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Book review: How neoliberalism reshapes motherhood in Calcutta

Published on May 14, 2009 by lorenz Posted in anthropology in the news, Asia, books, gender, globalisation

How do middle-class women in Calcutta understand and experience economic change? What impact is globalization having on the new middle-classes in Asia? Our reviewer Tereza Kuldova has again been lucky with her choice of books. For antropologi.info, she reviewes Domestic Goddesses: Maternity, Globalization and Middle-Class Identity in Contemporary India by Henrike Donner:

Donner, Henrike. (2008). Domestic Goddesses: Maternity, Globalization and Middle-Class Identity in Contemporary India. Ashgate. 230 pages. Price: £55.00.

Review by Tereza Kuldova

This anthropologically rich study based on an extensive ethnographic fieldwork brings us to the contemporary Calcutta and the homes of its middle-classes. It draws us convincingly right into the everyday domestic lifeworlds of the Bengali middle-class women, with all their concerns, ideas and ideals, sorrows, anxieties and joys.

This fresh study in urban anthropology undoubtedly fills a gap in the discussions on the Indian middle-class and modernity. Through identifying and establishing the domestic sphere as the key site of the remaking of the Indian middle-class in the contexts of globalization, post-liberalization and neo-liberal ideologies this book provides a novel rethinking of the wider transformations within the Indian society.

Analyzing the middle-class women’s narratives, Henrike Donner explores the shifts in the meanings and lived experiences of marriage, motherhood, conjugal relationships and family values. Focusing on the roles the women play as wives, mothers and homemakers, she examines the various ways in which the Indian urban middle-class is produced and reproduced – be it through seemingly unsubstantial lunch boxes of the middle-class children or the preference of caesarean section among the middle-class women. She analyses the ways in which the discourses on class, family and marriage, which commonly favour the role of the housewife and stay-at-home mother in order to produce a perfect family, shape the lives of these women; and how these women in turn shape the contemporary Indian society through their daily practices and ideas.

In her own words this “study is a reminder that the conflicts over the meaning of economic reform are not played out on the public stage of electoral politics alone, but also within families, between generations and in the embodied experiences of citizens. If neo-liberalism is not seen purely as an ideology but as a set of institutions, ideologies and technologies that bring about specific discourses, my research shows how it reshapes the Indian middle-class family, and with it motherhood” (180).

The Introduction gives us an idea about the background of the study, its location and reflections on fieldwork method. The part discussing the positioning of the anthropologist – a white woman from the “West” – and the power relationships between the fieldworker and her subjects evolving on the basis of this categorization are particularly interesting and give us closer insight in how relations are negotiated and how they evolve through time.

The first chapter on Middle-Class Domesticities and Maternities presents absorbing theoretical discussion of motherhood, kinship and reproduction. In her theoretical discussion on and analysis of how motherhood is constructed and discussed by women and the ways in which it dominates and orders their lives, Henrike Donner continually reflects on how these discourses and practices surrounding motherhood relate to power relations in the society, how they reflect the hegemonic processes of change, the ideas about modernity, the Hindu nationalist thought and the socio-economic relations. Motherhood is thus turned into the institution par excellence through which the historical change is studied. This continual linking between the wider transformations in the society and the rich ethnographic detail through a modified lens is, I believe, the greatest contribution of the study.

The second chapter Of Love, Marriage and Intimacy brings us at the core of the middle-class obsession with the discussions of love and marriages, which centre on the topics of, arranged and love marriages, suitable spouses, arranging matches and weddings and much more. Again these discussions and rich ethnographic material is set within the context and framework of the wider discursive formations and collective histories, contextualizing for example metropolitan ideas of what makes a good match through wider analysis of changing relationships between women and men, daughters and parents, in-laws and their son`s wives. The empirical data and cases are used actively in a combination with theory in a balanced manner, and the presence of the anthropologist throughout the whole book makes the text more readable and interesting. Viewing marriage in terms of process, which changes its meanings and the ways it is perceived over the lifecycle and across gender is also one of the strengths of Donner’s approach.

