Indian Journal of Gender Studies, Volume 31, Issue 1, Page 102-121, February 2024.
There has recently been a shift in the portrayal of women in Indian media, from a domestic background and docile image to a more professional and empowered representation. This study explores whether such changed portrayals in the media are also positively perceived and if there is an impact on the status of women in the social reality of India. The study examined gender perceptions through focus group discussions with participants from Gen X and Gen Z cohorts. Gen Z, conditioned in an age of technology and liberalisation, was expected to have different gender perceptions than Gen X, conditioned in a pre-liberalised traditional India. The discussions revealed the participants’ complexities, dilemmas and compromises regarding gender stereotypes and the modern versus traditional portrayal of women in Indian media. While Gen X participants were bound to old gender structures and equations, the iconoclastic Gen Z participants appeared to be onsetting a change in gender perceptions of India.
Category Archives: Indian Journal of Gender Studies
Book review: Usha Thakkar, Congress Radio: Usha Mehta and the Underground Radio Station of 1942
Indian Journal of Gender Studies, Volume 30, Issue 3, Page 383-387, October 2023.
Usha Thakkar, Congress Radio: Usha Mehta and the Underground Radio Station of 1942, (Penguin Random House, 2021), 353 pp., ₹699 (Hardback), ISBN 978-0-670-09566-7.
Usha Thakkar, Congress Radio: Usha Mehta and the Underground Radio Station of 1942, (Penguin Random House, 2021), 353 pp., ₹699 (Hardback), ISBN 978-0-670-09566-7.
New Resources
Indian Journal of Gender Studies, Volume 30, Issue 3, Page 394-398, October 2023.
Women and Waste: The Question of Shit-work
Indian Journal of Gender Studies, Volume 30, Issue 3, Page 271-287, October 2023.
One of the fastest-growing sectors of the Indian economy is waste. Its labour illustrates Deliege’s paradox of material essentiality combined with social stigma and marginalisation. Between 2015 and 2019 the production and disposal of waste in a small South Indian town was traced through its circuits of industrial production (agro-processing), distribution (of people and of food), consumption, the production of labour (human wastes) and the reproduction of society (health care activity). The material substances of waste, their physical organisation and gendered labour processes are mapped onto each circuit. This enables a discussion of three questions: (a) regulative institutions in the formal and informal waste economy; (b) the gendering of property and work in the capitalist waste economy and (c) the gendered significance of collective action. The privatisation of waste work has caused a deterioration in work conditions throughout the waste economy. Literally and metaphorically, waste work is shit-work in which women experience the worst conditions in both physical and economic terms.
One of the fastest-growing sectors of the Indian economy is waste. Its labour illustrates Deliege’s paradox of material essentiality combined with social stigma and marginalisation. Between 2015 and 2019 the production and disposal of waste in a small South Indian town was traced through its circuits of industrial production (agro-processing), distribution (of people and of food), consumption, the production of labour (human wastes) and the reproduction of society (health care activity). The material substances of waste, their physical organisation and gendered labour processes are mapped onto each circuit. This enables a discussion of three questions: (a) regulative institutions in the formal and informal waste economy; (b) the gendering of property and work in the capitalist waste economy and (c) the gendered significance of collective action. The privatisation of waste work has caused a deterioration in work conditions throughout the waste economy. Literally and metaphorically, waste work is shit-work in which women experience the worst conditions in both physical and economic terms.
Book review: Jeemol Unni, Vanita Yadav, Ravikiran Naik and Swati Dutta, Women Entrepreneurship in the Indian Middle Class: Interdisciplinary Perspective
Indian Journal of Gender Studies, Volume 30, Issue 3, Page 380-383, October 2023.
Jeemol Unni, Vanita Yadav, Ravikiran Naik and Swati Dutta, Women Entrepreneurship in the Indian Middle Class: Interdisciplinary Perspective. Orient BlackSwan, 2021, 271 pages, ₹1,075 (Paperback), ISBN: 978-93- 5442-145-7.
Jeemol Unni, Vanita Yadav, Ravikiran Naik and Swati Dutta, Women Entrepreneurship in the Indian Middle Class: Interdisciplinary Perspective. Orient BlackSwan, 2021, 271 pages, ₹1,075 (Paperback), ISBN: 978-93- 5442-145-7.
Book review: Vasanthi Raman, The World of the Banaras Weaver: A Culture in Crisis
Indian Journal of Gender Studies, Volume 30, Issue 3, Page 374-376, October 2023.
Vasanthi Raman, The World of the Banaras Weaver: A Culture in Crisis, Second South Asia edition (Routledge, 2020), xxiii + 339 pages, ₹1495 (Hardback), ISBN 978-0-367-44351-1.
Vasanthi Raman, The World of the Banaras Weaver: A Culture in Crisis, Second South Asia edition (Routledge, 2020), xxiii + 339 pages, ₹1495 (Hardback), ISBN 978-0-367-44351-1.
