I know it sounds corny, but books really are some amazing things. I’ve realized this even as a child, but it still remains true even though I’m now in college. Books are nice because they allow the reader to formulate their own images of what they are reading. They can transport the reader to a place where the reader would not otherwise ever be able to visit. This could be the reason why I have been a fan of studying history and geography throughout my years of schooling. I can formulate the events in my mind, which in turn makes them much easier to understand. This has also been the case so far in college.
I never really studied India in extreme detail in middle school or high school, but I feel like I’ve almost visited the country based on the images I have created in my mind. Don’t get me wrong, I know that no amount of reading is a substitute for visiting a place, but in some ways, I think that reading can almost be more beneficial in learning about a place. In particular, books can be quite effective in relaying images of the culture of a place. This is because the reader can see the day-to-day lives of people in a certain place such as Raju in The Guide, for example. Textbooks can only tell so much about a place such as the population, total physical area, major landmarks, and so on. You will never truly understand that place until you understand their culture, and one of the best ways to understand a culture is to examine that culture’s arts; in this case their books. In my opinion, studying India through reading books that show its culture has been much more beneficial than any textbook has been.
I think the books we have read from so far in my first year seminar class have been quite effective in helping me understand Indian culture. I think this is mostly because we started by reading books written by people from places whose cultures could be characterized as western cultures. This made it much easier to understand because it was easy to relate to the authors, which therefore made it easy to understand their reactions to Indian life and culture. Once we read a few books from the perspective of a western culture, we moved on to read a book (The Guide), which shows Indian culture through the eyes of somebody who is actually from India. I don’t think you can get a true vision of a place without both of these views (the view of somebody from your own culture and the view of somebody from that place).
Books talking about another culture are so effective because they not only make the reader think about that culture, but they also usually make the reader compare that culture to their own. To me, India seems like it has two different facets to it (even though there are many more in reality): the India with the hustle and bustle of the insanely packed streets and the India in the mountains that are littered with calm temples that seek to provide peace and enlightenment. I think that both of these perceptions are due to the rural setting that I grew up in. Indian cities seem like the busiest places in the world because they just seem to be the polar opposite of the small town that I’m from. The Indian mountains seem so calm because they are like my hometown, only even more secluded and less “civilized” or industrialized. I know that this is not how India really is, but it serves as a basic understanding of the country and culture.
The more I think about India and its culture, the more I realize that I barely know anything about the place. I’ve just kind of accepted the fact that there is too much to know about India, so I’ll never know everything, but the books that I've read have helped to provide even a basic understanding of the complex country. While browsing the Internet, I came upon a website that quickly glosses over some of the diversity in India. It even says that there are over 400 languages spoken in India! That’s something I could never keep track of, but I’m doing my best to understand the country through the books I have read.
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