Archaeology in 2021 was characterized by a continued call to use the tools of the discipline to document the violence of settler colonialism in the past and present, pushing anthropology to reckon with its own role in perpetuating historical trauma. The tension between disciplinary reflection and reform was most clearly articulated in the use of archaeological geophysics to detect the unmarked graves of incarcerated Indigenous children who died at residential and boarding schools in Canada and the United States. The highly publicized investigation of these schools has brought renewed attention to issues of repatriation and historical reclamation for many communities impacted by settler colonialism. These discussions have reverberated throughout the discipline, prompting revisions to the Society for American Archaeology's “Statement Concerning the Treatment of Human Remains,” reopening conversations around an African American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act, and informing debates around the ethics of DNA research. These conversations are part of a larger movement toward decolonizing the field by using archaeological methods to explore marginalized histories and support communities most impacted by the violences of settler colonialism.

This essay discusses Urdu-language akhlaq (ethics) texts produced and circulated in late-colonial India (1858–1947), situating them both within a classical genre of Islamic ethics and in the context of Indian vernacular print culture. It focuses on three akhlaq texts published between the 1870s and 1930s to consider contemporary Muslim ethical concerns and schema, arguing that the genre points to a widespread, everyday, and unexceptional Muslim subjectivity that placed a high value on ethical striving. The essay offers new perspectives on the history of Muslims in late-colonial India by highlighting a non-institutional, diffuse, and capacious intellectual formation whose ideas were disseminated through print in a commercial market. It also expands existing notions of Muslim authority from individuals—such as the ulama (Muslim clerical class)—and institutions—such as madrasas (religious schools and seminaries)—to include literary genres themselves. Finally, the article broadens the range of Muslim subject-positions represented in scholarship on Islam in colonial India.