Women and Their Interests in Rural India
Indian Journal of Gender Studies, Volume 30, Issue 3, Page 288-308, October 2023.
There is a substantial and growing recognition of the hazards of treating the interests of women as being homogenous. A variety of sources focus on diversity in the interests of a woman, ranging from bargaining with patriarchy where she is forced to carry out diverse tasks within the household, to the extension of these negotiations elsewhere in her socio-economic reality. These challenges are accentuated at times of wider social transformation. Responses of women to these challenges are also influenced by their position within the household. This article seeks to gain insights into the complex negotiations between women, households and society in times of socio-economic transformation by exploring the relationship between women’s interests, strategic gender interests and practical gender interests within households that are headed by women. It does so through an empirical examination of the linkages between these interests of women across four different patterns of transformation in 21st-century rural India.
There is a substantial and growing recognition of the hazards of treating the interests of women as being homogenous. A variety of sources focus on diversity in the interests of a woman, ranging from bargaining with patriarchy where she is forced to carry out diverse tasks within the household, to the extension of these negotiations elsewhere in her socio-economic reality. These challenges are accentuated at times of wider social transformation. Responses of women to these challenges are also influenced by their position within the household. This article seeks to gain insights into the complex negotiations between women, households and society in times of socio-economic transformation by exploring the relationship between women’s interests, strategic gender interests and practical gender interests within households that are headed by women. It does so through an empirical examination of the linkages between these interests of women across four different patterns of transformation in 21st-century rural India.
Book review: B. S. Sherin, Gendering Minorities: Muslim Women and the Politics of Modernity
Indian Journal of Gender Studies, Volume 30, Issue 3, Page 390-393, October 2023.
B. S. Sherin, Gendering Minorities: Muslim Women and the Politics of Modernity. Orient BlackSwan, 2021, 240 pages, ₹615 (Hardbound). ISBN: 978-93-5287-669-3.
B. S. Sherin, Gendering Minorities: Muslim Women and the Politics of Modernity. Orient BlackSwan, 2021, 240 pages, ₹615 (Hardbound). ISBN: 978-93-5287-669-3.
Between the Devil and the Deep Sea: Tribal Women’s Inheritance Rights in India
Indian Journal of Gender Studies, Volume 30, Issue 3, Page 309-329, October 2023.
In recognition of their distinct culture and identity, tribal communities in India enjoy constitutionally guaranteed autonomy and self-governance, which extend to customary laws for marriage, matrimonial rights and inheritance. In contexts where the tribal customary law has denied women inheritance rights, some women have approached the courts of law. The Hindu law on inheritance specifically excludes tribal communities from its application; yet, courts have found a way to apply it by reasoning that the parties to the case were ‘sufficiently Hinduised’. This article examines Indian judicial responses to this issue, and the ramifications for the inheritance rights of tribal women. The article critiques law’s lack of imagination and inability to capture the complex dynamics of social relationships in tribal communities, in a context of their massive dispossession from tribal lands. While highlighting the distinct relationship of property, community and family in tribal communities, it examines how law could ensure that tribal women retain their tribal identity and yet secure equal inheritance rights, rather than force a trade-off between tribal identity and securing inheritance rights on grounds of ‘sufficient Hinduisation’.
In recognition of their distinct culture and identity, tribal communities in India enjoy constitutionally guaranteed autonomy and self-governance, which extend to customary laws for marriage, matrimonial rights and inheritance. In contexts where the tribal customary law has denied women inheritance rights, some women have approached the courts of law. The Hindu law on inheritance specifically excludes tribal communities from its application; yet, courts have found a way to apply it by reasoning that the parties to the case were ‘sufficiently Hinduised’. This article examines Indian judicial responses to this issue, and the ramifications for the inheritance rights of tribal women. The article critiques law’s lack of imagination and inability to capture the complex dynamics of social relationships in tribal communities, in a context of their massive dispossession from tribal lands. While highlighting the distinct relationship of property, community and family in tribal communities, it examines how law could ensure that tribal women retain their tribal identity and yet secure equal inheritance rights, rather than force a trade-off between tribal identity and securing inheritance rights on grounds of ‘sufficient Hinduisation’.
Book review: Smita Tewari Jassal, Islamic Conversation: Sohbet and Ethics in Contemporary Turkey
Indian Journal of Gender Studies, Volume 30, Issue 3, Page 387-390, October 2023.
Smita Tewari Jassal, Islamic Conversation: Sohbet and Ethics in Contemporary Turkey, (Routledge Islamic Studies Series, Routledge, 2020), 161 pp., ISBN 978-1-138-39119-2.
Smita Tewari Jassal, Islamic Conversation: Sohbet and Ethics in Contemporary Turkey, (Routledge Islamic Studies Series, Routledge, 2020), 161 pp., ISBN 978-1-138-39119-2.