Podcast Summary: New Books Network - Interview with William J. Glover
Episode: "Reformatting Agrarian Life: Urban History from the Countryside in Colonial India"
Date: November 5, 2025
Host: Origno | Guest: William J. Glover

Overview of the Episode

This episode of the New Books Network features historian William J. Glover, discussing his latest book, Reformatting Agrarian Life: Urban History from the Countryside in Colonial India (Stanford UP, 2025). The conversation, hosted by Origno, explores Glover's intellectual journey from his previous work on urban Lahore to this new study, which investigates how urban concepts and spatial practices migrated into and reshaped the countryside of colonial Punjab. The discussion delves into the co-constitution of rural and urban spaces, theoretical inspirations, the power of spatial order, and the broader implications for understanding South Asian history.

Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Intellectual Evolution and Motivations

• From Lahore to Punjab's Countryside:
  • Glover explains his journey from Making Lahore Modern to his current book, noting a continuing interest in how physical environments influence society and well-being.
  • A personal anecdote about his modern, gadget-loving grandfather (06:45) inspired Glover to interrogate assumptions about rural “backwardness” and modernity.
  • "There was this kind of rural modernity going on at the same time that urban modernity ... was happening." (08:04, Glover)
• Prompting Question:
  • The push to consider the hinterland and context of cities came from sociologist Amita Bhaviskar (07:36), whose challenge led Glover to explore urbanism outside city borders.

2. Methodology: Navigating Sources and “Surfaces of Emergence”

• Archival Breadth Through Foucault:
  • Glover adopts a methodology influenced by Michel Foucault's idea of seeking “surfaces of emergence,” casting a wide net for sources where urban and rural interconnectivity appears (11:15).
  • He champions rereading familiar sources, finding new meanings over time, and allowing unconventional materials into his analysis (13:39).
  • "If you're interested in a topic, don't just look for things that are denominated by that topic ... That topic will appear, you know, even in absence." (11:00, Glover)

3. The Uniqueness & Stereotypes of Rural Punjab

• Punjab as Case Study:
  • Punjab is stereotypically known as India's breadbasket, but Glover wanted to reveal the region’s radical urban influences (15:19).
  • Even a province-sized area like Punjab, with a population comparable to France, is “big and important enough” to warrant focused study (17:00).

4. Intellectual Influences: Raymond Williams & Timothy Mitchell

• Williams:
  • Provided the central analytic: probing the city-countryside relationship, recognizing that most spaces blend both (19:30).
  • "He says right up front, most spaces are a combination of the two ... and yet we act as though they're very, very different." (20:22, Glover)
• Mitchell:
  • Informing the very title, Glover draws on Mitchell’s notion of the state as a “claim” that attempts—and fails—to present cohesiveness, and his concept of “reformatting” space itself (21:38).

5. Theoretical Framework: Spatial Order and the Power of the Grid

• Drawing on Schmitt & the Geometry of Control:
  • Influenced by theorists like Carl Schmitt, Glover describes colonial projects as the imposition of a “spatial order”—specifically the grid—on agrarian Punjab (23:18).
  • The grid is favored for its legibility, ability to make discrepancies visible, and for standardizing control (24:10).
  • "It's a regime of squares ... you can compare between things very easily." (25:40, Glover)
• Example: Punjab Canal Colonies:
  • In late 19th-century Western Punjab, canal irrigation enabled the founding of 50 new, gridded towns—a massive undertaking that blurred city/village distinctions (26:21).

6. The Project of “Co-Constitution”

• Moving Beyond the Binary:
  • Glover challenges enduring discourses (e.g., Gandhi’s “real India lives in her villages”) by tracing how urban logic infused rural spaces, especially by the early-to-mid 20th century (29:18).
  • By the 1950s, “you can't really be taken seriously ... without saying that there's a connection between the city and the village.” (30:44, Glover)
  • Co-constitution means these spaces actually produce each other; they’re not just interdependent, but mutually defining (31:02).

7. Contemporary Resonance: Census Towns and Rural Urbanization

• Modern India’s Ambiguities:
  • The postcolonial Indian state continues to struggle with categorizing proliferating “census towns” along highways and in peri-urban areas, revealing the blurred, dynamic boundaries Glover historicizes (34:00).
  • "There's all of these urban spaces in the countryside now ... My gambit was to say, oh, but this has been going on much longer than that." (35:39, Glover)

8. Colonial Knowledge, Famine, and Resource Management

• The Role of the 1880 Famine Commission Report:
  • This watershed document recast the British colonial state’s responsibilities—envisioning famine as inevitable but manageable through prediction (data/statistics) and response (market mechanisms) (38:18).
  • The shift entailed new understandings of agriculture as mobile, governed by the movement of grain through markets, depots, and railways (40:47).
  • Agrarian management thus became an urban interface, further concretizing city-village entanglement.

