Feminism In India Research Articles

Western Feminism and Indian Feminism: A Comparative Study

Feminism is a comprehensive movement that aims to address diverse manifestations of injustice and promote the rights of women. Despite their diverse nature, women's movements around the world express shared concerns regarding reproductive, political and legal rights. The primary objective of feminism is to emancipate women from various forms of mistreatment and foster global collaboration among women. However, there remains a substantial discrepancy in the quality of life experienced by women in economically impoverished nations in the Global South compared to those in economically prosperous countries in the Global North. Women residing in the economically developed regions of the world known as the Global North tend to benefit from capitalism and the global economy. Conversely, women living in the economically disadvantaged regions of the world known as the Global South typically encounter poverty and challenging working conditions. Indian feminism highlights the equal significance of economically exploitative behaviors, racism and gender discrimination as key issues. Indian feminism is considered more comprehensive than other forms of feminism since it places equal importance on both reproductive and productive responsibilities. The objective of this research is to examine the discrepancies between Western and Indian feminist ideology specifically focusing on the challenges associated with the adoption of Western ideals in India particularly the concept of essentialism. This research also examines the impact of increasing inequality on systems that depend on male involvement as well as the philosophical concerns associated with feminism in both Western and Indian settings. In order to illuminate the intricacies and subtleties present in these two prominent feminist traditions, the study employed a qualitative comparative analysis to emphasize discrepancies in the objectives of feminist groups regarding gender equality and women's empowerment.

Marital Discord and Pursuit of Gender Equality in Manju Kapur’s Custody Novel

The landscape of Indian literature has never been found to be equal in contribution from both the genders. It has always been dominated by male writers. It is very fair to say that the aspirations and expectations of Indian women have been largely confined to the ambit of moral and social commitments prevailing in our country. By and large, the Indian women writers in English have come from higher social strata and they do not have felt experience regarding reality of life in India. Despite it, they have started questioning the wisdom of prominent old patriarchal domination and they are no longer willing to play a subservient role to men. They have proved their mettle in literature both qualitative and quantitative wise. In the modern English fiction, the emergence of women centred or feminist approaches have been major developments. For establishing their identity, several Indian women writers have been delving deep into female subjectivity. The image portrayed by these writers regarding women has undergone a complete change. It is due to a paradigm shift in the attitude of the Indian women writers in portraying women as self -sacrificing persons to strong individuals trying to establish their identity. Among the prominent Indian women writers, Manju Kapur has carved a niche for herself by highlighting issues pertaining to patriarchy, family bonding, male –female bonding, inter religious marriage and co -existence of past and present. In 20th century, the works of Indian women writers have been considered as powerful equipment for making modernist and feminist statements. Feminism in India became an accepted doctrine and it was able to gradually set aside the male supremacy prevailing in the society. In fact, the history of feminism in India can be considered in three different phases. The first phase started when the British initiated steps against evil Sati practice. The next co-related with Quit India movement and the third took place after independence when there was a clamour for fair treatment from feminine gender after marriage. This article explains the part played by feminine gender at the domestic front and their willingness to be economically and socially independent and the challenges faced by them in attaining independence in a male dominated society.

Towards inclusivity: Dalit women’s representation in contemporary Telugu cinescapes

Cinema acts as a cultural product, a medium of expression and a source of popular entertainment; usually it appears to conscientiously genuflect to upper-caste dictums. Since its inception, Telugu cinema, or Tollywood, the third-largest film industry in India, has produced various caste-based films like Gudavalli Ramabrahmam’s Malapilla (1938), Kasinadhuni Vishwanath’s Kalam Marindhi (1972) and K. Balachander’s Rudraveena (1988), amongst others. In the discourse surrounding caste, the ‘Dalit woman question’ and its representation is either consciously ignored or erased, and thus, it stands enfolded in upper-caste reformist politics. This article analyses the representation of Dalit women in select Telugu films produced at significant sociopolitical junctures of contemporary times. These films mark a significant departure from the stereotypical representation of Dalit women as submissive and portray them as women with voices. Within the larger framework of feminist activism and human rights discourse, we see Dalit women protagonists in these films with an agentic space of their own. In the Indian context, where equality and no discrimination are constitutional rights, the films under discussion, Srikanth Addala’s Narappa (2021) and Sekhar Kammula’s Love Story (2021), are an appropriate intervention to showcase the inclusivity of Dalit women in the larger scheme of Indian feminism. This study employs critical textual and frame analysis to read selected Telugu films as cultural texts with Dalit feminist consciousness embedded within them.

