This book brings a new methodological approach to understand modernity by considering it as a shared and transcultural phenomenon. By expanding the terms of reference of modernity, it seeks to dismantle binaries like tradition/modernity, religious/secular, state/civil society, authoritarian/liberal and democratic, cosmopolitan-metropolitan/provincial and rural/urban etc. It brings diverse themes like India's alternative modernities; competitive histories; Confucian democracy in cultural China; Chinese maritime economy; public sphere of the Bhakti movement; alternative(s) to modernity in India, to argue for a polycentric notion of modernity with many centres across Eurasia.

Comprehensive and topical this book will be useful for scholars and researchers of literature, philosophy, cultural studies, history, political studies and political sociology.