This book is an innovative and rigorous study of Jhumpa Lahiri's Indian American female characters' lived and imagined diasporic house space, using domesticity and the house as an analytical tool to explore their hidden domestic spaces. The book explores how the house as a spatial construct, shares a symbiotic relationship with its inhabitants, and through their implicit and explicit response to various parts of their diasporic house space, interprets their maladies, limitations and opportunities. Indian American diasporic women, especially homemakers, have long been grappling with issues of socio-cultural invisibility as they have no other space to interact with except their houses in the hostland, now more than ever, during the global corona crisis. A reading of this multi-layered relationship between houses and their women will help readers understand not only the political, intellectual, emotional and sexual dispositions of middleclass Indian women in America, but also social, cultural and economic positions they occupy within the hostland. The book shows the represented domestic interstices and looks at them as signifiers of distinct individual trajectories, wherein lies embedded the women inhabitants’ oppositions beneath the acceptance of normative Indian family values in diaspora. It also offers elemental insights into ways in which migration acts as an opportunity for establishing new, often hybridized, identities, for which it is important to realise their connections with their house space. Presenting an alternative methodology for reading real and imagined lives of women in Indian American diaspora, the book proposes an unconventional mode of understanding diasporic realities and representations in cultural studies that is not readily apparent. It will be of interest to researchers in the field of South Asian Studies, Diaspora Studies, Migration Studies, Culture Studies, Feminist Writings, Gender Studies and Asian Literature. Foreword by Bill Ashcroft
Founded in 1907 by the visionary Bengali thinker and reformist, Ramananda Chatterjee, The Modern Review quickly emerged as a vital platform for debates on nationalism, patriotism, history and society. Alongside the leaders of the freedom movement - M.K. Gandhi, Subhas Chandra Bose, Jawaharlal Nehru, Rabindranath Tagore - thinkers like Romain Rolland and J.T. Sutherland contributed to its pages. While questions of self-rule, gender justice and caste inequality were hotly debated, the Review also ran fiction, poetry and personal essays, forging a character for itself that was uniquely literary, political as well as cosmopolitan. Marking Chatterjee's 150th birth anniversary, this anthology, edited by members of his family and introduced by Ramachandra Guha, brings together a selection from the rich archives of the Review to convey its eclectic range and ambitions. Even after a century, the debates that played out in its pages resonate with the spirit of the turbulent times we live in, making it urgently relevant to the state of the nation and the body politic.
Controlling reproduction – who has children, how many, and when – is important to states, communities, families, and individuals across the globe. However, the stakes are even higher than might at first be appreciated: control over reproduction is an incredibly powerful tool. Contests over reproduction necessarily involve control over women and their bodies. Yet because reproduction is so intertwined with other social processes and institutions, controlling it also extends far into most corners of social, economic, and political life. Nancy Riley and Nilanjana Chatterjee explore how various social institutions beyond the individual – including state, religion, market, and family – are involved in the negotiation of reproductive power. They draw on examples from across the world, such as direct fertility policies in China and Romania, the influence of the Catholic Church in Poland and Brazil, racial discrimination and resistance in Mexico and the US, and how Japan and Norway use laws intended to encourage gender equality to indirectly shape reproduction. This engaging book sheds new light on the operations of power and gender in society. It will appeal to students taking courses on reproduction in departments of sociology, anthropology, and gender studies.
It is estimated that more than 30 million people of Indian Subcontinental origin presently live outside their homeland. The present geo-political status of the Indian Subcontinental diaspora calls for more research and newer theorisation on how migrants from the Indian Subcontinent relocate, acculturate and renegotiate their identities in new host environments. This volume focuses on their historical, socio-cultural and economic patterns of migration and identity negotiation and formation within transnational discourses. While some of the chapters here focus on the nature of representations of the homeland and hostland in the works of Indian Subcontinental diasporic writers and film directors, others deal with the economic and historic aspects of the Indian Subcontinental diaspora. The book also includes chapters on women’s Kalapani crossings, liminal spaces, Anglo-Indian-Australian diaspora, Chinese-Indian-Canadian diaspora, and Indian Subcontinental-British home workers’ transnational space, ushering in a new era of diasporic identities.