Looking Back to Look Ahead: COVID-19, domestic violence, and digital activism in India

We look back to explore the impact of COVID-19 lockdowns on domestic violence amplification in India and the digital activisms that spotlighted this social and health injustice. This analysis focuses on two case studies – the #LockDownMeinLockUp [#LDMLU] campaign mobilized on Instagram, and articles drawn from the digital feminist publication, Feminism in India [FII]. We share our perspectives on how the #LDMLU campaign visually politicized the public nature of a silenced and normalized injustice against at-risk women during a pan-national health crisis. We turn to FII’s reporting on DV exacerbation during India’s pandemic that vocalized this issue from three critical perspectives: structural problems that contribute to gender injustices; financial violence; and mental, emotional, and physical health impacts on abused and at-risk women. In addition to this ‘look back,’ we look ahead to consider calls-to-action and opportunities, digital and/or on-ground, that remain imperative after the urgency of the viral lockdown. We are still at the threshold of activisms waiting, and needing, to happen. We conclude with questions for ourselves and our readers about what happens to advocacy when urgency ends. This growing body of feminist work demonstrates that advocacy will persist across physical and virtual landscapes. It is our responsibility and hope, as gender and communication scholars, to rally challenges against oppression based on gender or sex. Domestic violence against Indian women is continually overlooked. Our collective perspective intends to consolidate visibility toward such acts of abuse at the center of this scholarly piece.

Exploring Gender Dynamics in Indian and Pakistani English Poetry: A Comparative Pragma-Stylistic Examination

This research paper highlights the analysis of gender dynamics among Indian and Pakistani poetry by conducting manual thematic analysis on Kishwar Naheed’s poem collection ‘Composition of Scorched Heart’ and ‘Ms. Militancy’ by Meera Kandasamy. The thematic analysis was executed through the lens of gender identity, opposition to patriarchal norms, experiences of oppression, the significance of sisterhood, and the pursuit of empowerment and liberation. Both poets provide insights about the emotional settings formed by rigid social norms also challenging cultural expectations. Comparative examination reveals common themes, differences in methodology, symbolism, and intersectionality recognition. These volumes of poems challenged readers to consider the distinctions of women's lives within liberal feminist ideals, contributing to the ongoing conversation on gender, power, and cultural expectations. This comparative study investigates the expressions of liberal feminism in India and Pakistan via an analysis of two stirring poetry collections: “Ms. Militancy” by Meena Kandasamy and “Composition of Scorched Heart” by Kishwar Naheed.

Navigating the Labyrinth: Struggles and Triumphs of the Indian Women’s Movement

The paper highlights the dynamic nature of Indian feminism, emphasizing its diverse interpretations, intersectional approach, and unwavering commitment to achieving gender justice. It underscores the need for continued dialogue, critical analysis of successes and failures, and sustained efforts to dismantle the entrenched structures that perpetuate gendered inequalities. By exploring the ongoing struggles and celebrating the hard-won victories, this paper aims at inviting a deeper understanding of this ever-evolving movement and its crucial role in shaping India's future. Feminism in India is a vibrant, complex tapestry woven across centuries, marked by both remarkable progress and tenacious struggles. Rooted in colonial critiques and anti-patriarchal movements, Indian feminism has evolved into a multifaceted platform challenging gender inequalities across numerous fronts: economic disparity, political underrepresentation, social discrimination, and culture-specific injustices like dowry deaths and female infanticide. Its key achievements include constitutional guarantees of equality, landmark legislation like the Protection of Women from Domestic Violence Act, and growing representation in education and the workforce. However, the fight for a truly equitable society remains an ongoing battle. Challenges like entrenched patriarchal norms, religious fundamentalism, and systemic injustices against marginalized communities, especially Dalit women and those in rural areas, continue to impede progress.

