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Alice Thorner (1917-2005)

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  28 February 2024

Marc Gaborieau*
Affiliation:
CNRS/EHESS, Paris

Abstract

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This is the obituary of Alice Thorner, an American scholar-specialist of the social history of India, who spent most of her career in France. She first worked with her husband, Daniel Thorner (1915-74), who briefly taught in Pennsylvania before being expelled from the USA by McCarthy. They lived in India from 1952 to 1960, where they worked on Land and Labor. They settled in Paris in 1960 when Daniel was appointed to the EPHE 6th section (now EHESS) where he taught the economic (especially agrarian) history of India up to his death, and became a member of the Centre of Indian Studies created by Louis Dumont. Alice, who travelled to India every year, continued her own research on gender studies, on working-class women, and on the town of Bombay. This paper, written by a younger colleague and friend, uses personal anecdotes to sketch Alice's career; it also lists her principal publications.

Type
Research Article
Copyright
Copyright © ICPHS 2006

References

Bagshi, J., Patel, S. and Raj, K. (eds) (2002) Thinking Social Science in India: Essays in Honour of Alice Thorner. New Delhi: SAGE Publications.Google Scholar
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Thorner, D. and Thorner, A. (1962) Land and Labour in India. Bombay: Asia Publishing House.Google Scholar
Thorner, A. (1977) ‘Kerala: A Strange Case of Poverty’, Purushârtha, 3: 141153.Google Scholar
Thorner, A. (1978) ‘Portrait statistique de l’immigré à Calcutta et à Bombay’, in Philippe Sagant (ed.), Les Migrations en Asie du Sud, special issue of L’Ethnographie, 77-8.Google Scholar
Thorner, A. (1982) ‘Semi-feudalism or capitalism: the contemporary debate on classes and modes of production in India’, in Pouchepadass, Jacques (ed.), Caste et classe en Asie du Sud, pp. 1972. Paris: EHESS (Collection Purushârtha 6).CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Thorner, A. (1991a) ‘A historian among the economists’, Bombay, Sunday Observer, 17-23 March.Google Scholar
Thorner, A. (1991b) ‘Le travail dans la vie des femmes des quartiers populaires de Bombay’, in Heuzé, Gérard (ed.), Travailler en Inde, pp. 139–54. Paris: EHESS (Collection Purushârtha 14).Google Scholar
Thorner, A. and Krishnaraj, M. (eds) (2000) Ideals, Images and Real Lives: Women in Literature and History. Bombay: Orient Longman (for Sameeksha Trust).Google Scholar
Thorner, A. and Ranadive, J. (1992) ‘Working class women in an Indian metropolis: a household approach’, in Sarodamani, K. (ed.), Finding the Household: Conceptual and Methodological Issues. New Delhi: SAGE Publications.Google Scholar
Thorner, A. and Desai, N. (1993) ‘Working class women in Bombay: family patterns, religious beliefs and practices’, in Kosambi, Meera and Poonacha, Veena (eds), Eclectic Streams in Women Studies 8. Bombay: Bombay Research Centre for Women’s Studies, SNTD Women’s University.Google Scholar