Following Françoise d’Eaubonne’s creation of the term “ecofeminism” in 1974, scholars around the world have explored ways that the degradation of the environment and the subjugation of women are linked. In the nearly three decades since the publication of the classical work Ecofeminism by Maria Mies and Vandana Shiva in 1993, several collections have appeared that apply ecofeminism to literary criticism, also known as feminist ecocriticism. The most recent of these include anthologies that emphasize international perspectives, furthering the comparative task launched by Mies and Shiva. To date, however, there have been no books devoted to gaining a broad-based understanding of feminist ecocriticism in India, understood in its own terms. Our new volume Indian Feminist Ecocriticism offers a survey of literature as seen through an ecofeminist lens by Indian scholars, which places contemporary literary analysis through a sampling of its diverse languages and in the context of millennia-old mythic traditions of India.
This book sheds new light on the causes and consequences of elephant migration in the Panchet Forest Division of Bankura District in West Bengal, India- an area characterized by fragmented forested landscape modified by agriculture and settlement expansion. Anthropogenic activities result in the decline in quality and coverage of forests, loss of biodiversity and removal of forest corridors which ultimately restrict or modify the movement of elephants causing a forceful change of their habitats. A major objective of this monograph is to identify the characteristics of man–elephant conflicts in terms of land use change, cropping patterns, ecological characteristics of the fragmented dry deciduous forest, trends and patterns of elephant migration, and livelihood patterns of the inhabitants in the affected areas. Readers will discover insights into changes in the behavioral pattern of elephants and local people in the conflict ridden zones, and how this influences food selection. Through this book we also learn about rational management strategies that can be employed on the local and national level to mitigate human-elephant conflicts. Ecologists, landscape conservation planners and environmental managers engaged in the conservation of large vertebrates in fragmenting and human-dominated landscapes will find this book valuable.
This book presents research on landscape ecology and the relationship between humans and wildlife. It helps readers understand how ecological patterns and processes are interconnected. This research illustrates and proposes (practicable) management strategies toward long-term ecological restoration and mitigation of consequences of conflict. Increasing wildlife activities in localities and forest fringes are an alarming issue. Ecological processes like movement, colonization, extinction and conflict issues depend on the landscape and ecological activities, the movement for example of migratory elephants and their colonization not only affects society but the wildlife and biodiversity too. Strategic management measures can contribute to enriching the biodiversity, habitat quality as well as landscape, while minimizing human-wildlife conflicts. This book describes landscape ecological patterns and processes, habitat dominancy, habitat dependency, suitability, connectivity and corridor selection. To synthesize these patterns and processes, several ecological indices are used. Use of geo-spatial techniques improves future management strategies for similar circumstances, especially, related to forest regeneration and forest restoration. This book provides a concise overview to a wide range of readers including postgraduate students, researcher, academics, landscape planners, decision makers and even local populations. The techniques and management strategies described should help planners to improve forest management, by implementing quality enhancement programs such as plantation area selection and corridor selection.
Advanced GIS and Crime Analysis explores the existing spatial variability of crime committed against women in West Bengal and steadily excavates the underlying determinants accountable for specific crimes against women. The book applies GIS technologies to visualise complex crime patterns over space and suggests specific measures to curb oppression. The book applies statistical methods and GIS techniques to visualise the vulnerable areas of crime against women in West Bengal and critically discusses emerging criminogenic issues with respect to theoretical understanding and immediate situations. The determination of the most significant crime hotspots, deliberation of substantial facts through a variety of collective socio-economic as well as environmental perspectives, and suggestive measures will assist law enforcement officials, practitioners, and policymakers in adopting immediate, effective measures. Advanced GIS and Crime Analysis will be beneficial for students of criminology, research scholars, practitioners, urban planners, and policymakers to understand the complex crime patterns that exist in West Bengal.