Caste Capitalism and Queer Theory: Beyond Identity Politics in India

This article uses “caste capitalism” as a framework for thinking through the entanglements of sexuality politics, caste, and capital in contemporary India. The author uses a queer hermeneutic of heritability and endogamy, drawing inspiration from Indian feminist, queer, anti-caste, and Marxist critiques, and from racial capitalism as theorized by Cedric Robinson. The author argues that caste capitalism, read through a queer hermeneutic, makes the historicity of caste rules clearer, showing how they are both enforced through violent social norms, and, at the same time, selectively or intermittently ignored, e.g., in spaces of non-normative sexuality and gender expression. The use of this hermeneutic emphasizes the normative functions of caste-based endogamy while undoing the idea of sexuality as a scientized aspect of the privatized and “private” self, which is understood here as an effect of conceiving the body as hived off from questions of land rights, economic autonomy, and historically contingent iterations of caste categories and relations. This use of caste capitalism contributes to countermanding Hindu nationalist deployments of homonationalist rhetoric that rely on the ahistoricity of caste as a central aspect of arguing for a timeless and territorially coherent religion and culture that must now be defended through violent and autocratic means.

Indian Scenario Feminism in Sujata Parashar’s In Pursuit of Infidelity

The word ‘Feminism’, but understanding of it remains vague and there is a general rejection of its relevance to the Indian context. ‘Indian feminism’ should lie in the spread of education, economic self-sufficiency, preservation of human rights, self respect and in the awareness of the desire for liberation from all restriction made by patriarchal society. Sujata Parashar’s protagonist is a typical Indian woman, she has accepted everything without questioning. Sometimes she introspects and thinks of her marriage, she is trying to forgive herself and she feels if she forgives him, she may be able to forgive herself as well as with this realization, she goes back to her husband Gaurav.

Emerging Digital Feminist Voices and Activism in India

The advent of technology and virtual media have changed the way it helps to create more multidimensionalconnections. Feminism too has taken the virtual media as an important channel of communicating and creating global networks. Empowerment of women in the new technological realm is an ongoing need of the current digital age as it paves way for essentialsocio-economic and political empowerment.Digital feminism an avant-garde phase of the feminist activism is a growing phenomenon across the world as well as in India, which is being shaped by various social, cultural and political factors.It goes far ahead of former feminist waves that conceived women as a universal and homogenous group, whose interests could be represented by a singular framework.This research paper aims to trace the emergence of Digital Feminism in India, along with analyzing its effect and solidarity of these movements and activism on women’s lives and issues. It also examines the way in which women are using digital media platforms to challenge the gender stereotype and gender inequalities in their everyday lives. The paper also dwells upon the arena where the use of digital media platforms enables, newer forms of exposure and connection previously unavailable to women and allowing them to redraw the boundaries between themselves and society.

Examination of three postcolonial African writers' perspectives on third world feminism

A variation of feminism known as postcolonial feminism emerged in opposition to feminism that exclusively addressed women's experiences in Western societies. In order to demonstrate how racism and the lasting political, economic, and cultural repercussions of colonialism affect non-white and non-Western women in the postcolonial globe, postcolonial feminism examines these issues. African feminism is a subset of feminism developed by African women that is focused on the issues and concerns of women in continental Africa (African women residing on the African continent). These feminism movements do not all represent the realities of African women because Africa is not a homogeneous continent. Some feminists are particularly focused on particular subgroups of African women, including movements with a national foundation, such as feminism in Sweden, feminism in India, feminism in Mexico, feminism in Japan, feminism in Germany, feminism in South Africa, etc. The concept of feminism for many African writers in the post-colonial era in the Third World has been the subject of widespread controversy, as it is seen as a feminist movement in line with and for African women in the diaspora instead of African women in the African continent. In this study, we present the perspectives of three African writers interested in the feminist movement about their vision of the concepts and role of the feminist movement in the post-colonial era in the Third World by shedding light on African feminist movements and the challenges they face. The study presents the vision of three African writers for the women's movement in the Third World in general and the African continent in particular in the post-colonial period through the emergence and development of the African feminist movement, and the three writers selected in this study are activists of the feminist movement inside Africa through their literary activity. Delusion: Molara Ogundipe-Leslie, Assia Djebar and Robert C.J.Young.