The third chapter concerned with The Place of Birth, i.e. basically the medicalization of childbirth, the availability of health services and changing birthing practices, opens up in front of us the world of parenthood as understood by the urban Bengali middle-class women. It discusses parenthood as a public prove of sexual prowess, fertility and reproduction being crucial in making and expanding the social significance of marriage as well as in making and reproduction of the middle-class. Infertility on the other hand carries a great social stigma, the infertile couple not only symbolizes “sexuality without a purpose, ‘coupledom’ without a future, and personal loss” but also challenges “generally held ideas about marriage and the Indian middle-class family” (92).

Discussing several cases Donner analyses the changing birthing practices, the interesting popularity of the self-elected caesarean sections, and the domestic relations at the time of the women’s pregnancy and much more. Particularly the analysis of the popularity of the caesarean deliveries is very enlightening, bringing in the notions of class, pollution, social status and middleclassness. The caesarean deliveries distinguish the middle class from the low class woman, they are markers of class and affluence, they are “clean” and the convalescence takes a considerable amount of time, which the low class woman in opposition to the middle class one does not have. Caesarean sections thus manage status as well as pain, pollution and embarrassment during the birth.

The fourth chapter on Education and the Making of Middle-Class Mothers is concerned with schooling during the early years of childhood and “the way parenting is implied in institutional practices and the way intimate relationships between mothers and their children are informed by wider socio-economic transformations” (123). This chapter thus discusses a rarely investigated topic of contemporary parenting in India and the role of mothers. The analysis shows how the mothers reproduce the middle-class ideals and tastes through active parenting strategies and how the children actually become subjects of multiple practices resulting from the liberalization policies and processes.

The fifth chapter with the title Motherhood, Food and the Body explores the middle-class woman’s agency as a consumer and relates the analysis of consumption to that of gendered bodies and (re)production of middle-class through consumption patterns. She particularly focuses on the wave of “new” vegetarianism and the various meanings it has, from control of the woman’s sexuality to idioms of purity.

This study shows clearly that even thought there is an increasing number of nuclear families, love marriages and divorces in urban India, which are commonly seen as indications of the post-liberalization changes, “the patrilocal residence, arranged marriages and lifelong unions still constitute normative discourses, and are often reinvigorated” (181). But at the same time “the increased significance of privacy, conjugality and individualism among urbanites supports new socialities and gendered identities” (182).

It also shows the ambiguous and surprising outcomes of the processes leading to the new middle-class lifestyles, which oscillate somewhere in between ideologies of individualism and media representations of family ideologies, which depict the Indian middle-class as consumption- and family oriented, as well as thoroughly nationalist.

One of the shortcuts of the study, I believe, is that it is thoroughly restricted to the domestic sphere and the middle-class household and does not take into account how the production and reproduction of the middle-class through the work of women is staged in the public sphere; how it is played out in the daily interactions outside the home and how these interactions actually shape and bring into being the lived social hierarchies. The discussion of relationships with men and the men’s views is certainly a missing link in the broader connections, too, though maybe intentionally omitted; such a discussion and focus would give the analysis more depth.

This book is without any doubt a great contribution to current anthropological discussions on how globalization and consumer oriented economies change and influence the kinship and marriage systems, as well as on how the class hierarchies are produced and reproduced in the urban setting. It is a must read for any anthropologist or a student of anthropology concerned with the modernity in developing countries, globalization and kinship. But the clarity of the language, interesting issues raised and richness of the ethnographic detail will surely draw the attention of a much broader specter of readers.

I haven’t found much material about or by Henrike Donner online. But on this page you’ll find links to papers she has put online: Committed mothers and well-adjusted children: privatisation, early-years education and motherhood in Calcutta and The significance of Naxalbari: accounts of personal involvement and politics in West Bengal

Chronicles Women’s Social Movements in India

How electricity changes daily life in Zanzibar – Interview with anthropologist Tanja Winther

Published on November 27, 2008 by lorenz Posted in Africa, anthropology in the news, books, development empowerment, fieldwork / methods, gender, technology

(Links updated 1.6.2021) How does everyday life change when electricity becomes available to people in a village in Zanzibar, East Africa, for the first time? Anthropologist Tanja Winther answers this question in her new book The Impact of Electricity. Development, Desires and Dilemmas.

