Topic: Essay

Order Description
Choose one of the following topics and write an essay in response to it. You need to have a clearly defined thesis, which contains an argument or claim developed in response to the selected topic. Indra Sinha’s Animal’s People ( This is a book)and the essays in The Globalization Reader are your evidence.

Direct quotations must be distinguished from indirect quotations through the use of quotation marks. For the difference between the two, please see https://owl.english.purdue.edu/owl/resource/563/01/Cite approximately two quotes (direct or indirect) per paragraph. Keep the length of each quotation to approximately 1-2 lines each time. Integrate each quote into a paragraph by discussing or commenting on it. You must demonstrate that you have read Animal’s People by quoting from the beginning, middle, and end of the novel. You must use at least 2 essays (read since 3/08) from the syllabus, excluding the novel. You may use up to 2 outside sources and, if you do, use them sparingly. Please note that outside research is secondary to the novel and the essays from the reader. All quotes (direct and indirect) must be acknowledged using parenthetical citation and a works cited page. Your works cited page or bibliography must follow the MLA or APA styles. Number your pages and indicate word count at the end of the essay.

1. In “A House on Fire,” Shrivastava and Kothari, remark “Though ‘sustainable development’ has been the official [government] motto for a number of years, the ecological crisis [in India] has only intensified” (123). Using Indra Sinha’s Animal’s People, discuss the impact of globalization on the environment. Recall that Union Carbide arrives in India to facilitate the “green revolution” but their modernization of Indian agricultural practices is by no means green or natural, a point echoed by environmental activist Vandana Shiva. What methods does Sinha use to depict the environmental impact of the gas leak in Kaufpur? How does Shrivastava and Kothari’s notion of “ecological imperialism” relate to
Sinha’s novel

2. How does Indra Sinha’s Animal’s People function as a counter history (or alternative history) to the official history of the Bhopal disaster? To what extent can this form of “counter-hegemonic” narrative compare with farmers’ movements like tebhaga and navdanya (see Shiva)? If globalization is a form of ecological imperialism (Shrivastava and Kothari), how does Animal’s Peoplefunction as an anti-imperial narrative? If novels (and literature in general) are considered a history from below (as opposed to top down methods), how does Indra Sinha achieve this “subaltern” history through his narrator Animal? What is gained and what is lost in fictionalizing the worst industrial disaster that the world has seen?
3. While the Union Carbide disaster precedes the arrival of globalization in India, the Bhopal disaster (as depicted in the documentary) can be an object lesson in what can happen under a neo-liberal regime in which profit reigns supreme. In “A House on Fire,” Shrivastava and Kothari argue, “the lack of regulation is an inevitable consequence of an economy driven by demand” (128). How does deregulation and weakening environmental and social governance (i.e. conflicts of interest, lack of transparency, etc.,) contribute to the disaster in Animal’s People? What type of justice does Indra Sinha envision for the people of Kaufpur at the end of the novel? How can the lessons from Bhopal make globalization more ethically responsible? How should under-regulated nations (like India or China) balance their development goals and ecological security? What relevance (if any) do recent environmental controversies in Flint, Michigan and Porter
Ranch, California have to global environmental degradation?