Raving with Equality? On Protean Forms of Caste and Gender in the Women’s/Gender Studies Departments in India

Women’s and gender studies in the twenty-first century have transformed the question of theory and praxis across the globe. As a discipline, it is waging its struggle against diverse forms of power and patriarchy. Women’s studies in India started its own unique trajectory from the 1970s onwards. However, Dalit feminism critiqued the metanarrative of Indian feminism in the 1990s. Dalit feminists argued that they are oppressed on the basis of caste, class and gender. Dalit feminism subverted the internal and external patriarchy through its own powerful methodology and tropes. It debunked the partial, Brahminic, Indian feminism and its conspicuous silence on the relations of caste, gender, class and patriarchy. Dominant feminists included Dalit feminist discourse in the curriculum in a patronising fashion. Paradoxically, the social composition of those academicians was confined to the upper caste/class locations. This article engages with the experiences of Dalit women academicians who teach in the department of women’s and gender studies in India. It explores forms and practices of caste, class, and gender discrimination in such departments. These forms of domination and subordination show the contradiction between practice and theory. It reflects on the moral and ethical positioning to unpack the everyday caste violence that operates in the educational institutions. It maps the politics of women’s and gender studies in India. This article analyses the possibilities and impossibilities related to Dalit feminist engagement with capabilities and intersectional approaches in women’s and gender studies in India. The main thrust is to examine the real and utopian dimensions of the assertions of Dalit women academicians.

From “Neti” to “Deathless Goddess”: The Feminine in Nandini Sahu’s Sita and Shedding the Metaphors

In both Sita and Shedding the Metaphors, Nandini Sahu offers revolutionary interpretations of womanhood, effortlessly embracing nature, tradition, and modern cultural norms. She says she "pours" her own "image" and "personality" into her characters and stories, drawing on her own experience and interactions (Shedding the Metaphors, Preface, 13). Her approach embraces subjectivity and empiricism as well as her broad variety of readings, including both literary and academic works, even though it is not necessarily autobiographical. Nandini Sahu also makes Sita her own in Sita, revitalizing Sita's mythology in the process and giving her a strong sense of modern relevance in poetry that is never prosaic and is driven by argument. Her women characters emerge as strong and impressive, with a strong emotional maturity and a marked sense of empathy and morality but willing to reveal their raw emotions and spontaneity. Their exploitation by uncaring individuals is seen in keeping with a patriarchal society, that is destructive of both femininity and nature. The strong single mothers and single working women manage to draw on their capacity to love and take care of others to feed their strength. Her women are Goddess-like and like primal Nature: abundant, giving, strong, eco-feminist, and ready to break free from stereotypes and conventional metaphors. The subjectivity of Sahu's Sita is strongly Indian feminist and highly modern. She moves fluidly between the past, conceptions of the past, and present patriarchy, where female foeticide still haunts India, without missing a beat (of argument or metre). She probes into every facet of women's existence, connecting old conceptions of male supremacy with present clichés.

Sita’s Story: Intertextuality and Folkloric Allusions in the Creation of a Desi Feminist Discourse in Nandini Sahu’s Sita

The story of Sita in the Indian epic Ramayana has over time been subject to several transformations, reinterpretations, and recontextualization. Sita the fiercely dedicated wife of Lord Rama has evolved to become a woman protagonist and, in some cases, even a feminist idol. Although there have been several modern interpretations of the Ramayana, Nandini Sahu’s Sita composed as a poetic memoir running into 25 cantos, in its form, content, and context is situated in a liminal space between the real world and the mythical world. This liminality is otherwise referred to as the “permeable membrane” in the words of A. K Ramanujan provides scope for many voices to emerge; from orality, from marga and desi mediums all of which oscillate between the temporal zones of the past, present, and future, constantly engaging with one another. Furthermore, the figure of Sita and her narratives extend to what Sahu refers to as the “Sitaness” in every woman whose agency has been snatched. For instance, she yokes together women protagonists from the Literary domain such as Desdemona, mythical namely, Trijada, and historical such as Meerabai, Mother Teresa, Kalpna Chawla, and even Nirbhaya respectively to create a uniquely Indian feminist discourse highlighting various instances of injustice meted towards women. Moreover, the poem is crafted using self-reflexive storytelling inspired by oral tradition and folklore. It also implements multilayered intertextual allusions to reimagine Sita as a woman protagonist transcending time and space. Therefore, this paper will investigate the intertextual and folkloric allusions in Nandini Sahu’s Sita consequently exploring the relevance of this composition as a contribution towards the creation of a desi-feminist discourse.

