Trust and Obligation’s Asymmetries 52
3. No House, No Spouse: The Bombay Parsi Punchayet 75
4. The Beneficiary, the Law, and Sacred Space 105
5. From Excarnation to Ashes: Trust to Trust 128
6. Awakening the “Dead Hand”: Liquid and Solid Properties 146
Conclusion: An Unsettled (E)state 167
Notes 175
References 185
Index 201