Talk:Famines, epidemics, and public health in the British Raj

Title
I have serious doubts about the article name. It sounds like the title of a chapter from a history book. The article could be split into - Public health in the British Raj Famines in the the British Raj Epidemics in the British Raj KnowledgeHegemonyPart2 (talk) 06:01, 12 May 2008 (UTC)
 * Good point! However, I think, for now (i.e. while the page is still under construction), it is better to not create three new pages. The reason is that the three issues are interconnected: famines caused epidemics and they created the need for extensive public health measures.  When the page has more bulk, we could then revisit the issue, and decide if we need three new articles or a single article under a more compact name.  How does that sound?  Fowler&amp;fowler  «Talk»  11:33, 12 May 2008 (UTC)
 * Yeah, no hurry! Go ahead expand it first. KnowledgeHegemonyPart2 (talk) 16:00, 12 May 2008 (UTC)

An Exception to the "no overall food shortage"
This article cites an essay which states that at no time was there ever an overall food shortage in India. However, according to The Famine of 1896-1897 in Bengal By Malabika Chakrabarti there was in fact a serious food shortage (although not in the earlier famines). —Preceding unsigned comment added by 87.115.73.75 (talk) 21:16, 27 August 2008 (UTC)

Removing graphic
I have removed the timeline graphic from the 'Famine in India' article and just came across the same being used here. I hope nobody minds if I cut and paste my rationale for removal from the talk page of the other article:

The graphic at the top right of this page seems to both have little informational value and to attempt to convey a POV. The POV communicated is that a) the 'colonial era' was a distinct period in India's history of famines, with b) the implication that colonial (i.e. British) rule was responsible for the, according to the graphic, comparatively high number of famines and the high severity of the famines in this period. This claim does have considerable support in some scholarly circles but it is by no means uncontested despite being conveyed by the graphic in an absolutist manner (graphics simply don't have the ability to frame arguments and counter-arguments, of course).

There are a few other significant problems with the graphic that are distinct from its POV nature but, I suspect, related to it. Firstly, it is deeply questionable whether this tripartite time-frame is appropriate for providing formal 'eras' for the history of famine in India. Much of India was not under colonial rule during some points of the 'colonial era' and at least two of the early famines in this period occurred primarily in areas that were not ruled by the British (a similar problem arises when clicking the 'colonial era' link which leads to a page titled 'Timeline of Major Famines in India during British Rule' but which includes a number of famines that took place outside the areas ruled by Britain). Using titles such as the 'colonial era' or 'British Rule' for periods may be fine in general but is dangerous when used in a context that also argues for the effect of actual colonial or British rule, given the the temporal periods so designated do not, in fact, coincide perfectly with the political realities. If there must be a chronology based on a before, during, and after of British Rule then if the 'during' period is to have any force it can only, surely, correspond with a period when Britain's political control extended across the whole of India (or at least all parts of India affected by famines within the time-frame) or the name for the era will be both arbitrary and also carry the danger of being very misleading (see, e.g. '... Under British Rule' on the linked page for a particularly strong version). Whilst I understand the desire to argue that British rule had a significant negative effect on the outcomes of famines, I think that this point is best confined to the text, where both side can be argued, rather than in a graphical form where a single-stranded time-line is unable to do justice to the complexities of the political divisions in India at the time.

Secondly, I have to question the value of the tripartite comparison as it currently stands. The post 1947 world is technologically very different from the period 1765-1947, so it is hard to see what value a straightforward comparison between these two periods might have. In particular, any inferences drawn on the basis of a simplistic time-line such as this will be victims of the common logical fallacy 'after that therefore because of that' (post hoc ergo propter hoc). It may well be the case that people do place weight on such a comparison but, again, that is something that I think must be expressed in text as the simplicity of the comparison cannot be nuanced in the form of a time-line. Equally, the value of comparing a list from during the colonial erea to a list from before that era seems minimal given the different quantity and quality of historical documents from the periods being compared. Again, I can't really see any reason for incorporating this comparative division into the time-line other than to convey a particular POV. The same actual information can be provided in a simple linear form without the contentious period divisions.

Thirdly, as things stand the sense that the comparisons are there for POV reasons is strengthened by the huge inbalance in research done on each period. This may well relate to the state of wikipedia's current knowledge-base for the different period with more work having been done on the colonial era but this doesn't really matter. As it stands, the pre-colonial period is pretty much absent any footnotes or figures for deaths and nor is there are reason to believe it is exhaustive, especially given the 1500 year gap between the first two listed famines. A comparative timeline is not only pointless but completely misrepresentative if only one of the elements being compared is adequately researched. Once again, I think this provides good reasons for changing from a tripartite time-line to a simple, undivided timeline.

Regards,

Paul — Preceding unsigned comment added by 78.52.53.54 (talk) 14:31, 15 October 2011 (UTC)


 * Is this not the exact thing that is also done with Mass killings under Communist regimes? First sentence is "Mass killings occurred under some Communist regimes during the twentieth century with an estimated death toll numbering between 85 and 100 million." That includes all deaths in communist states whatsoever (highest estimates), and ignores all population increases. Bataaf van Oranje (talk) 11:37, 17 April 2015 (UTC)