9. Knowledge, Pedagogy, and Colonial Publicity

• Changing Habits, Not Forcing Compliance:
  • In the 1920s–30s, state and philanthropic actors sought to instill “felt needs” in villagers via propaganda, moral reform campaigns, and educational scripts (45:05).
  • The focus was less on direct control and more on modernizing the agrarian “body,” even without achieving total transformation (47:13).
  • "I'm not talking only about actually realized plans. I'm also talking about ... ideologies ..." (47:42, Glover)

10. The Distribution of the Sensible: Aesthetics vs. Politics

• Rancière and Village Reform:
  • Glover adopts Jacques Rancière's theory of the "distribution of the sensible"—the social organization of what is visible and sayable.
  • Reformers (including Gandhi) and colonial officials often envisioned the same spatial “aesthetics” (clean, straight, modern), but their politics diverged in response to disruption, not aesthetics themselves (49:08).
  • "The politics are not defined by the aesthetics. The politics are defined by how both reacted to this rupture." (50:00, Glover)

11. The Book's Cover and Its Symbolism

• Hamza bin Faisal’s “Daro di Var”:
  • Glover selected a contemporary Lahore artist’s painting for the cover to evoke the subtle modernities and visual grids animating both rural and urban life (52:16).
  • "That series is called Daro di Var ... it's about looking closely and seeing connections between things." (53:10, Glover)

12. Future Projects

• “Landscape Effects:”
  • Glover sketches a nascent book project exploring landscapes at various scales—deforestation, dams, city heat, and tourism—and drawing inspiration from Dilip Da Cunha’s The Invention of Rivers. (55:03)
  • "You've just heard the initial description of the project. No one has ever heard it anywhere else." (56:46, Glover)

Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• “I realized from a fairly early age that farming wasn’t this kind of rustic occupation. I mean, he [my grandfather] was so modern. ... He had the first Polaroid camera that printed an instant picture.” (09:01, Will Glover)
• “If you’re interested in a topic, don’t just look for things that are denominated by that topic ... That topic will appear, you know, even in absence.” (11:00, Will Glover)
• “Most spaces are a combination of the two [city and countryside], you know, and yet we act as though they’re very, very different.” (20:22, Will Glover)
• “Co-constituting means that they produce each other, that the one is the effect of the other and it doesn’t exist without it.” (31:06, Will Glover)
• “So my gambit was to say, oh, but this has been going on much longer than that. ... I’m giving a sort of prehistory of the census town at some level.” (35:45, Will Glover)
• “Agriculture is something that’s based on processes that are not bound any longer to particular local spots, but that are mobilizable, that you can move things around.” (41:50, Will Glover)
• “The politics are defined by how both reacted to this rupture from the older one to the newer one. That was my point about rupture, distribution of sensible space.” (50:20, Will Glover)
• “That series is called Daro di Var, ... it’s about looking closely and seeing connections between things.” (53:15, Will Glover)
• “I finished this book last year and became chair of the History Department, which colonizes my entire free time.” (55:05, Will Glover)

Important Timestamps

• 02:09 – Host Origno introduces the episode and William J. Glover.
• 04:51 – Glover discusses the intellectual connection and divergence between his two books.
• 10:56 – Glover outlines his research methods and use of “surfaces of emergence.”
• 15:19 – Discussion of rural Punjab's significance and its stereotypes.
• 18:53 – Influence of Williams and Mitchell on Glover's approach.
• 22:39 – Spatial order, grids, and their historical authority in colonial Punjab.
• 29:18 – The migration and merging of rural and urban forms (“co-constitution”).
• 34:00 – Contemporary echoes: census towns and new urban-rural dynamics.
• 38:18 – Famine Commission report as a pivot in the urbanization of rural life.
• 45:05 – The role of knowledge, pedagogy, propaganda, and the notion of “felt needs.”
• 48:50 – Interpreting Gandhi and the politics of rural reform through Rancière.
• 52:16 – The story and symbolism of the book’s cover image.
• 55:03 – Glover’s tentative new project “Landscape Effects.”

Conclusion

This in-depth interview brings together conceptual, historiographical, and personal elements to illuminate William J. Glover’s Reformatting Agrarian Life. The conversation unravels how colonial and postcolonial projects of “urbanism” penetrated India’s countryside, rearranging socio-spatial relations and complicating the city-village binary. Glover’s historical and theoretical agility, as well as his reflections on sources, method, and design, make this episode essential for those seeking to understand South Asian urban and rural histories—and how such histories remain deeply entangled.