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HISA 3121 WOMEN AND POWER IN INDIAN HISTORY Spring’15
Mr. Barnett Ofc. Nau Hall 384 Hours Thursdays 2:15-3:15, or by appt. 924-6396
Purpose This course addresses women’s roles and statuses, means of gaining and using power, and contributions in political and other realms, during four millennia of South Asian history. With emphasis on the modern, but with relevant background in Indian mythology, classical history and literature, medieval Islamic chronicles, autobiographies, and eyewitness accounts, we will examine original sources, social science studies, fictional works, and secondary material on the following issues: √origins, persistence, and revision of socially and religiously constructed gender identities; √typologies of autonomy vs. dependence, security vs. risk, oppression vs. liberation; √medieval and modern women as political actors and exemplars; √female infanticide, self-immolation of widows, and bride-burning; √education, health and workplace; √ Western and Asian feminisms; and √women power brokers in what is now India, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, Nepal, and Bangladesh. No previous acquaintance with South Asia, or with history, is assumed.
Approach & Focus In this course we will read and write about, report on, and discuss topics concerning gender in South Asia, assessing the various ways in which subjects exercised power (or not) and—whether colludingly, unthinkingly, or defiantly—how they defined their roles in history.
RequirementsEvaluation will rest on class discussion (30%), six-minute presentations on individually-assigned readings (20%), a book review (20%), and three quizzes (30%). No presentations may be postponed without either 24 hours’ advance notice or a life-changing emergency. Presenters will write a one-page outline of their oral presentations, copy it and distribute it to classmates. Signups for oral presentations and book reviews must be on my syllabus copy only, to avoid duplicate choices. (Write your name clearly on the LEFT margin of my syllabus copy to sign up) Written reviews to classmates are of books whose titles are at the end of this syllabus; tell me your choice, and sign up for this separate assignment on my syllabus, sooner than later. Readings for reports must be accessed ASAP ! ! !
Note: the purpose of both oral presentations and book reviews is to impart the content of more source materials, and hence information, to classmates. But your assessment and evaluation is just as important as conveying the author’s purpose, style, method, and degree of success. Both your 6-minute talk and your book review must be polished, edited, original, pledged contributions. The book reviews are due in hard copy to me on or before the last class day, and must be posted on the class web page in Collab, according to instructions from me beforehand (since Collab changes at times).
The importance of informed discussion This is not a lecture class, so don’t be passive. Class participation, analyzing and asking questions about the readings and presentations, is vital to the success of this course, so diligence in reading all assignments in advance is expected without exception. All are very strongly urged to read ahead of the topics. Do not send me panicked emails begging to know what the next readings are, as they will be evident from the syllabus. Also, asking in an uninformed way about something that is clearly presented in the readings or reports will blatantly reveal what you have not done, and will reduce our level of comfort. (See the criteria for evaluating class participation in the graphic at the end of the syllabus.) I will call on a wide variety of classmates for purposes of equity, Construct a name flag, and keep it with you all semester. Class attendance is vitally important—for each unexcused absence beyond three, the course grade will be reduced by 20%.
Texts and assignments: The following are available from UVa Bookstore and on line:
Shahla Haeri, No Shame for the Sun: Lives of Professional Pakistani Women (Syracuse, 2002)
Elizabeth Bumiller, May You be the Mother of a Hundred Sons (New York & Delhi, 1990)
Geraldine Forbes, Women in Modern India (Cambr. Univ. Press,1998)
Farah Ahmedi, The Other Side of the Sky(New York: Simon Spotlight Entertainment, 2005)
A required book of photocopies is on sale at Brillig Books, 7 Elliewood Ave., selections being cited below as “PH-COPY.” Its table of contents will guide you to the assignments. Some selections are more challenging than the ones in the textbooks, but they must be carefully studied and understood anyway.
Writing assignment (required, ungraded): write one double-spaced typed page on "My Image of South Asian Women." Be thoughtful and candid. Write essay before starting the readings. Due in class, on our second class day, at the beginning of class. Since I will read and mark for content and style, and return in class, this cannot be submitted via email. The point is to establish a baseline for your knowledge and awareness.
