This anthology provides a lively and stimulating view of the lives of ordinary citizens in India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Nepal, and Sri Lanka. For the second edition of this popular textbook, readings have been updated and new essays added. The result is a timely collection that explores key themes in understanding the region, including gender, caste, class, religion, globalization, economic liberalization, nationalism, and emerging modernities. New readings focus attention on the experiences of the middle classes, migrant workers, and IT professionals, and on media, consumerism, and youth culture. Clear and engaged writing makes this text particularly valuable for general and student readers, while the range of new and classic scholarship provides a useful resource for specialists.
This anthology provides a lively and stimulating view of the lives of ordinary citizens in India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Nepal, and Sri Lanka. For the second edition of this popular textbook, readings have been updated and new essays added. The result is a timely collection that explores key themes in understanding the region, including gender, caste, class, religion, globalization, economic liberalization, nationalism, and emerging modernities. New readings focus attention on the experiences of the middle classes, migrant workers, and IT professionals, and on media, consumerism, and youth culture. Clear and engaged writing makes this text particularly valuable for general and student readers, while the range of new and classic scholarship provides a useful resource for specialists.
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Overview
This anthology provides a lively and stimulating view of the lives of ordinary citizens in India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Nepal, and Sri Lanka. For the second edition of this popular textbook, readings have been updated and new essays added. The result is a timely collection that explores key themes in understanding the region, including gender, caste, class, religion, globalization, economic liberalization, nationalism, and emerging modernities. New readings focus attention on the experiences of the middle classes, migrant workers, and IT professionals, and on media, consumerism, and youth culture. Clear and engaged writing makes this text particularly valuable for general and student readers, while the range of new and classic scholarship provides a useful resource for specialists.
Product Details
| ISBN-13: | 9780253013576 |
|---|---|
| Publisher: | Indiana University Press |
| Publication date: | 12/22/2021 |
| Sold by: | Barnes & Noble |
| Format: | eBook |
| Pages: | 566 |
| Sales rank: | 328,191 |
| File size: | 9 MB |
| Age Range: | 18 Years |
About the Author
Diane P. Mines is Associate Professor of Anthropology at Appalachian State University. She is author of Fierce Gods: Inequality, Ritual, and the Politics of Dignity in a South Indian Village (IUP, 2005).
Sarah Lamb is Associate Professor and Chair of Anthropology at Brandeis University. She is author of White Saris and Sweet Mangoes: Aging, Gender and Body in North India and Aging and the Indian Diaspora: Cosmopolitan Families in India and Abroad (IUP, 2009).
Read an Excerpt
Everyday Life in South Asia
By Diane P. Mines, Sarah Lamb
Indiana University Press
Copyright © 2010 Indiana University PressAll rights reserved.
ISBN: 978-0-253-01357-6
CHAPTER 1
One Straw from a Broom Cannot Sweep: The Ideology and Practice of the Joint Family in Rural North India
Susan S. Wadley
The Indian joint family is built upon the idea and reality that power comes through numbers, and that those who seek to be most powerful, especially in India's village communities, should remain in joint families in order to successfully sustain a family's honor and position. A second, but equally important, component of the success of joint families in practice is the training that children receive that marks their interdependence, their sense of belonging to a group that is more important than individual goals and aspirations. The ideal joint family is made up of a married couple, their married sons, their sons' wives and children (and possibly grandsons' wives and great-grandchildren), and unmarried daughters. In the community of Karimpur in rural Uttar Pradesh, some 150 miles southeast of New Delhi, some joint families extend to four generations and include more than thirty members. For Karimpur's landowning families, which are more likely to be joint than are poor families, separating a joint family is traumatic, rupturing family ties, economic relationships, and workloads, as well as necessitating the division of all of the joint family's material goods (land, ploughs, cattle, cooking utensils, stocks of grain and seed, courtyards, verandahs, rooms, cooking areas, etc.). Separation (nyare) is, in fact, most comparable to an American divorce. It also brings dishonor to one's family.