Worldwide demand for sand and gravel is increasing daily, as the need for these materials continues to rise, for example in the construction sector, in land filling and for transportation sector based infrastructural projects. This results in over-extraction of sand from channel beds, and hampers the natural renewal of sediment, geological setup and morphological processes of the riverine system. In India, illegal sand mining (of alluvial channels) and gravel mining (of perennial channels) are two anthropogenic issues that negatively affect the sustainable drainage system. Along the Kangsabati River in India, the consequences of sand mining are very serious. The construction of Mukutmonipur Dam (1958) on the river causes huge sediment deposition along the middle and downstream areas, these same areas are also intensely mined for sand (instream and on the flood plain). Geospatial models are applied in order to better understand the state and the resilience of stream hydraulics, morphological and river ecosystem variables during pre-mining and post-mining stages, using micro-level datasets of the Kangsabati River. The book also includes practicable measures to minimize the environmental consequences of instream mining in respect to optimum sand mining. It discusses the threshold limits of each variable in stream hydraulics, morphological and river ecological regime, and also discusses the most affected variables. Consequently, all outputs will be very useful for students, researchers, academicians, decision makers and practitioners and will facilitate applying these techniques to create models for other river basins.
Worldwide demand for sand and gravel is increasing daily, as the need for these materials continues to rise, for example in the construction sector, in land filling and for transportation sector based infrastructural projects. This results in over-extraction of sand from channel beds, and hampers the natural renewal of sediment, geological setup and morphological processes of the riverine system. In India, illegal sand mining (of alluvial channels) and gravel mining (of perennial channels) are two anthropogenic issues that negatively affect the sustainable drainage system. Along the Kangsabati River in India, the consequences of sand mining are very serious. The construction of Mukutmonipur Dam (1958) on the river causes huge sediment deposition along the middle and downstream areas, these same areas are also intensely mined for sand (instream and on the flood plain). Geospatial models are applied in order to better understand the state and the resilience of stream hydraulics, morphological and river ecosystem variables during pre-mining and post-mining stages, using micro-level datasets of the Kangsabati River. The book also includes practicable measures to minimize the environmental consequences of instream mining in respect to optimum sand mining. It discusses the threshold limits of each variable in stream hydraulics, morphological and river ecological regime, and also discusses the most affected variables. Consequently, all outputs will be very useful for students, researchers, academicians, decision makers and practitioners and will facilitate applying these techniques to create models for other river basins.
Advanced GIS and Crime Analysis explores the existing spatial variability of crime committed against women in West Bengal and steadily excavates the underlying determinants accountable for specific crimes against women. The book applies GIS technologies to visualise complex crime patterns over space and suggests specific measures to curb oppression. The book applies statistical methods and GIS techniques to visualise the vulnerable areas of crime against women in West Bengal and critically discusses emerging criminogenic issues with respect to theoretical understanding and immediate situations. The determination of the most significant crime hotspots, deliberation of substantial facts through a variety of collective socio-economic as well as environmental perspectives, and suggestive measures will assist law enforcement officials, practitioners, and policymakers in adopting immediate, effective measures. Advanced GIS and Crime Analysis will be beneficial for students of criminology, research scholars, practitioners, urban planners, and policymakers to understand the complex crime patterns that exist in West Bengal.
This book sheds new light on the causes and consequences of elephant migration in the Panchet Forest Division of Bankura District in West Bengal, India- an area characterized by fragmented forested landscape modified by agriculture and settlement expansion. Anthropogenic activities result in the decline in quality and coverage of forests, loss of biodiversity and removal of forest corridors which ultimately restrict or modify the movement of elephants causing a forceful change of their habitats. A major objective of this monograph is to identify the characteristics of man–elephant conflicts in terms of land use change, cropping patterns, ecological characteristics of the fragmented dry deciduous forest, trends and patterns of elephant migration, and livelihood patterns of the inhabitants in the affected areas. Readers will discover insights into changes in the behavioral pattern of elephants and local people in the conflict ridden zones, and how this influences food selection. Through this book we also learn about rational management strategies that can be employed on the local and national level to mitigate human-elephant conflicts. Ecologists, landscape conservation planners and environmental managers engaged in the conservation of large vertebrates in fragmenting and human-dominated landscapes will find this book valuable.