Background reading In case you feel somewhat at sea during the first few weeks of such a course, the following are very strongly recommended:
Barbara D. and Thomas R. Metcalf, A Concise History of India (2003)
Sugata Bose and Ayesha Jalal, Modern South Asia: History, Culture, Political Economy (1997, plus
several updated editions)
1.Introduction to the course, classmates, and instructor
Class reading:
Ashok K. Dutt, “India: A Geographic Preface,” in Neil DeVotta, ed., Understanding
Contemporary India, 2nd ed., 22-10. PH-COPY
Benjamin Cohen, “The Historical Context,” in DeVotta, ed., 31-65. PH-COPY
Bumiller, ch. 1, “Arrival & Introduction,” 3-23Forbes, 1-9
In-class video: “Honor Diaries” (directed by Micah Smith,2013), 61 minutes
2.An historical template; our first short story
Class reading:
Forbes, 10-31Iyengar, “The Library Girl,” PH-COPY
Lisa Trivedi, “Women in India,” in DeVotta, ed., 181-208. PH-COPY
3. Gender roles, gender statuses: an introduction
Class reading:
Forbes, 32-63Haeri, xxi-xxxi
4.Women in agrarian settings, part 1
Class reading:
Shama Futehally, “The Meeting,” pp. 136-143, in Lakshmi Holmstrom, ed.,
The Inner Courtyard PH-COPY
Haeri, chapter 4, “Legitimacy: in the Boots of a Feudal Lord,” pp. 169-225
In-classVideo: “Dadi’s Family.” Dadi is the grandmother managing an extended farming famiy. Women in this film--whose dialogue has to be listened to with focused attention-- discuss family
conflict, work in the fields and at home, and the loneliness of being a stranger in the husband’s family. Items from this video and the earlier one will appear on at least one quiz.
5. Women in Early Indian History: Manu, Jha and the Golden Age, svayamvara, sati
Class reading:
Kirit K. Shah, The Problem of Identity: Women in Early Indian Inscriptions (OUP India,
2001), “Prologue,” pp. 1-31 PH-COPY
Uma Chakravrti, “Beyond the Altekarian Paradigm: Towards a New Understanding
Of Gender Relations in Early Indian History,” Social Scientist 16:8 (Aug. 1988)
pp. 44-51. To be distrubuted by email as a PDF by instructor.
Note: If at least three of the following are not selected, we cannot proceed.
ReportLaurie L. Patton, ed., Jewels of Authority (OUP, 2002), Introduction and chapters 1 & 4.
ReportMoti Chandra, The World of Courtesans. DS421 .C435 (ALD-STKS) Omit ch. 9.
ReportVatsyayana, The Kama Sutra, Book One only. HQ470.S3 V3 1967
ReportS. Tharu and K. Lalita, eds., Women Writing in India, vol. 1 pp. 41-56, 65-89
PK 2978 .E5 W57 1991
6. Heroine-ism & Public Rituals in Medieval & Early Modern India, part 1
Class reading
Intro and two chapters in Gavin Hambly, ed., Women in the Medeival Islamic World:
Power, Patronage and Piety (New York: St. Martin’s, 1998): ALL IN PH-COPY:
G. Hambly, “Becoming Visible: Medieval Islamic Women in Historiography and
History,” pp. 2-27
Stephen P. Blake, “Contributors to the Urban Landscape: Women Builders in
Safavid Isfahan and Mughal Shahjahanabad,” pp. 407-428
G. Hambly, “Armed Women Retainers in the Zenanas of Indo-Muslim Rulers:
the Case of Bibi Fatima,” pp. 429-468;
ReportI. H. Siddiqui, “Socio-Political Role of Women in the Sultanate of Delhi,” and
Kiran Pawar, “Role of Royal Women in the Career of Babur,” pp. 85-
110 in Kiran Pawar, ed., Women in Indian History: Social, Economic,
Political and Cultural Perspectives, HQ1742 .W6657 1996
ReportRumer Godden, Gulbadan: Portrait of a Rose Princess at the Mughal Court
DS461.9.G84 G62 1980
ReportEllison Banks Findly, Nur Jahan: Empress of Mughal India (OUP India, 2000
DS 461.9 .N8 F56 1993
ReportK. Sadasivan, Devadasi System in Medieval Tamil Nadu BL 1237.58 D48 S23
1993
Report Ramya Sreenivasan, The Many Lives of a Rajput Queen: Heroic Pasts in India
c.1500-1900 (2007; with instructor)
7.Heroine-ism in Medieval & Early Modern India, part 2
Class reading
Richard B. Barnett, “Embattled Begams: Women as Power Brokers in Early Modern
India”, 521-36 in Gavin Hambly, ed. PH-COPY
Report Peter Jackson, “Sultan Radiyya bint Iltutmish,” in Hambly, ed. Women in the Medieval
Islamic World (New York: St. Martin’s, 1998), 181-198, AND Gregory C.
