Reviews

"Appropriately Indian is a detailed and extensive contextualization of the politics, or lack thereof, of middle-class workers in India's IT economy. Radhakrishnan's attention to gender is consistent and well-argued, and her critique of IT workers' inattention to gender and class differences is measured and compelling."

--excerpt from Mathangi Krishnamurthy, Anthropology of Work Review, November 2011

“Appropriately Indian is a wonderful book, which provides crucial background about India’s rising image in the world and at home. Smitha Radhakrishnan covers notions of caste, class, and prestige, as well as the transnational character of the privileged knowledge workers she discusses. At the same time, does not portray these professionals only in terms of privilege. Her intimate descriptions of people’s lives are full of dilemmas and heartaches. The passages on traditional marriage expectations and modern individualistic drives are particularly illuminating.”

—A. Aneesh, author of Virtual Migration: The Programming of Globalization

“With her soberly critical ethnographic eye, Smitha Radhakrishnan proves a delightfully judicious guide to what happens when class and culture get transnationally stretched. Refusing both the hype that surrounds the world of India’s global IT class and a simple ideology critique, she gives us a vivid portrait of everyday lives lived at a leading edge of globalization.”

—William T. S. Mazzarella, University of Chicago