The paradigm most frequently used to regulate social life in Karimpur is that of the ordered family, implying the authority of a male head, a number of adults working together under that authority, and respect for all of those higher in the family (or village) hierarchy. As in many north Indian communities, Karimpur residents use fictive kin terms toward all nonrelated village residents of whatever caste group; and traditionally, they have seen the village community as one family. As one elderly Brahman man put it in 1984:
Where there is cooperation (sangthan), there are various kinds of wealth and property. And where there is no cooperation, there is a shortage of each and every thing or there is an atmosphere of want. Where there is cooperation there is no need [of the ambition] to pile up wealth. "The minor streams or rivers go into the ocean but they do not have the ambition [to be big]." So, in the same way, property and comfort accrue without being sought after when there is cooperation: property comes to the properly regulated (kayda) man.
Hence the family is dependent upon a man who has himself, and his family, under his control. This control is attained through a variety of daily practices, as well as a clearly articulated ideology of male superiority. The same elderly Brahman male spoke of women in this way:
Q: How does the man *control* her?
BM: *Control*? They [women] don't have much knowledge (gyan). How is the lion locked in the cage? It lacks reason (vivek). Man protects her from everything.
Q: If a woman progresses, then she would be knowledgeable. Then how can you shut her in a cage?
BM: I say that if the sun begins to rise in the west, then what? It is a law of nature.
At another time, he added that "a woman cannot think as much as a man" (even though, he went on to state, she might be more powerful). A Brahman widow concurred with this assessment, saying, "The woman is inferior (choti, literally 'small'). A woman can only work according to the regulations (kayda). She can never leave the regulations." Hence a woman who follows the laws and customs of her family will be controlled and bring honor to her family.
A male gains honor by having land and wealth, by being kind to others, by keeping his word, and by having virtuous women who maintain purdah (seclusion). Families can lose honor through their women by having daughters or daughters-in-law who elope, become pregnant prior to marriage, or are seen outside too often. Men may bring dishonor to a household by stealing, gambling, drinking, and eating taboo foods, as well as by being unkind and miserly. A family also loses honor by not remaining joint, in part because control is easier in a joint family.
Karimpur's residents believe that joint families are able to maintain better control of their members, especially young adults. Shankar, a Brahman male and village headman of Karimpur in the early 1980s, suggests that self-control, particularly sexual control, is more easily maintained in a joint family. Several aspects of joint family living relate to his remarks. First, as he notes, no one has his/her own room or even space in the traditional household. In fact, through the 1960s in most joint families, the mother would assign sleeping places on a nightly basis; this gave her immense control over the sexuality of her sons and daughters-in-law. If she felt it appropriate, she would arrange for them to have a place where they could meet at night. A young man, newly married, once complained that he and his wife were being forbidden to sleep together because he had had a bad cold for some time and his grandmother (female head of his joint family) thought that they should remain apart for the good of his health. This raises a second point: many South Asian Hindu men believe that male health is threatened by too much sex, for a man loses vital energy through his semen. Hence controlled male sexuality is especially important. On these issues, the headman remarked:
But if society lives together (samaj ikhatthe), your self-control (sanyam apka) is maintained. If you live separately, you lose your self-control. You get a separate room. You get a separate cot. You have separate food. Everything becomes separate. This affects your health (tandurusti). But when you live together—you have your mother at one place, sister at another, bhabhi (older brother's wife) somewhere else, or a servant at some place—then self-control is not difficult. You don't have any place to indulge yourself [implied is food or sexual indulgence]. This is the greatest factor in good health. That is why it is essential for the family to live together. Now it is important to understand that all this is a gift of nature (kudarat). If it is not in men, then how can we blame others? This tendency to live separate is very dangerous. They say that if a young daughter is alone in a room, then even her father should not go into that room. She is the girl whom you have produced out of your own seed, out of your own body, and she is young. So you should not go into that room. So when our family lives together, then we get less time, and we get more opportunities to work. We would not even be able to think about it [sex]. That is why our health used to be good.