Scripting of a ‘New Woman’: Rabindranath Tagore’s Jogajog

There has been a whole range of both male and female writers who have advocated the cause of women and portrayed the diverse shades of their personality in inventive works. Rabindranath Tagore has been the most countless-minded personality of modern India. He was the first writer to give equal or perhaps more place to women in his writings. The wave of new woman ideology was not only limited to the Western world. It affected women around the world and even men who were sensitive to women’s issues. Rabindranath Tagore was a personality who clearly dealt with issues like women’s will, their rights and freedoms in his novels. The approach adopted in the present study is not a follow-up to Western feminist ideas, but a synthesis of the concepts available within the Indian sociological system. In India, feminism is a debatable concept. Indian feminist researchers or women studies researchers have not been able to define what Indian feminism exactly is? Indian feminists are not very comfortable in creating a strict definition of theories such as writing and Western feminism. He was a personality who dealt with issues such as women’s will, their rights and freedoms clearly in his novels. In Tagore’s narrative, there is a reflection of courageous women in women. One can call them the ‘New Women’. Keywords: New Woman, Feminine, Indian Society, Marriage and Family, Man-Woman Relationship, Sexuality

Dalit Feminism and the Intersection of Class, Caste and Gender in The Prisons We Broke by Baby Kamble

Dalit feminism emerged as a response to mainstream Indian feminism, which tended to downplay caste related issues. Dalit feminism studies not only the patriarchal oppression of Dalit women at the hands of upper-caste men but also from the members within their own caste. Baby Kamble grapples with this issue as a writer as well as an activist. This paper attempts to study the intersectional impact of caste, gender and class in her work The Prisons We Broke using the Dalit feminist theoretical approach. It attempts to analyse the textual representation of Dalit women’s predicament not only through the portrayal of the interlinked complexity of caste, gender and class-based oppressions but also through the intersection and overlapping of these realities within the autobiographical rubric of writing. In her seminal work, Baby Kamble exposes the deprivation of Dalits and the struggles and oppression of Dalit women. Kamble seems to immerse or place herself within the community but does not leave out the complexity of identity for a Dalit woman. Her autobiography thus disrupts the standard concepts of autobiography that place individual at the centre. As opposed to the existing gap among mainstream feminist movement, there seems to be a scope to reshape feminist solidarity among the Dalit feminist scholarship. This paper builds upon the major concerns shared by Dalit feminists within the social structures that assert the subjugation of Dalit women using the lens of caste and gender. It further attempts to extend the theoretical scope and applicability of Dalit feminism by exploring the conceptual specificity of the social reproduction of the social location-based knowledge of Dalit women’s predicament.

Shatta music, a new space for French West Indian feminism

Shatta music, a new space for French West Indian feminism

Dissonant intimacies: Coloniality and the failures of South–South collaboration

North–South research collaborations have come to include both an epistemic and ethical promise – of disrupting hierarchies, inequalities and asymmetries in global knowledge production. In practice, however, these have been ridden with limits, tension and failure. The ‘South–South’ has emerged as a worthy foil: an easy repository of positive affects and of decolonial futurity. This article turns to a feminist collaborative research initiative that seemed primed to fulfil these promises, but in fact, failed to do so. A partnership between African and Indian feminist scholars did not provide meaningful and reciprocal intellectual exchange. On the contrary, it powerfully revealed the coloniality of knowledge and power in higher education and how it manifested, differently, in two distinct locales in the Global South. This partnership constituted less of a shared ground, than one of complex and uneven relationships – a terrain of dissonant intimacies. It is not surprising that these were Southern scholars working in marginalised areas of research, like gender and sexuality. Such a double marginalisation produces specific sets of choices – and ambivalent desires – when it comes to being included in an unequal global epistemic order (and responding to neoliberal demands). This article contributes to larger debates on decolonising higher education, by shifting the scale from the North–South to the complexities of knowledge-making and power within and across the South.