The book is based on her doctoral dissertation and was also published in Swahili. “I think it would be a good thing if phd-budgets in general included the important step of making results accessible to the people under study”, she says in an email-interview with me.

“Electricity is a social phenomenon, and I hope that many anthropologists will join this fascinating field”, she adds.

Here is the interview:

So what has changed after the introduction of electricity?

What was most striking to me was the tremendous effect electricity has had on people’s time management. With electric light the day in theory has 24 hours instead of 12. People must make new choices as to what to do when. In consequence, time is speeding up and practices change: Women cook only two meals each day and not three as they used to (they now serve leftovers for the third meal). This is also linked to their wish to watch television in the evening and their opportunity to earn money during daytime.

Relations change in the process; the man has ‘entered the home’ in a new way. In the evenings, men and women now sit together in the same room, together with neighbours and the extended family. The electric light provide transparency and purity and the television programme is in focus. The paradox, although a phenomenon also observed in many other places, is that the spouses new opportunity to spend more time together actually provides less time for marital (?) intimacy. Sexual patterns change due to electricity. Because of this and also electricity’s high cost and rapid normalisation, there are signs that the birth rate is on the decrease. This was exemplified when men complained to me that due to the need for electricity, it is becoming too expensive to have more than one wife, or even get married at all.

People’s relationship to spirits also change; electric light is said to make space safer. Elderly, Swahili-speaking people would therefore refer to the new technology as ‘security light’.

Health wise, electrified water pumps and improvements in the health services (ex light at night time at the local clinic when a woman is in labour) has had a direct positive effect in development terms.

The arrival of water taps in the village implies that girls do not have to spend long hours fetching water from wells. Instead they are sent to school to the same extent as boys. Children, also girls, attend night classes before important exams and sleep in the school building. This surprised me, because parents in this Muslim context pay considerable attention to controlling girls’ whereabouts. I guess they have faith in the teachers looking properly after their children. But this also speaks of the tremendous importance people put on education in rural Zanzibar these days.

What are your thoughts about these changes?

When I started this study I was determined not to expect that electricity would bring ‘development’ to the countryside in Zanzibar. Overall, however, I am convinced that people’s new access to electricity has been a change to the better. Electricity is so fundamental when it comes to people’s access to information, to public services and to making the hard life in this region less physically demanding.

The notion of development in Swahili (maendeleo) is all about getting new ideas and new things that make you move forward. Following a grounded, entitlement-based approach to development one may even conclude that it should be a human right to have access to electricity. What they use electricity for must of course be left to the people in question to decide.

There are also problems, however, one challenge in Zanzibar being linked to the unequal structures that were also at work before electricity was introduced. In particular, I would highlight women’s lack of rights to inheritance and the fact that the divorce rate is high and easily obtained by men. Most women in rural Zanzibar do not own houses. They do not become electricity customers nor owners of appliances. Yet, they contribute substantially to financing the family’s high cost of electricity. This constitutes a problem the day their husbands want a divorce, when they are left with extremely little material wealth. Electricity may in this way have made women even more dependent on men than before.

In everyday life, there is also a concern among some people that electricity’s high costs may negatively affect the family’s food security. Perhaps the reduction in cooked meals implies that people eat less than before? (this has not been investigated from a detailed, nutritional point of view). At the same time, the alternative, to buy expensive kerosene for lighting and batteries for the radio, is also a financially risky business. In 1991, it would take a family 9 years to pay back their investment in electricity for light and radio as compared to the use of kerosene and batteries. (Thus after 9 years it would become cheaper to use electricity than the alternative fuels). In 2005, due to a rise in the kerosene price, the pay back time had been reduced to 4 years.

Information Project: People from Uroa (working for the Information Project) explaining the use and dangers of electricity during a public meeting in Uzi Village, 2005.

It seems that people sleep less than before. Those without electricity at home sometimes complain that their neighbours are tired after having watched television until midnight and therefore quarrel more than before. Many parents are concerned that children, especially boys who are freer to stay out late at night, are too tired to learn properly at school.