This book presents research on landscape ecology and the relationship between humans and wildlife. It helps readers understand how ecological patterns and processes are interconnected. This research illustrates and proposes (practicable) management strategies toward long-term ecological restoration and mitigation of consequences of conflict. Increasing wildlife activities in localities and forest fringes are an alarming issue. Ecological processes like movement, colonization, extinction and conflict issues depend on the landscape and ecological activities, the movement for example of migratory elephants and their colonization not only affects society but the wildlife and biodiversity too. Strategic management measures can contribute to enriching the biodiversity, habitat quality as well as landscape, while minimizing human-wildlife conflicts. This book describes landscape ecological patterns and processes, habitat dominancy, habitat dependency, suitability, connectivity and corridor selection. To synthesize these patterns and processes, several ecological indices are used. Use of geo-spatial techniques improves future management strategies for similar circumstances, especially, related to forest regeneration and forest restoration. This book provides a concise overview to a wide range of readers including postgraduate students, researcher, academics, landscape planners, decision makers and even local populations. The techniques and management strategies described should help planners to improve forest management, by implementing quality enhancement programs such as plantation area selection and corridor selection.
The great Indian nationalist leader Subhas Chandra Bose arrived in Singapore in 1943 to revitalize the Indian National Army (INA). Taking the opportunity of the Japanese occupation of parts of Southeast Asia, he launched armed struggle against British colonial rule in India. Two years later, that attempt failed at the eastern gates of India. Yet, it was a temporary failure because the INA helped set in motion a series of developments within India. These would culminate in its freedom in a further two years. Bose is household name in India. He is remembered in Southeast Asia as well, particularly among Indians. However, while his contributions to India's independence movement have been recorded exhaustively, less is known about the legacy that he left behind in Southeast Asia. This book seeks to fill that gap in the international understanding of a great Indian nationalist and pan-Asianist. It records how participation in the nationalist struggle invested Southeast Asian Indians with a rare sense of dignity and helped foster a mushrooming of militant trade unions, making it difficult for the returning British planters to perpetuate their control over what had been a docile workforce. The INA's Rani of Jhansi movement proved to be a pioneering effort at drawing Southeast Asian Indian women out of their traditional roles and expectations. It inspired some of them to take up mainstream roles for the cause of equality and emancipation. A Gentleman's Word retraces this journey of self-discovery of those who were inspired by Subhas Chandra Bose. The great Indian nationalist leader Subhas Chandra Bose arrived in Singapore in 1943 to revitalize the Indian National Army (INA). Taking the opportunity of the Japanese occupation of parts of Southeast Asia, he launched armed struggle against British colonial rule in India. Two years later, that attempt failed at the eastern gates of India. Yet, it was a temporary failure because the INA helped set in motion a series of developments within India. These would culminate in its freedom in a further two years. Bose is household name in India. He is remembered in Southeast Asia as well, particularly among Indians. However, while his contributions to India's independence movement have been recorded exhaustively, less is known about the legacy that he left behind in Southeast Asia. This book seeks to fill that gap in the international understanding of a great Indian nationalist and pan-Asianist. It records how participation in the nationalist struggle invested Southeast Asian Indians with a rare sense of dignity and helped foster a mushrooming of militant trade unions, making it difficult for the returning British planters to perpetuate their control over what had been a docile workforce. The INA's Rani of Jhansi movement proved to be a pioneering effort at drawing Southeast Asian Indian women out of their traditional roles and expectations. It inspired some of them to take up mainstream roles for the cause of equality and emancipation. A Gentleman's Word retraces this journey of self-discovery of those who were inspired by Subhas Chandra Bose.
This book focuses on the theoretical concepts of community psychology and its applications in day-to-day life. It discusses the challenges that adversely affect the welfare and well-being of common people and suggests community-centric, evidence-based measures to address them. Factors like new-age lifestyles, fast-paced development, and an increase in occurrence of natural calamities have been detrimental to the psychological well-being of the community. This volume integrates the social, cultural, economic, political, and environmental aspects of community psychology to address community life-based issues which include mental health stigma, social asymmetries, resource disparities, disadvantaged minority groups, the differently abled, HIV/AIDS patients, project-affected people, and disaster victims. Key features of this book include: • Dedicated intervention-based chapters on mental health, physical health, differently abled people, the elderly, vulnerable children, HIV/AIDS patients, and people affected by development projects and disasters. • Focus on challenges faced by students and school-based family counselling. • Case studies and conceptual models for better understanding and application of the subject. The volume will be a valuable resource to students, researchers, and teachers of Psychology, Social Work, Sociology, Public Health, and Social Economics. It will also be an indispensable read for social workers, NGOs, advocacy groups, and policymakers working in the field of social upliftment.
