Into the melting pot: Global pragmatism and nation-building in India and Mexico

Description

The research project is entitled ‘Into the melting pot: Global pragmatism and nation-building in India and Mexico’. Funded by The Leverhulme Trust, this work examines the American philosophy of pragmatism as a global idea in India and Mexico (1915-1950). In these countries, pragmatism was used by several intellectuals against racial and hierarchical supremacy ideologies. Inspired by the work of John Dewey but transforming it to their particular needs, Mexican and Indian thinkers believed that Indian Dalits (untouchables) and Mexican indigenous communities could be included into the nation-building project through culture, politics and education. This study points to new South-to-South intellectual connections. It shows that global ideas cannot be traced to an original source as they are reappropriated in specific regional contexts.