But in the larger picture, such effects are considered as details. The coming of tourists, however, is seen as a greater challenge. The foreigners are often considered to have an improper conduct that could affect new generations in unfortunate ways (alcohol, drugs, clothing etc). If tourism provided people with jobs, this would have balanced the picture, but so far, rural Zanzibaris mostly experience the negative side of this growing business. Still, people are strikingly warm and welcoming towards foreigners. Knowing the social and moral cost of the tourists’ presence in the neighbourhood, this attitude surprised me again and again.

What are the implications of your findings?

I hope to have demonstrated that asking and realising the question of “how” is just as important as “what” (e.g., electricity). My main case, electrification in Uroa village, was atypical in the sense that they were not included in project plans but ended up with the highest number of electricity customers and the only village in Zanzibar with street lights.

I try to show that the success of Uroa was not random, but a direct result of their own initiative and contribution in the process, including the use of magic remedies. People in the village are very proud of what they achieved. They demonstrated in practice what participation is about. Such involvement is possible despite the “heavy” and apparently predetermined nature of infrastructure projects.

On another level, the study revealed that ordinary customers have not been properly informed about how the accounting system works. As a result, the think they are being cheated by the utility and their own morality regarding illegal use becomes affected.

In response to these findings, Norad (The Norwegian Agency for Development Cooperation) agreed to finance an information project in Zanzibar where we put emphasis on electricity’s possibilities but also difficulties. Two teams (both genders, people from town and people from villages experienced with electricity) travelled around the islands for two months and held fabulous speeches:

– Do you think the ocean is dangerous? (Yes)
– We still go out fishing, don’t we? (Yes)
– It is the same with electricity. You just have to know how to deal with the danger…

I have received feedback from management in the World Bank’s evaluation group that the study is interesting also from their point of view. If the experiences from Uroa can be useful to people working and living elsewhere, nothing would be better.

In anthropology, I think there is a need for more studies on electricity and energy. Economists and engineers have had a claim to this field for a long time and there is renewed focus on energy these days.

This was exciting to study, I suppose? You’ve been there during the first years with electricity?

Yes, I arrived in Uroa village in 1991, one year after village electrification. When I came back for the main fieldwork in 2000, they had 10 years of experience with the new technology; more appliances, more households connected. I had expected to find many women cooking food with electricity (what people in 1991 said they expected would be the case). But very few did.

I thus learned the old lesson that people do not necessarily do what they say they want to do. There are many reasons why, but it is interesting to try to understand such discrepancies. I have also returned to Zanzibar in later years as a consultant. People’s use of electricity, as any practices, change in a fascinatingly rapid manner.

What was it like turning the doctoral dissertation into a book? A long process?

It took about one year to get the process started and then 1 1/2 years in production, so yes, it was a long process. Berghahn’s external reader had some very useful comments on an overall level that I have tried to respond to. Otherwise, I felt quite on my own in the process – the luxury of having a splendid supervisor (Aud Talle in my case), was gone. But when writing the thesis I had kept in mind Unni Wikan’s advice to think about the thesis as a book. To a great extent, I could keep to the same structure.

Why did you translate the book into Swahili?

The idea was initiated by one of my friends in Uroa during fieldwork. He does not speak or read English. He told me enthusiastically that he was thrilled about the thought of knowing that other people in East Africa would read the story from Uroa – and learn about electrification. Thus he was concerned about sharing the material with other groups.

I was just as concerned about making this man (and his co-villagers) have access to their own story. The Norwegian Embassy later kindly agreed to finance the translation of a shorter version of the material and have a book produced in 500 copies. This would perhaps not have been the case had I chosen another, less ‘relevant’ topic in their eyes.

But I think it would be a good thing if phd-budgets in general included the important step of making results accessible to the people under study. The book was recently distributed to 35 households in Uroa and schools across Zanzibar.

By the way, I remember Pat Caplan, the main opponent during the defence of the thesis, asking me what reactions I would expect from people in Uroa if they had access to the written material. I said that they would be likely to be proud and agree with most parts, but also surprised and perhaps even disturbed regarding other parts. In particular, the critical analysis of women’s position and the social exclusion of people in opposition to the government, could produce some reactions. I did not leave these aspects out in the published book, which is entitled Umeme: Faida na Athari Zake. Uzoefu Kutoka Kijiji cha Uroa. (Electricity: Its benefits and challenges. Experiences from Uroa Village). So far, I have not heard any reactions from the village, but of course, I am quite exited.

