Book Title: Framing the Future: India and Language in a Multipolar Age
Author: Peggy Mohan
Publisher: Allen Lane India
Number of Pages: 224
ISBN: 9377303745
Date Published: Oct. 12, 2026
Book Review
Peggy Mohan’s “Framing the Future: India and Language in a Multipolar Age” is a thoughtful book about a question India often avoids: why should progress still have to pass through English? Drawing on history, linguistics and her long engagement with Indian languages, Mohan imagines a country where technology helps people speak across languages without asking them to abandon their own.
Her central idea is refreshing. Instead of treating India’s many languages as a problem to be managed, she sees them as a source of strength. New tools, including artificial intelligence, could let knowledge move between Hindi, Tamil, Bengali, Marathi and other languages, opening science, technology and public life to people who think best in their mother tongue. Mohan’s argument is not sentimental; she wants major Indian written languages to become serious languages of modern ideas.
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The book is strongest when Mohan connects language to power. She shows that languages rise and fall not simply because of beauty or usefulness, but because institutions, education and technology decide whose words matter. Her vision of a “multipolar” India feels timely: a future where confidence does not require everyone to first become fluent in English.
Still, “Framing the Future” can feel more like an inspiring thought experiment than a detailed plan. Mohan is persuasive about what could be possible, but readers may want clearer answers on funding, digital access, teacher training and the risk that technology serves only a few languages. Even so, this is a valuable, humane book that asks India to stop seeing its linguistic diversity as a burden—and start treating it as its future.
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About the Author
Peggy Mohan is a linguist and author born in Trinidad, West Indies. She studied linguistics at the University of the West Indies before earning her PhD in the same discipline from the University of Michigan. Over the course of her academic career, she has taught linguistics at Howard University in Washington, D.C., Jawaharlal Nehru University, and Ashoka University. She has also taught mass communications at Jamia Millia Islamia in New Delhi.
Her books explore language, history, and cultural identity. Wanderers, Kings, Merchants (2021) received the Mathrubhumi Book of the Year Award, while Father Tongue, Motherland (2025) won the Sarvepalli Radhakrishnan Award for Non-Fiction at the Banaras Literature Festival.
Peggy’s interests extend beyond academia and writing. She has explored cartoon animation, produced a Hindi-language television series for children, and taught music. She currently lives in New Delhi.
