This extraordinary book brings long years of ethnographic engagement with the Ongee and the Jarawa, otherwise known as the Andaman Islanders, to render an intimate history of their contact with traders, colonialists, global tourists and the developmental state. Vishvajit Pandya displays a superb command over theory, history and ethnography that makes this one of the most important books to engage with the question of how ideas of wildness and civilization have been shaped through sensory experiences of vision, touch, smell and sound. The history of intimacy is rendered with consummate skill, making this a book that will be treasured by specialist and non-specialist alike. -- Veena Das, Krieger-Eisenhower Professor of Anthropology, Johns Hopkins University
