Why India could not invent the printing press

More appropriately, this article ponders on why cultures south of Himalayas couldn't invent the printing press or railway steam engine or aeroplane or computer chips.

Printing Press-- the grand invention that changed the equation of whose ideas would spread or not and how far. Also the invention that detached the vehicle of carrying ideas from its human source only to later be bridged by copyright law. Interestingly Gutenberg himself was party to lawsuits by his partners around financial compensation and his secret work on this invention.

Steam Engine or Birth of Railways-- the magnificent invention that changed sense of time and geography. Also the invention that loosened attachment to land as culture and history. When the machine moved itself and moved other things.

For long, debates have raged in Indian circles on the lack of innovativeness amongst Indians and the criticism that we, till the last century, mostly served as expert labour for the reproduction and spread of global inventions.

I thought maybe I could explore this in another way, ask a different question.

What made cultures south of Himalayas have a sense of this-is-enough?

No desire to disseminate ideas and beliefs to large numbers of people, no desire to ease the labourious process of hand-scribing records or epics, no desire to reach a place faster and more easily and such...

Of course I can’t speak to various historical moments as archaeological evidence and how they are read is tricky as the David Graeber and David Wengrow’s book The Dawn of Everything eminently points out.

Rather, I decided to bring my attention to continuing cultural artifacts and what they reveal.

To be honest, this shift in attention was driven by another question. I wondered, given cultures of the south asia have long histories of multiple literary offerings -- epics, poems, songs-- how was intellectual property rights practiced?

That exploration merged with this exploration of cultural enoughness and landed in the recent celebration of harvest in Southern India -- in Tamil Nadu, Andhra Pradesh, and Telangana.

[These are my initial hypotheses and hence the question I raised in the headline cannot be answered at this point.]

The four-day Sankranti/Pongal festival is a popular community celebration through elaborate rangoli play, stories and songs sung by wandering storytellers, through large family feasts, and sports competitions like bullock cart races and bull fights and dances.

The core of these celebrations is offering gratitude to various elements for their contribution in abundance of that community. The first day is Bhogi when the old unuseful belongings are returned to fire and earth and fresh energies welcomed. The second day is worship of sun through the offering of the first harvest. The food is cooked in special vessels tied by turmeric plants. In Tamil Nadu, there are two kinds of food made -- Pongal made with Jaggery and Pongal made with grains and lentils with local hot pepper. Third day celebrates the bovine family and shares food with different animals. Fourth day, in Tamil Nadu, is dedicated to ancestors and community. Crows, believed to be ancestors are invited to eat and women pray for community and family cohesiveness. Younger folks seek blessings of the elders.

South Indians familiar with this festival and indeed having variations of this festival may wonder on the relevance of the above para to the topic at hand.

Notice how abundance is credited meticulously and publicly to the various elements in their universe -- a cleansing of old material possessions through return to earth via fire, the Sun who is offered the first helping, the cows and buffaloes that till and manure the land, the ancestors for their many teachings, the elders for their presence, gifts to employees and helpers, and prayers for community unity as the sticky force that sustains and cycles abundance.

These ritualistic credits or gratitude offering are enacted through performances of humility and subservience.

Or in other words, at the peak of success, at the harvest of one’s labour, the call is to offer gratitude and practice humility. A cultural way to keep ego in check ritualistically every year. Also a cultural way to honour the complexity inherent in farming success. That no one person could have achieved the harvest.

An enoughness seeps through this grand community celebration which strangely occurs no matter how big or small a harvest.

In modern times, these practices collide with neo-global performances of status and individuality and offer a disturbed experience of being-with and not.

However disturbing the current edges are, there is something that is continuing, that tends to the systemic complexity and keeps interdependencies intact. A ritualistic reproduction that is both utterly serious-solemn at core and playful at the edges and meta-communicates-- only a systemic movement is harmonious. An individual cannot lead change.

From within this sauce of being-with, even in its current form, where is the discontent that will drive new inventions to be copyrighted to an individual? How will the individualistic desire like "my ideas must disseminate far and wide" and "my goods must reach far and quickly" occur?

How will this particular culture deeply abiding in time-as-held-in-seasons have individuals who will consider manufacturing other time experiences?

My broad-stroke rumination at this point is -- modern inventions have emerged from certain qualities sauced in culture of a community that in one form sits in discontent “this-is-not-enough" and in another, moves to wean off from interdependencies.

And that perhaps it is okay if south asian cultures don’t invent anything phenomenal any day soon...