POSTMODERNISM, CIVIC ENGAGEMENT, AND ETHNIC-CONFLICT - A PASSAGE, TO INDIA

Postmodern work on identities and ethnic conflict claims the primacy o f historically grounded master ''narratives'' or ''representations'' o ver ''facts.'' Postmodern studies of Hindu-Muslim conflict in India ba se their arguments on an aggregation of conforming cases, not on varia nce. A comparison of communally peaceful and violent towns accounts fo r the triumph of ''representations.'' The validity of postmodern argum ents about ethnic conflicts thus depends on the absence of interethnic networks of civic engagement.