A Radical Feminist Reading of Kamala Das’ Poetry

“I am different; I am an entity” —uttered Kamala Das, one of the India’s renowned poetess who was known for her iconoclast views regarding the female issues and their sexuality. She openly waged a war on the hypocrisy of society and fought against it to establish a society where women are not deprived of their rights and discriminated on the basis of their sex and gender. She was fearless when it comes to women issues and vehemently opposed the dictum ‘angel in house’ or ‘men for the field and women for the hearth’ which were used to confine the women to four walls of the house. Her poems celebrate the female sexuality and uniqueness of female body. She doesn’t shy away from putting it into public through her writing which has fetched her, the title of being the ‘radical feminist’. The paper will show how audacious was Kamala Das in her protest against patriarchy and embracing of matrilineal culture with a romantic fervour, the exploration of female sexuality and sexual desires of women — and, in the words of K.R. Srinivasa Iyengar, “aggressively individualistic,” is Kamala Das aka Madhavi Kutty, the icon of Indian feminism.

Traversing Gendered Margins through the Lens of Mother-Daughter Relationship: A Reading of Krishna Sobti's Listen, Girl! and Geetanjali Shree's Tomb Of Sand


 
 
 
 This paper seeks to examine the obfuscating yet definitive and detrimental presence of patriarchal control and gendered realities in family dynamics through an analysis of Krishna Sobti's Ai Ladki (Listen Girl!) and Geetanjali Shree's Ret Samadhi (Tomb of Sand). These two fictional texts can help to understand the intricate relationship between gender, identity, and other cultural constructs within the context of Indian literature in Translation through a close examination of the power dynamics and social norms underlying the family system as portrayed in these narratives. The objective is to investigate these complex interplays so as to locate the position and subjectivity of Indian women in specific contexts and relationships. Both texts map the space of the historically victimized female subject and further explore the possibility of alternative subjectivities within the framework of Indian feminism. The paper is divided into three sections, each of which foregrounds the importance of equal representation of all genders as well as individuals from the periphery, making inclusivity the central theme. The first section explores the distinct fields of literary and cultural translation and their contribution to the making of “Women's Writings” within the expansive framework of “Indian Literature,” highlighting the often-overlooked status of women writers and translators and their invaluable contributions to shaping and amplifying the voices of Indian women relegated to obscurity due to the burden of being both women and Indian. The second section sheds light on the strong and intense presence of women writers in indigenous languages and their considerable impact on the wider literary landscape. The third section probes the chosen literary works as specimens of “ecriture feminine” (to use the term coined by Helene Cixous).
 
 
 

'Dalit Feminist Theory: A Reader'

This reader is a compilation of eighteen essays written by academics, feminists and scholar-activists from a Dalit Feminist Perspective. The editors Sunaina Arya and Aakash Singh Rathore, introduces the book by theorizing Dalit feminism underpinning its ontology and epistemology. Critiquing the academic discourse of feminism which predominantly questions gender inequality on a single axis as a fight against patriarchy, Arya and Rathore pose the important question, ‘Why Dalit Feminist Theory?’. Although the dialogue on Dalit Feminist standpoints started during the 1990s, the core of the book lies in attempting to legitimize Dalit Feminist Theory due to the ubiquity of caste question in Indian society, which cannot be overlooked in any circumstances. Thus, the book revisits the Indian Feminist discourse for feminists to critique the gatekeeping that ‘upper caste’ privileged feminists did to represent the issues of all women by homogenizing the category of a woman based on a few percentages of upper caste women leaving out Dalit, Bahujan, Adivasi and minority women who forms a much larger percentage in comparison. The book is an important read due to its critical engagement and initiation of a dialogue with Indian feminists to argue the need for Dalit Feminist Theory in reshaping Indian feminist discourse.