This volume explores how India as a geographical space was constructed by the British colonial regime in visual and material terms. It demonstrates the instrumentalisation of cultural artefacts such as landscape paintings, travel literature and cartography, as spatial practices overtly carrying scientific truth claims, to materially produce artificial spaces that reinforced power relations. It sheds light on the primary dominance of cartographic reason in the age of European Enlightenment which framed aesthetic and scientific modes of representation and imagination. The author cross-examines this imperial gaze as a visual perspective which bore the material inscriptions of a will to assert, possess and control. The distinguishing theme in this study is the production of India as a new geography sourced from Britain's own interaction with its rural outskirts and domination in its fringes. This book: Addresses the concept of "production of space" to study the formulation of a colonial geography which resulted in the birth of a new place, later a nation; Investigates a generative period in the formation of British India c. 1750–1850 as a colonial territory vis-à-vis its representation and reiteration in British maps, landscape paintings and travel writings; Brings Great Britain and British India together on one plane not only in terms of the physical geo-spaces but also in the excavation of critical domains by alluding to critics from both spaces; Seeks to understand the pictorial grammar that legitimised the expansive British imperial cartographic gaze as the dominant narrative which marginalised all other existing local ideas of space and inhabitation. Rethinking colonial constructions of modern India, this volume will be of immense interest to scholars and researchers of modern history, cultural geography, colonial studies, English literature, cultural studies, art, visual studies and area studies.
The Female Voice of Myanmar seeks to offer a female perspective on the history and political evolution of Myanmar. It delves into the lives and works of four of Myanmar's remarkable women who set aside their lives to answer the call of their country: Khin Myo Chit, who spoke about latent sexual politics in pre-Independent Burma; Ludu Daw Amar, who as the editor of the leftist Ludu Daily, was deemed anti-establishment and was witness to the socialist government's abortive efforts at ethnic reconciliation; Ma Thida, whose writing bears testimony to the impact the authoritative military rule had on the individual psyche; and Aung San Suu Kyi, who has re-articulated Burmese nationalism. This book breaks new ground in exploring their writing, both published and hitherto unexamined, some in English and much in Burmese, while the intimate biographical sketches offer a glimpse into the Burmese home and the shifting feminine image.
The novel has a mandate that there could be nothing more beautiful than the universal attributes of love, compassion, tolerance, forgiveness, a sisterhood and a brotherhood, understanding and humanitarianism seen through a variety of lenses and perspectives in general and gender in particular. The book carries a genuine message for humanity and the new world that is emerging. "A beautiful piece of writing that touches many issues such as violence; the pitfalls of retributive justice and the scourge of social inequality (all set against a backdrop of India) in a non-pedagogic, story like manner. Unputdownable." Shabnam Hashmi, Social Activist, Founder ANHAD (Act Now for Harmony and Democracy) “I have known Nilanjana Sanyal as a columnist for Tehelka magazines. Ms Sanyal’s new novel "There's Love In Every Heart" reminds me of noted author Francis Bacon who once penned “Some books are to be tasted, others to be swallowed, and some few to be chewed and digested; that is, some books are to be read only in parts; others to be read, but not curiously; and some few are to be read wholly, and with diligence and attention.” Every word of her novel is to be tasted, swallowed, chewed and digested literally.” Charanjit Ahuja, Editor, Tehelka
This book looks at madrasas and educational institutions run by Muslim communities in India focusing on the history, social relevance and importance of these institutions. It provides a sensitive and in-depth analysis of the push and pull of tradition, religiosity and modernity within these establishments. The book studies several institutions in Kozhikode, Surat, Mumbai, Hyderabad, Barak Valley in Assam, Ladakh, Delhi and several cities in Uttar Pradesh and examines new initiatives, curricula, models of education and professional training being offered. It contextualises educational reforms in madrasas in response to changing policies and larger socio-economic realities in contemporary India. It also interrogates stereotypes associated with Islam and madrasa education, paying particular attention to their syllabi and desired outcomes. This book also looks at the roles and positions of women in these institutions. Emphasising the long and complex history of Muslim communities and madrasas, the book showcases the remarkable diversity of approaches and pedagogical practices which combine deeni and duniyadi education across India today. This book will be of interest to students and researchers of the history of education, religious education, comparative education and sociology. It will also be useful to people working with NGOs and policymakers in the field of educational reform and planning.