Kozlowski, “Private Lives and Public Piety,” Women and the Practice of Islam
in Mughal India,” in Hambly, ed., 469-488.
Report Ruby Lal, Domesticity and Power in the Early Mughal World (CUP, 2005)
ReportRenuka Nath, Notable Mughal and Hindu Women in the 16 and 17th centuries
DS 461.9 .A1 N38 1990
ReportJoyce Lebra-Chapman, The Rani of Jhansi: a Study in Female Heroism in India
DS475.2.L34 L43 1986
ReportClaudia Preckel, Begams of Bhopal (Delhi: Roli Books, 2000) DS 495.B5 2000
ReportRokeya Sakhawat Hossain, Sultana’s Dream, and Selections from The Secluded
Ones PR9420.9.R65 S86 1988
Quiz #1, 20 minutes You have a choice of 20 out of c.40, mostly terms from reports, discussion, and readings. Identify each item briefly, and then state its historical importance. Mixed in will be some short-answer questions, for variety. All three quizzes have the same format.
8.Women in South Asia and Western feminist thought
Class reading
Haeri, chapter 1, “Stating the Problems: Theoretical Contemplation,” pp. 3-44
ReportTwo essays from Sue Morgan, ed., The Feminist History Reader HQ1121 .F437 2006:
Ania Loomba, “Dead Woimen Tell no Tales: Issues of Femail Subjectivity, Subaltern
Agency and Tradition in Colonial and Post-Colonial Writings on Widow Immolation
in India,” pp. 309-322; Sanjam Ahluwalia and Antoinette Burton, “Rethinking Boundaries:
Feminism and (Inter) nationalism in Early Twentieth-Century India,” pp. 351-359.
ReportMartha Nussbaum, Sex and Social Justice (Oxford: OUP, 1999) [Note: endnotes are in
addition to the listed page numbers, and must also be read.] “Introduction:
Feminism, Internationalism, Liberalism,” pp. 3-25; “Women and Cultural
Universals,” pp. 29-54; “Religion and Women’s Human Rights,” pp. 81-117.
NOTE: this reading is extremely important to the progress of this class.
9.Women in agrarian settings, part 2
Class reading
Bumiller, ch. 4, “Beyond the Veil: the Women of the Village of Khajuron,” 75-100
Susan Wadley, “Women and the Hindu Tradition,” in Jacobson and Wadley, Women of
India: Two Perspectives, pp. 111-136 PH-COPY
ReportBina Agarwal, A Field of One’s Own: Gender and Land Rights in South Asia, 1994
HD 860.3 .Z63 A35 1994
ReportPatricia Jeffrey and Roger Jeffrey, Don’t Marry Me to a Plowman! Women’s
Everyday Lives in Rural North India, 1996 HQ 1745 .B55 J45 1996
10.Women Nationalists and Gandhians
Class reading:
Forbes, 64-156. Note: by now you will have adjusted to the fact that this is a text,
which must perforce attempt a comprehensive narrative. It can admittedly
become overwhelming at times; just absorb the overall patterns and life
histories, without obsessing about all the details.
ReportManmohini Zutshi Sahgal, An Indian Freedom Fighter Recalls her Life
HQ 1742 .S235 1994
ReportShudha Mazumdar, Memoirs of an Indian Woman HQ1742 .M3813
11.Typologies of Oppression and Liberation
Class reading:
Ismat Chughtai, “Tiny’s Granny,” Kali for Women, ed., Truth Tales (New York: Feminist
Press, 1990), pp. 147-159 PH-COPY
Bumiller, ch. 5, “No More Little Girls: Female Infanticide Among the Poor of Tamil
Nadu and Sex-Selective Abortion among the Rich of Bombay,” 101-124
Farah Ahmad, The Other Side of the Sky, 1-69.