What are doing right now?

I am with the Centre for Development and the Environment (SUM) at the University of Oslo, who have hosted me since I first came in 1999 as an engineer wanting to learn and do anthropology. As member and secretary for a reference group of a trust fund in the World Bank (TFESSD), I discover that the Bank has come quite far in analytical work that integrate work on social development, gender and infrastructure.

The link between gender equality and energy continue to be one of my main interests, and I also currently work on a little piece called Why do poor people steal electricity?

Electricity is a social phenomenon, and I hope that many anthropologists will join this fascinating field. I think we are both needed and appreciated.

Thanks for the interview!

>> information about the book by the publisher (Berghahn Books)

>> more information about Tanja Winther

Related texts online by Tanja Winther:

Tanja Winther: Empowering women through electrification: Experiences from rural Zanzibar (pdf)

Tanja Winther: Social Impact Evaluation Study of the Rural Electrification Project in Zanzibar, Phase IV (2003-2006) (pdf)

Tanja Winther: Information Project. Zanzibar Rural Electrification Project, Phase IV. Project Report (pdf)

For readers in Norway: Her book will be presented in Klubben, University Library, Blindern, University of Oslo, Tuesday 9.12. from 16-17 o’clock.

Links updated 1.6.2021

(Links updated 1.6.2021) How does everyday life change when electricity becomes available to people in a village in Zanzibar, East Africa, for the first time? Anthropologist Tanja Winther answers this question in her new book The Impact of Electricity. Development,…

The anthropology of nudity: New issue of American Ethnography Quasimonthly

Published on November 27, 2008 by lorenz Posted in anthropology in the news, gender, journal articles / papers, Northern America

(LINKS UPDATED 13.8.2020) “Why are you, with your impeccable credentials, studying nude dancing?” “I am an anthropologist. Anthropologists study human behavior”, answered Judith Lynne Hanna when she did her field work on striptease clubs. Hoochy Coochy Dancing and Fantasy Love is the topic of the new issue of American Ethnography Quasimonthly.

Exotic Dance Adult Entertainment. Ethnography Challenges False Mythology by Judith Lynne Hanna is one of the texts in the November issue. Furthermore, there is a chapter of the book “G-Strings and Sympathy” by anthropologist Katherine Frank on strip clubs and a photoessay by Juliana Beasley who worked eight years as a professional nude dancer.

Sociologist Danielle Egan also worked as a striptease dancer and wrote about it and we can read an excerpt from her book “Dancing for Dollars and Paying for Love”.

There are also two historical contributions: Anthropologist Patsy Holden writes about the history of the Waltz and Swing, and we can read the first chapter of Thomas Faulkner’s book From the Ball-Room to Hell (1892)

There is open access to all articles.

Researched the sexual revolution in Iran

Sexual anthropologist explains how technology changes dating, love and relationships

“Prostitution is not sex for money”

Anthropologist: “Decriminalize prostitution! It’s part of our culture”

(LINKS UPDATED 13.8.2020) “Why are you, with your impeccable credentials, studying nude dancing?” “I am an anthropologist. Anthropologists study human behavior”, answered Judith Lynne Hanna when she did her field work on striptease clubs. Hoochy Coochy Dancing and Fantasy Love…

Researched the sexual revolution in Iran

Published on November 2, 2008 by lorenz Posted in anthropology in the news, books, gender, Middle East, politics, youth

Girls wear makeup, go with their hair uncovered, drink, have boyfriends and premarital sex: For seven years, anthropologist Pardis Mahdavi has studied the sexual revolution in Iran, the Ventura Country Star reports.

Those actions could have brought harsh punishment and even jail time in the past. But now the sheer numbers of young people overwhelm the morality police, who must often turn a blind eye on offenders, she said during a lecture.

Many parents are onboard with the changes:

Before 2002, women could not wear open-toe shoes, and then suddenly women began to openly defy the law, and you saw many, many women wearing sandals and flip-flops without any recrimination. I think they wear red lipstick just to irritate authority.