Aside from the physical surveillance that is implied in joint family life, other forms of control are vital to the success of a joint family. These include such means as the silencing of women and children (or even adult males younger than the head of the household) through rules that deny them the opportunity to speak, through the seclusion of women (purdah), through rituals which mark the superiority of male kin and the importance of the family unit, and through daily practices such as eating routines that mark the male as superior. For example, a woman should speak only in a whisper, if at all, to her husband's father or older male relatives. A man should not talk with his wife in front of his parents, nor should he do anything disrespectful before his father (such as smoking a cigarette). A woman should keep her face covered before all men senior to her husband, and she should not leave the family home unless accompanied by another woman or male relative and her head and body are covered by a shawl. The yearly ritual calendar is filled with celebrations in which women pray for healthy sons, for longliving husbands, and for their brothers. There are no annual rituals where they pray for their mothers or daughters. Finally, a Hindu wife should never eat a meal before her husband and other male relatives have eaten as this would be enormously disrespectful: the result is that women often eat late at night, after the last men have returned from the town or fields.
These factors are dependent upon and support the powerful male head of the family. The unified, cooperating joint family demands both a trustworthy leader and the respect of the sons. The most powerful Brahman family in 1984 achieved the ideal more successfully than any other Karimpur family: the family was composed of four brothers, the widows of their two dead brothers, their wives, children, children's wives, and grandchildren, who had lived together for over twenty years since the death of the parents. One of the brothers attributed this success to the male head, his older brother, saying, "We understood that he is wise, older, more sensible, would do every kind of good work, but would not do bad work." The family is now separated, but the brother heading the largest portion was described as thinking ahead, having understanding, and seeking peace.
If the family stays together, its power increases. One young Brahman man used the imagery of a broom to explain the need for a large, cooperating family: "Say there is a broom. If you have one straw separate, it can't sweep. But when all are together, it can sweep." One elderly Brahman man used the example of a family with four sons. All have different habits. But the family's power would increase if all four were under the control of one person.
I am telling what I understand. A family must have one thing. That is, a family is strong when all remain in the control of one [person]. Whatever is said, they must accept that. In other words, having accepted the words of Brahma [the Hindu deity], they have become firm and constant in that, whether it is right or wrong. But the family must be controlled by one, whether or not he has money. Unless there is selfishness [on the part of the leader], the power [of the family] will endure.
On another day, this same man added, "If the family goes every which way, then the whole house is ruined."
Equal treatment of all the members within the family and unchallenged decisions by the head are necessary to the smooth functioning of the united family. I learned this lesson soon after beginning fieldwork in Karimpur in 1967. I was living in a family that included four married sons, along with their wives and children. Whenever I brought sweets or fruits for treats, I was required to give them to the grandmother, who would distribute them among her sons, daughters-in-law, and grandchildren. Her decision as to who got what amount carried weight: mine did not (although I find that thirty years later, I am allowed to make the distribution myself). Further, if I bought saris for the women, they had to be identical, apart from color, for the women at each tier: the brothers' wives all should get one kind, their sisters should get one kind; the daughters all should get one kind, and so on. Likewise, frocks for the young girls or sweaters for the boys should differ in color only, unless I wanted to instigate fights and high levels of tension among the women. So I learned the appropriate buying patterns, those used by heads of households. Thus it is easy at holidays or at more public events like the district fair to identify family groupings, because of the clusters of girls in identical dresses or boys in matching shirts.