Report Ruby Lal, “Recasting the Woman Question:the‘Girl-Child/Woman’‟in the Colonial
Encounter‟, Interventions Vol. 10 (3) (2008): 321-339. Reprinted in Gyanendra
Pandey (ed.), Subaltern Citizens and their Histories: Investigations from India and
the USA (London and New York: Routledge, 2010): 47-62.
ReportAnita Weiss, Walls Within Walls (OUP: Karachi, 2002)
ReportVeena T. Oldenburg, Dowry Murder:the Imperial Origins of a Cultural Crime (OUP, 2002)
HV6250.4 .W65 O43 2002
ReportTehmina Durrani, My Feudal Lord (Lahore) DS 385 .D87 A3 1991
Report Kunal M. Parker, ‘“A Corporation of Superior Prostitutes:” Anglo-Indian Legal
Conceptions of Temple Dancing Girls,1800-1914,’Modern Asian Studies 32:3 (1998): 559-
633
12.Purdah: the Whys and Wherefores
Class reading:
Hannah Papanek, “Purdah: Separate Worlds and Symbolic Shelter,” in Papanek and Gail
Minault, eds., Separate Worlds: Studies of Purdah in South Asia, 4-51 (PH-COPY)
ReportTaj Hashmi, Women and Islam in Bangladesh: Beyond Subjection and
Tyranny (London: MacMillan, 2000), chapters 2 (“Women and Islam:
a Reappraisal”), 3 (“Mullas, Popular Islam and Misogyny”) and 4
(“Women as Victims of the Salish: Fatwas, Mullas and the Village
Community”), pp. 12-132. HQ1745.6 .H375 200
ReportIndira Ghose, Women Travellers in Colonial India PR778 .T72 G56 1998
13.Marriage as tragedy, marriage as bliss
Class reading
Haeri, chapter 5, “Marriage: Making a Culture of Her Own,” pp. 229-304
Elizabeth Bumiller, chapter 2, “Wedding First, Love Later”
Ismat Chughtai, “Chauthi ka Jaura,” pp. 74-88. PH-COPY
Report Betsy Hartmann and James K. Boyce, A Quiet Violence: View from a Bangladesh
Village (London: Zed Books and New Delhi: OUP, 1983), chapter 6, “The
Reluctant Bride,” 75-81; chapter 7, “Heaven under her Husband’s Feet,”
82-106; and chapter 8, “The Children,” 107-120. These two ethnographers
lived in Bangladesh for years, mostly in one village. Although their data
are 30 years old, their account is still very revealing of women’s roles.
14.Women in the History of the Raj
Class reading:
Haeri, chapter 2, “Identity: Contested Visions of Womanhood and Society,” pp. 46-106
Bumiller, ch. 6, “Towards, Equality: The Indian Women’s Movement,” 125-146
Forbes, 157-222
ReportTwo chapters from Kumkum Sangara and Sudesh Vaid, eds., Recasting Women:
Essays in Colonial History (Kali for Women, 1989): Partha Chatterjee,
“The Nationalist Resolution of the Women’s Question,” 233-253; and
Susie Tharu, “Tracing Savitri’s Pedigree: Victorian Racism and the Image
of Women in Indo-Anglian Literature,” 254-268. HQ1742 .R39 1989
(there are two copies in Alderman)
ReportBharati Ray, From the Seams of History: Essays on Indian Women (OUP, 1997)
ReportRosalind O’Hanlon, A Comparison between Women and Men: Tarabai Shinde and
the Critique of Gender Relations in Colonial India (Madras: OUP, 1994)
ReportAntroinette Burton, Dwelling in the Archive: Women Writing House, Home, and History
in Late Colonial India (any two chapters, not the one in the PHO-CO) (OUP, 2003)
15.Women in Agrarian Settings, Part III
Class reading
Aparna Rao,”Khatij, a Woman from a Kashmiri Mountain Village,” in Mukulika Banerjee,
ed., Muslim Portraits: Everyday Life in India (Bloomington: Indiana
University Press, 2008), 96-108 (PH-COPY).
Farah Ahmad, The Other Side of the Sky, 70-133.
ReportAnn Grodzins Gold, Listen to the Heron’s Words GR305.5 .U8 R34 1994 (Ald.)
