Research

Professor Pinch is currently finishing a book-length study of the social and emotional world of Indian soldiers in the Bengal army (the “Company Fauj“) in mid-nineteenth-century north India, beginning with the mutiny and military revolt in Meerut in 1857.  He is also completing a joint translation of two long eighteenth-century Hindi (Brajbhāṣā) poems celebrating the warlord Anūpgirī Gosāīṃ, a.k.a. “Himmat Bahādur” (d. 1804).

Pinch is the author of numerous book chapters, essays, and reviews, as well as articles in History and Theory, Past & PresentModern Asian Studies, and Indian Economic and Social History Review.

Some recent and forthcoming articles include:

  • “Killing Ascetics: Yogis, Sufis, and the Raj,” in David Gilmartin, Prasannan Parthasarathi, and Mrinalini Sinha (eds.), Cambridge History of the Indian Subcontinent (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, forthcoming 2025), approx. 20 pp.
  • “History and Hindi Film,” in Kim Nelson, Mia Treacey, and Marnie Hughes-Warrington (eds.), A Companion to History and Film (New York: Routledge, 2023), 176-193.
  • “Who Killed Arjun Singh? Poetry and History in Bundelkhand,” in Manan Ahmed (ed.), “Circuits of Culture in Early Modern South Asia: Essays in Honor of Allison Busch,” special issue of Comparative Studies of South Asia, Africa and the Middle East, 42, 2 (August 2022), pp. 370-380
  • Rajo guṇa: Sovereignty and the Self in India,” in Dilip Menon (ed.), Concepts in the Global South (New York, London, New Delhi: Routledge, 2022), pp. 151-166
  • “Blown Away: The Prelude to Buxar, 1764,” in Kathinka Sinha Kerkhoff, Neeraj Kumar, and Sunita Lall (eds.), Coming of Age in Bihar: Readings in Social Sciences (New Delhi: Primus Books, 2020), pp. 237-253
  • “The Yogi’s Way of War,” in Robert Antony, Stuart Carroll, and Caroline Dodds Pennock (eds.), Philip Dwyer (gen. ed.), The Cambridge World History of Violence, vol. 3, 1500-1800 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2020), pp. 156-173

Pinch served as an associate editor of History and Theory from 2012 to 2021 and continues to serve as a consulting editor for the journal.

And he has authored two books, edited one festschrift, and co-edited one theme issue for History and Theory:

Pinch Peasants and Monks coverPinch Warrior Ascetics coverPinch Speaking of Peasants coverHistory-and-theory