My elderly Brahman friend once told his (somewhat idealized) version of the rule within his family:
In the United States, when people get married, a man becomes master for himself and feels that his duty is to his wife and children. But here in India, whenever there is a guardian and we make the bread in one place [meaning that they cook together], we cannot say, "My wife does not have bread. Bring some for her." Or that "she has no blouse." Whether she has no clothes or she changes into a new sari every day, I do not have the right [to give clothes to her or to complain].... We are either oppressed by the older people or we have respect for them. There is another thing: we cannot say that she does not have a sari so why don't you bring one for her. And I cannot bring another either. The time never came when I had to think about whether she had clothes or not. No one [namely his wife] ever said to me, "I have no clothes or other things." No one ever told me this problem. If she had, what could I have done? That rule has been in my mind till now. But for the past five or six years we have become separate. Now I do all of this that the family wants—saris and clothes for the children. Before, my brother was master of the family and I was always behind. I never was concerned whether my children were in trouble or were happy. I never worried about this.
The unity of the joint family depends, too, on the wife's first duty being to her parents-in-law, not to her husband. As one young man, a Water-carrier by caste, explained:
First of all she should think about the family. Then me.... First of all she should take care to feed them. My mother is old, so my wife should massage my mother. It is her duty to eat the food after my mother, my older brother's wife, and sister. If my parents want her to clean the pots, she must clean them. Even if she feels that she is a new bahu (wife/daughter-in-law) and she need not clean the pots now, her duty is to clean the pots.
Another man remarked that the women must also see to equality, not giving bread rubbed with ghee (clarified butter, a prestige item) to one person and plain bread to another. Above all, the good daughter-in-law is one who serves and obeys her father-in-law/mother-in-law (sas-sasur). As a poor Cultivator said, "She should accept what the father-in-law and mother-in-law say, whether they are right or wrong." The authority of the parents-in-law is key, because if a woman seeks favoritism through her husband, the unity of the family is threatened. I vividly remember a young man in his twenties telling us that his mother and aunt (his father's sister) used to like his wife very much, but that he hadn't liked her. (It was an arranged marriage, as are all marriages in Karimpur.) Now he loved her, so they no longer liked her. Without his affection for her, the unity of the family was secured and the power structures unchallenged. Once his affection developed, the power structures that allow for the ideal unity and cooperation were threatened.
Behavior within the family marks the hierarchies. Respect for those senior is demanded: sons respect fathers and older brothers and obey their mothers, with whom a more affectionate relationship exists. Sons cannot smoke, play with their children, or talk with their wives in the presence of their fathers. The Flower Grower's wife says that sensible (literally "understanding," samajdhar) boys show respect to their fathers, but some, like one of her sons, refuse to listen to the advice of their parents. Women must also show respect within the household. A bahu asks her mother-in-law what to cook, how much spice to add, whether she can go to the fields, and so on, even when she is forty and the mother-in-law sixty or more. Bahus also show respect through veiling, by touching the feet of senior women on ritual occasions, and through eating patterns, always eating after both the men and the women senior to them.
The rule of those senior is not always benign, however, and decisions are regularly enforced with physical punishment. The household head (or more senior person) has "understanding" that the others lack. If they do not accept that understanding, that wisdom regarding right and wrong, the message can be reinforced through physical punishment. Husbands can beat wives; fathers can beat sons (and, more rarely, daughters). The Flower Grower's son, a young man then in his early twenties with an eighth-grade education who did construction work in Delhi, explained the roles of husbands and wives thus: if a wife erred but did so in public (sitting with her friends, for example), she should not be corrected, for that would be an insult. But in private, a husband could say something or beat her. "In other words, you should scold her, if she makes an error. You must make her understand that she must not do so." A Sweeper woman said, resignedly, "If we don't work well, we're bound to get a beating." A young Water-carrier man told of the time he hit his wife:
At that time I was studying in high school. It was 1978. One day the food wasn't cooked. On that day, I said nothing. On the following day, I was also made late because the food wasn't ready. Again I didn't speak to her. On the third day again I was made late. In this way, I was late each day. On the fourth day, I went again [to eat, late]. It was summer. I sat on the roof in the air. Then after eating, I hit her four or five times.
(Continues...)
Excerpted from Everyday Life in South Asia by Diane P. Mines, Sarah Lamb. Copyright © 2010 Indiana University Press. Excerpted by permission of Indiana University Press.