Report Gilla, Mahindara Kaura, The role and status of women in Sikhism BL2017.8 .G58 1995
ReportPatricia Jeffrey, Roger Jeffrey, and Craig Jeffrey, “Aisha, the Madrassa Teacher,”
in Mukulika Banerjee, ed., Muslim Portraits: Everyday Lives in India (Bloomington:
Indiana University Press, 2008), 56-68; and Soumhya Venkatesan, “Thalaivar Amma,
the Female Leader of Paiyur, Tamilnadu,” in the same volume, 128-140.
Quiz #2, 25 minutes
16.Bride-burning and sati (self-immolation or coerced burning of Hindu widows?)
Class reading:
Bumiller, ch. 3, “Flames: a Bride Burning and a Sati,” 44-74
ReportJohn S. Hawley, ed., Sati: the Blessing and the Curse (New York, OUP) GT3370 ..S27 1994
Consult with instructor to select chapters.
ReportCatherine Weinberger-Thomas, Ashes of Immortality; Widow Burning in India (OUP, 2000)
17.Mobilization, Liberation, Politics
Class reading
Haeri, chapter 3, “Violence: Woman’s Body, Nation’s Honor,” pp. 107-168
Bumiller, ch. 7, “‘Indira is India, and India is Indira’: Mrs. Gandhi and Her Legacy
for Indian Women in Politics,” 147-178
ReportKalima Rose, Where Women are Leaders: The SEWA Movement in India (London:
Zed, 1992) HD 6072.6 .I4 R67 1992
ReportIndrani Chatterjee, “Alienation, Intimacy and Gender: Problems for a History of Love in
South Asia,” in Ruth Vanita, ed., Queering India: Same Sex Love and Eroticism in Indian
Culture and Society (Routledge, 2002)
Report R. Raj Rao and Dibyajyoti Sarma, eds. Whistling in the Dark: Twenty-one Queer Interviews
(New Delhi: Sage India, 2009)
18.Women and the Hindu Right
Class reading
Forbes, 223-254
Report Tanika Sarkar and Urvashi Bulalia, eds., Women and the Hindu Right (Kali for
Women, 1995) HQ1743 .W6 1995
ReportCharu Gupta, Sexuality, obscenity, community : women, Muslims, and the Hindu
public in colonial India HQ1173 .G86 2001
19.in-class Video: “16 Decisions” 59 minutes. Bangladeshi women participate in a
cooperative banking system just for them, which however involves some serious life
choices. Micro-finance, accompanied by social uplift and mobilization.
20. Women in struggle: revolutionaries, prophets and heretics
Class reading
Bumiller, chapter 9, “Poets and Revolutionaries: Three women of Calcutta, 201-229”
Farah Ahmad, The Other Side of the Sky, 134-249.
ReportLakshmi Sahgal, A Revolutionary Life: Memoirs of a Political Activist (New
Delhi, 1997) With instructor.
21.Muslim Women and Shari’ah Law, Part I
Class reading
Haeri, ch. 7, “Religion: Reinterpreting the Text, Reinventing the Self,” pp. 348-404
ReportLeila Ahmad, Women and Gender in Islam: Historical Roots of a Modern Debate
HQ 1784 .A67 1992
ReportAmina Jamal, Jamaat-e-Islami Women in Pakistan (Syracuse Univ. Press, 2013)
Report Asiya Alam, “Polygyny, Family and Sharafat: Discourses Amongst North Indian Muslims,
circa 1870-1918, “ Modern Asian Studies 45.3: (May 2011), pp. 631-668,
22.Muslim Women and Shari’ah Law, Part II
Class reading
Haeri, “Conclusion,” pp. 405-411
Shamila N.b Chaudary, “Foreign Feminists: the Role of Feminists and the Women’s
Movement in Pakistan,” in Shaeed Shafqat, ed., New Perspectives on Pakistan:
Visions for the Future (Karachi: OUP, 2007), 238-257 (PH-COPY).
ReportAfiya Shahrbano Zia, “Faith-Based Versus Rights-Based Development for Pakistani
Women,” in Anita M. Weiss and Saba Gul Khattak, eds., Development Challenges
Confronting Pakistan (Sterling, VA, Kumarian Press, 2013, 199-208; AND Nazish Brohi,
“Gendering Peripheries: Structuring the Nation, the State, and Consensus in
Pakistan,” in the same edited book, 211-223.
ReportBilkees Latif, Her India: The Fragrance of Forgotten Years DS485.H9 H895 198