Bangladesh scholars dealing with the colonial period have largely looked at imperialism as an economic system and have relied on the notion of exploitation to examine processes of inequality; these particular conceptualizations have contributed to the absence of a critical examination of social and cultural processes in eastern Bengal during the colonial period.
This topic examines how issues of globalization and imperialism have been dealt with in studies of Bangladesh society and culture. To a large extent, these issues are marginal in the writings of academicians working on Bangladesh society and culture, as opposed to the themes of, for instance, development, gender, nationalism, religion etc. which are viewed as separable from, imperial practices.
Work which looks at how globalization impacts on Bangladesh is scarce; the few studies that do exist have largely been conducted without taking into account asymmetric power relations between nations, and/or in history-less voids. Bangladesh scholars dealing with the colonial period have largely looked at imperialism as an economic system and have relied on the notion of exploitation to examine processes of inequality; these particular conceptualizations have contributed to the absence of a critical examination of social and cultural processes in eastern Bengal during the colonial period.
Both liberal and left-leaning scholars have relied on tradition-modernity frameworks to explain and analyze social and cultural changes. Such a situation largely continues in present-day Bangladesh studies, which I contend, prevents a close examination of imperial power and its historically deep-rooted transformative endeavourer.