A World Not Neatly Divided Summary

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A World Not Neatly Divided
“A World Not Neatly Divided” an essay which appeared in 2001 in the New York Times. Amartya Sen suggest that generalizations about “civilizations” tend to blur the realities of complex culture. People often generalize whenever they first meet someone or have prejudices against a certain person or group. In this case, Sen writes about how the world turns a blind eye to the reality of the societies that we live in. The argument being made is that people over generalize areas of the world. In the essay, Sen uses an example from his home country of India. He states “ For example, describing India as a ''Hindu civilization'' misses the fact that India has more Muslims than any other country except Indonesia and possibly …show more content…

Sen also states that religion isn’t the only thing that we can be identified by. I thought that was a great example of how diverse one place is, but has a reputation for not being diverse at all. I think this is the way a lot of places around the world are thought of , and in reality they are way more different than people can imagine. Sen writes “Consider Akbar and Aurangzeb, two Muslim emperors of the Mogul dynasty in India. Aurangzeb tried hard to convert Hindus into Muslims and instituted various policies in that direction, of which taxing the non-Muslims was only one example. In contrast, Akbar reveled in his multiethnic court and pluralist laws, and issued official proclamations insisting that no one ''should be interfered with on account of religion'' and that ''anyone is to be allowed to go over to a religion that pleases him.’’ This piece from Sen’s essay shows that even the rulers of the Muslim and Hindu areas realize that people cannot be judge by the religion they are and should be allowed to go upon their own business as they please to. People within certain societies are not seen as who they are but are perceived as something worse. Religious views don’t contribute negatively to any

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