Ian Chesley has reviewed her book “Passionate Uprisings: Iran’s Sexual Revolution”:

Several of Mahdavi’s research subjects reported that by the summer of 2007, their parents considered premarital dating normal and acceptable. And while a parent in the US might be mortified by having to bail out their child from jail after an arrest at a rowdy party, some of Mahdavi’s adults happily come to their children’s rescue and forego any punishment of their own.

Mahdavi also writes of several parties put on by parents for their children and friends, and the parents come out looking more unrestrained than the younger generation. This observation is probably the most startling in the entire book: the fact that the older generation has begun to consider social behaviors as a form of protest against governmental restrictions is a clear piece of evidence that behavioral fashions are spreading to new segments of the population, beyond the young, wealthy and secular.

He writes that “the most startling and groundbreaking aspect of Mahdavi’s book is her description of the activities of young Iranians behind their bedroom doors. Not only are the book’s subjects frank and honest about their own liberal attitudes to sex, they have even provided Mahdavi with direct access to a group-sex party.

>> read the review i Gozaar

Mahdavi, who is a trained medical anthropologist and Del Jones Award Winner, adds that the sexual revolution has its problematic aspects:

I started this project looking at things from a public health standpoint — what about sex education, HIV, sexually transmitted diseases? The public health aspect is alarming. There is much premarital sex, but no sex education in schools, and almost all sex is unprotected. A condom can’t be purchased without proof of marriage. The young are largely uninformed about the risks of sex.

>> read the whole story in the Ventura County Star

>> Daily Sundial: Iranian youth continue sexual revolution against government

UPDATES:

Laura Secor has written a long review in The Nation (15.12.08)

The book was reviewed in The Australian (22.11.08)

Violet Blue sees similarities to white American evangelical teens (31.10.08)

Anthropologist explores heavy metal in Asia, South America and the Middle East

Lila Abu-Lughod: It’s time to give up the Western obsession with veiled Muslim women

Chronicles Women’s Social Movements in India

Those actions could have brought harsh punishment and even…

Native American Tribe Allows Gay Marriage

Published on August 22, 2008 by lorenz Posted in anthropology in the news, gender, Native American, Northern America

Gay marriage is banned in Oregon and the most states in the U.S. But if you are gay and Native American you are lucky: The Coquille Indian Tribe on the southern Oregon coast recently adopted a law that recognizes same-sex marriage.

The law extends to gay and lesbian partners all tribal benefits of marriage – even if a Coquille marries an Italian or Pakistani, The Oregonian and USA Today report.

According to anthropologist Brian Gilley, The Coquilles are probably the first tribe to legalize same-sex marriage. Gilley is author of the book, “Becoming Two-Spirit: Gay Identity and Social Acceptance in Indian Country”.

The interesting thing is that many Native American tribes historically accepted same-sex relationships. But in the colonial era, Europeans tended to change that.

Native Americans not only accepted lesbian and gay people, they also respected them as prophets, hunters or healers, anthropologist Rae Trewartha writes in The New Internationalist.

English and French-Canadian fur trappers were surprised to find that there were significant numbers of men dressed as women among the Native Indians, Scott Bidstrup writes:

What intrigued them the most, however, was the esteem with which these men were held by their fellow tribesmen. These men were considered to be spiritually gifted, a special gift to the tribe by God, men with a particular insight into spiritual matters.

Native Americans with mixed gender identity are called “Two Spirit” (see also a New York Times story about a Two Spirit gathering)

The new law rises interesting legal questions, anthropologist Brian Gilley explains, Because the Coquilles have federal status, a marriage within the tribe would be federally recognized. But that would violate the Defense of Marriage Act, a law that says the federal government “may not treat same-sex relationships as marriages for any purpose.”

“The federal government could challenge the Coquille law as a way of testing the limits of tribal independence”, he says.

>> Gay marriage in Oregon? Tribe says yes (The Oregonian, 20.8.08)

>> Native American tribe to allow same-sex marriages (USA Today, 22.8.08)

A subculture of hefty, hirsute gay men is attracting the attention of academics