Controlling reproduction – who has children, how many, and when – is important to states, communities, families, and individuals across the globe. However, the stakes are even higher than might at first be appreciated: control over reproduction is an incredibly powerful tool. Contests over reproduction necessarily involve control over women and their bodies. Yet because reproduction is so intertwined with other social processes and institutions, controlling it also extends far into most corners of social, economic, and political life. Nancy Riley and Nilanjana Chatterjee explore how various social institutions beyond the individual – including state, religion, market, and family – are involved in the negotiation of reproductive power. They draw on examples from across the world, such as direct fertility policies in China and Romania, the influence of the Catholic Church in Poland and Brazil, racial discrimination and resistance in Mexico and the US, and how Japan and Norway use laws intended to encourage gender equality to indirectly shape reproduction. This engaging book sheds new light on the operations of power and gender in society. It will appeal to students taking courses on reproduction in departments of sociology, anthropology, and gender studies.
This book examines the impact of British education policies on the Muslims of Colonial Bengal. It evaluates the student composition and curriculum of various educational institutions for Muslims in Calcutta and Dacca to show how they produced the educated Muslim middle class. The author studies the role of Muslim leaders such as Abdul Latif and Fazlul Huq in the spread of education among Muslims and looks at how segregation in education supported by the British fueled Muslim anxiety and separatism. The book analyzes the conflict of interest between Hindus and Muslims over education and employment which strengthened growing Muslim solidarity and anti- Hindu feeling, eventually leading to the demand for a separate nation. It also discusses the experiences of Muslim women at Sakhawat Memorial School, Lady Brabourne College, Eden College, Calcutta, and Dacca Universities at a time when several Brahmo and Hindu schools did not admit them. An important contribution to the study of colonial education in India, the book highlights the role of discriminatory colonial education policies and pedagogy in amplifying religious separatism. It will be useful for scholars and researchers of modern Indian history, religion, education, Partition studies, minority studies, imperialism, colonialism, and South Asian history.
This book is an innovative and rigorous study of Jhumpa Lahiri's Indian American female characters' lived and imagined diasporic house space, using domesticity and the house as an analytical tool to explore their hidden domestic spaces. The book explores how the house as a spatial construct, shares a symbiotic relationship with its inhabitants, and through their implicit and explicit response to various parts of their diasporic house space, interprets their maladies, limitations and opportunities. Indian American diasporic women, especially homemakers, have long been grappling with issues of socio-cultural invisibility as they have no other space to interact with except their houses in the hostland, now more than ever, during the global corona crisis. A reading of this multi-layered relationship between houses and their women will help readers understand not only the political, intellectual, emotional and sexual dispositions of middleclass Indian women in America, but also social, cultural and economic positions they occupy within the hostland. The book shows the represented domestic interstices and looks at them as signifiers of distinct individual trajectories, wherein lies embedded the women inhabitants’ oppositions beneath the acceptance of normative Indian family values in diaspora. It also offers elemental insights into ways in which migration acts as an opportunity for establishing new, often hybridized, identities, for which it is important to realise their connections with their house space. Presenting an alternative methodology for reading real and imagined lives of women in Indian American diaspora, the book proposes an unconventional mode of understanding diasporic realities and representations in cultural studies that is not readily apparent. It will be of interest to researchers in the field of South Asian Studies, Diaspora Studies, Migration Studies, Culture Studies, Feminist Writings, Gender Studies and Asian Literature. Foreword by Bill Ashcroft
Thank you for visiting our website. Would you like to provide feedback on how we could improve your experience?
This site does not use any third party cookies with one exception — it uses cookies from Google to deliver its services and to analyze traffic.Learn More.