All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
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Table of Contents
Acknowledgments
Note on Transliteration
Introduction
Map
I. The Family and the Life Course
Introduction
1. One Straw from a Broom Cannot Sweep: The Ideology and Practice of the Joint Family in Rural North India Susan S. Wadley
2. Allah Gives Both Boys and Girls Patricia Jeffery and Roger Jeffery
3. "Out Here in Kathmandu": Youth and the Contradictions of Modernity in Urban Nepal Mark Liechty
4. Rethinking Courtship, Marriage and Divorce in an Indian Call Center Cari Costanzo Kapur
5. Love and Aging in Bengali Families Sarah Lamb
II. Genders
Introduction
6. New Light in the House: Schooling Girls in Rural North India Ann Grodzins Gold
7. Offstage with Special Drama Actresses in Tamilnadu, South India: Roadwork Susan Seizer
8. Breadwinners No More: Identities in Flux Michele Ruth Gamburd
9. Life on the Margins: A Hijra’s Story Serena Nanda
10. Crossing "Lines" of Difference: Transnational Movements and Sexual Subjectivities in Hyderabad, India Gayatri Reddy
III. Caste, Class and Community
Introduction
11. Seven Prevalent Misconceptions about India’s Caste System
12. God-Chariots in a Garden of Castes: Hierarchy and Festival in a Hindu City Steven M. Parish
13. High and Low Castes in Karani Viramma, with Josiane Racine and Jean Luc Racine
14. Weakness, Worry Illness, and Poverty in the Slums of Dhaka Sabina Faiz Rashid
15. Anjali’s Alliance: Class Mobility in Urban India Sara Dickey
16. Recasting the Secular: Religion and Education in Kerala, India Ritty Lukose
IV. Practicing Religion
Introduction
17. The Hindu Gods in a South Indian Village Diane P. Mines
18. The Feast of Love McKim Marriott
19. The Delusion of Gender and Renunciation in Buddhist Kashmir Kim Gutschow
20. Muslim Village Intellectuals: The Life of the Mind in Northern Pakistan Magnus Marsden
21. In Friendship: A Father, a Daughter and a Jinn Naveeda Khan
22. Vernacular Islam at a Healing Crossroads in Hyderabad Joyce Burkhalter Flueckiger
V. Nation-making
Introduction
23. Voices from the Partition Urvashi Butalia
24. A Day in the Life Laura Ring
25. Living and Dying for Mother India: Hindu Nationalist Female Renouncers and Sacred Duty Kalyani Devaki Menon
26. Political Praise in Tamil Newspapers: The Poetry and Iconography of Democratic Power Bernard Bate
27. Mala's Dream: Economic Policies, National Debates, and Sri Lankan Garment Workers Caitrin Lynch
28. Interviews with High School Students in Eastern Sri Lanka Margaret Trawick
VI. Globalization, Public Culture and the South Asian Diaspora
Introduction
29. Cinema in the Countryside: Popular Tamil Film and the Remaking of Rural Life Anand Pandian
30. Dangerous Desires: Erotics, Public Culture, and Identity in Late-Twentieth-Century India Purnima Mankekar
31. A Diaspora Ramayana in Southall Paula Richman
32. British Sikh Lives, Lived in Translation Kathleen Hall
33. Examining the "Global" Indian Middle Class: Gender and Culture in the Silicon Valley/Bangalore Circuit Smitha Radhakrishnan
34. Placing Lives through Stories: Second Generation South Asian Americans Kirin Narayan
35. Unexpected Destinations E. Valentine Daniel
References
Contributors
Index
What People are Saying About This
This wonderful collection serves as a unique introduction to cultural life in contemporary South Asia. The essays included here provide insights into everyday life that are unavailable from any other single source. This text will be of great interest to scholars and students in anthropology, sociology, gender studies, religious studies, geography, and communication studies.
Mines and Lamb have once again provided an eminently readable, highly engaging and varied set of case studies, organized along major axes of current concern, both practical and intellectual. . . . [A] real joy to teach!