Howard Spodek, former professor of history at Temple University and America’s leading expert on Gujarat, passed away August 20, 2023. He had suffered a stroke while in Ahmedabad in January. He returned to the United States in February where he had been at a care facility for some time. He was 81 years old. Spodek had a history of association with the city of Ahmedabad that dates back almost 60 years. He first came to the city as a Fulbright Fellow when he was a graduate student in 1964, and was asked to teach English at H.K. Arts College for a year. He soon requested an extension and stayed a second year. Upon returning to the University of Chicago, he completed his PhD thesis on Indian history. A revised version of the thesis, on rural-urban integration in Saurashtra, was published in 1976. The thesis examined the historical relationships and conflicts between merchants, literate professionals and political rulers in Saurashtra from the colonial era into the post-independence period. He also wrote perhaps his most famous article, ‘On the Origins of Gandhi’s Political Ideology‘ during this time. It examined the way the Mahatma’s techniques of protest in national movements had been influenced by traditions forms of political expression derived from Saurashtra, where he had grown up. Spodek became a professor at Temple University in Philadelphia in 1972 and had a lengthy career teaching there with specialties in Indian history and urban studies. Much of his scholarship focused on Gujarat, and included important pieces on Vallabhbhai Patel and Ahmedabad’s industrialisation. And he continued to return to India to do research and maintain his ties with friends and social leaders in Ahmedabad. He had strong contacts with such organisations as the Center for Environmental Planning and Technology, SEWA (the Self-Employed Women’s Organisation) and many more. More recently, he became connected to the newly established Ahmedabad University and was the Shrenik Lalbhai Professor there. During much of his career, Spodek was also involved (along with Devavrat Pathak and John Wood) in translating the six-volume autobiography of Indulal Yagnik, a major politician of Gujarat and leader of the Mahagujarat movement. The World’s History, Howard Spodek, Pearson, 2005.Spodek also was well known in the US for his work promoting the teaching of world history and for devising texts for use by American high school students in the classroom. His textbook, The World’s History (2006), has now gone through five editions. He was awarded a Lifetime Achievement Award for his contributions in this field from the World History Association in 2016. Spodek was a major advocate of Indian studies in the US. At Temple he provided guidance for many a post-graduate student working on India, including the author of this article and such scholars as Sumathi Ramaswamy, who is now president of the American Institute of Indian Studies. He furnished similar support for many young scholars in India. He was more than a valuable advisor, he was a great listener who engaged everyone with his thoughtful questions about their interests. Several officers of the American Institute of Indian Studies have written me in the past two days in praise of his service to the AIIS, a major organisation devoted to promoting the study of India in the US. During much of his career, Spodek was intensely involved in studying Indian urban history and particularly the city of Ahmedabad. He became especially interested in understanding the causes of violence in Ahmedabad’s post-independence history, writing two important articles on the subject in Modern Asian Studies. His article on the riots in Ahmedabad in 1985 differed from other articles on the subject, which had discussed the motivations of the participants in crowd violence, such as anti-reservation sentiment. Instead he looked at changes in the larger political context that had made it difficult to exert control over the violence once it started. He particularly focused on the decline in the authority of local political institutions like the Gandhian Congress, the Textile Labour Association and the traditional merchant-industrial community. He also wrote extensively on the 2002 communal violence in the city. During this time, he developed a short and powerful film with Warren Bass on the displacement of local hawkers and residents from the riverfront area. The film was based on interviews both with the planners of the riverfront park and people who had been displaced by it but who had not been compensated. Also read: BBC Documentary on Gujarat 2002 Reminds Us That We Are Not Interested in the TruthAhmedabad: Shock City of Twentieth-Century India, Howard Spodek, Indiana University Press, 2011.The crowning achievement of Spodek’s career perhaps was his 2011 book, Ahmedabad: Shock City of Twentieth-Century India. While much of the most serious writing on Ahmedabad by historians had focused on economic and social changes in the city, the strength of Spodek’s work was in elucidating important political developments, including political violence, and the role of key political leaders in the city’s 20th-century past. Because of Spodek’s strong familiarity with source materials on Ahmedabad and his extensive discussions with scholars and other residents, the book was able to chart transitions in the character of the city during the 20th century in a way that few studies of cities in India had done. In contrast with most books published by western scholars, Ahmedabad was written with a local audience in mind as well as an academic one, and clearly reflected a love of the city. It has been widely read and discussed in Ahmedabad since the time it was published. Spodek continued his interaction with the city after he completed this important study, and he was planning to carry out further valuable and interesting projects. Unfortunately he will not have a chance to complete this work now. But he has left for us an impressive and inspiring legacy of scholarship as well as a host of friendships and memories in Ahmedabad and the US. Douglas Haynes is professor of history at Dartmouth College. He specialises in the history of South Asia, and teaches courses on modern South Asia, Gandhi, and India’s Dalit communities.
