A question hovered over my
head as I worked on Fear of the False: Forensic Science and the Law of
Crime in Colonial South Asia: how should I use detective fiction as a
source? There was a rich and vibrant world of detective stories in colonial
India—in Bengali, Urdu, Hindi, and English, for instance. But unlike
my other primary sources, these were fiction... In this 4th and final
guest post for August, I’d like to share some of the ways I got past my initial
(disciplinary?) resistance to using fiction as a source. I’m picking up the
baton here from Rohit De in his 2020 guest blogposts. More after the jump.
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