November 2004
Joeyta Bose
Welcome to Women, Ink. Booklink, the monthly e-mail update on what's new in the Women, Ink. collection, selected web sites, events of interest, and more… As always, we have additional resources, articles and websites related to the topic at hand listed after the book descriptions. We hope that this information supplements your research and adds value to the book information provided.
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Books from Southeast Asia: Feminist Fine Print
This month we focus on Feminist Fine Print, a new series offered by the India-based publishing house Women Unlimited, an associate of Kali for Women. The series presents moderately priced collections of two or more core essays on a single issue from a critical feminist perspective. The essays may be single-authored or have multiple-authorship, depending on the issue, its significance within India and South Asia, and its theoretical and political implications.
(For more information on Women Unlimited, please go to the resource section)
Gender in the Hindu Nation: RSS Women as ideologues
Paolo BacchettaThis collection of essays offers a detailed account of women who are active in India's predominant Hindu nationalist party - the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS). Using interviews, archival material and secondary sources like party publications and documents, Bacchetta analyses the dichotomies between the women's own conceptions and the RSS' articulation of a woman's place in their ideology, symbolic space and the Hindu rashtra (nation).Introducing these distinctions, the opening essay identifies the Sangh's ideal woman as the chaste mother or passive sister who is victimized by Muslims and is in constant need of protection from her strong, militant Hindu sons. However, the Rashtra Sevika Samiti (the women's division of the RSS) represents women as involved citizens, vigorous warriors and through Ashtabhuja, an eight-armed goddess who is equipped for war. In a similar vein, Bacchetta traces Sangh v. Samiti perceptions of the ideal Hindu nation through an analysis of the symbolic representations of India, construction of Hindu and Other, religion, culture, language and the interrelated functioning between all these parts.
Exemplifying the Samiti's philosophy, the second essay draws on the life of one of its dynamic members, a paramilitary expert, in an attempt to assess the options militant Hindu nationalism provide for the greater independence of women. While Bacchetta concludes that Sangh discourse provides only a limited space for the autonomous actions of Hindu women, she identifies a contrasting, more liberal space for Muslim women within it. Thus, the third essay traces the historical development of the Sangh sensibility that Muslim women are subjugated by their male counterparts and need to be rescued from Islam's daily oppressions by more enlightened Hindu men.
2004. ISBN No: 81-88965-02-2. Hardcover.144 pgs. WE676. $14.95
Shifting Body Politics: Gender, Nation, State in Pakistan
Shahnaz RouseThis second volume of scholarly essays explores the changing parameters of gender struggles in Pakistan. Rooted in an analysis of Pakistan's colonial and post-colonial experience, Rouse's first piece uncurls indigenous discourses on gender that are tied up with notions of nationalism, distinct patriarchic constructions and post-independence struggles over Islam's role in the nascent state of Pakistan. Stressing the sense that every Pakistani woman's private life has been impacted by these macro ideas, Rouse dives into the narratives of two women to highlight the importance of subjective discourses in discerning the multiple conceptions of feminism and patriarchy that exist in Pakistan today.Rouse's emphasis on the tensions between the public and private domains is carried forward into the second essay, in which she analyses sovereignty, citizenship and the impact of these categories and their emergent practices on women. Based on the central idea that women's bodies and identities have been, and continue to be, a key site of contestation and definition of 'self' and 'other' in the Pakistani context, Rouse's analysis probes into the formation of national identity and its influence on family life, social organization and gender relations.
Employing a long view of history (as she does through the book), the final essay addresses the close relationship between conflict, gender and shrinking democratic spaces within the country for women and other minorities. In particular, Rouse examines the governance of successive military and civilian regimes from 1948 onwards and traces their influence to the militarization and masculinization of these spaces.
2004. ISBN No: 81-88965-03-0. Hardcover.155 pgs. WE677. $14.95
Globalization's New Wars: Seeds, Water & Life Forms
Vandana ShivaIn this new age of globalization, the world is increasingly being drawn into new kinds of wars that are far removed from nuclear weapons and mass destruction. These wars have to do with ecology and the ethical limits of profit, and the "enemies" are coercive free trade treaties, technologies of production-based violence, genetic engineering and nano-technologies.Seed wars, or the control of food grains, are being fought through Trade Related Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS) that impose property rights on seeds to take them beyond the reach of farmers. Water monopolies, sought by multinationals like Coke and Pepsi, deny access to water by carving out private property in the realm of public water resources and by privatizing public services to increase the cost of accessing water by 200-300 per cent. Sharing and exchanging knowledge/practices about biodiversity with indigenous communities often turns to piracy when individuals and organizations use process patents to appropriate the wisdom of biodiversity, that has often been collected by these indigenous communities over generations.
This major new work by author of the best-selling Staying Alive, and winner of the Alternative Nobel Peace Prize (1993), forcefully establishes the relationship between globalization as an economic war, and militarism and fundamentalisms as political and cultural wars dividing the world.
2005. ISBN No: 81-88965-17-0. Hardcover.140 pgs. WE678. $14.95
Order now but only available in January
Resources
For more information on fundamentalism, South East Asia and women:
Women Unlimited
Women Unlimited is an associate of Kali for Women, India's first and oldest feminist press, and publishes scholarly and academic books in social science, fiction, general interest non-fiction, books for young adults, pamphlets, monographs and activist material. Among its publications are those written by some of India's finest women authors, scholars and academicians, including Rajeshwari Sundar Rajan, Radhika Chopra, Indira Jaisingh, Zoya Hasan, Kamla Bhasin, Maitreyee Chaudhuri, Anupama Rao, Ismat Chugtai, Qurratulain Hyder, Nayantara Sahgal and Bulbul Sharma etc. Out of the 12-15 titles published each year, some 30-40 per cent are fiction while the rest are non-fiction, divided between academic and activist books. Non-fiction books are largely in English as this is the predominant language of academic debates.For more information contact: Women Unlimited, K-36 Hauz Khas Enclave, Ground Floor, New Delhi &endash; 110 116. Tel: 011-91-26964947/26524129;
E-mail: womenunltd@vsnl.net.
Two articles on the role of women in the Hindu nation
These two articles assess women's contributions to the Hindu nationalist movement in India. In particular 'Women and Hindutva," analyses the potential dangers a Hindu nation holds for women, even as it promises a wider role for them in its creation. 'A Will to Violence" examines the role of women in the nationalist movement, in relation to their contributions to the violent political will that has developed against Muslims in India.
"Women and Hindutva" (1994) can be found at: http://waf.gn.apc.org/j5p42.htm"A Will to Violence" (2002) can be accessed at: http://www.indiatogether.org/women/violence/will2viol.htm
Resources Against Communalism and Religious Fundamentalism in India
Compiled by Indian activist Harsh Kapoor, this bibliography on religious fundamentalism in India is part of a series that seeks to systematically list and document information on the worldwide rise of fundamentalism and its effects on women. This bibliography also lists initiatives and writings that are attempting to counter such movements.Find the bibliography at: http://www.wluml.org/english/publistype.shtml?cmd[72]=c-1-Bibliographies%20&%20Resources
Challenging Fundamentalisms: A Web Resource for Women's Humans Rights
Born out a major international meeting in 2002 on the 'Warning Signs of Fundamentalism," this web resource monitors and analyses the rise of fundamentalism and its adverse effects on women across the globe, including Southeast Asia. It presents comprehensive thematic overviews on the impact of fundamentalism on areas like women's health and sexuality, education, employment, political participation etc; a guide to relevant human rights forums and mechanisms; and opinion pieces and interviews with women who are leading initiatives to protect rights where they are undermined by fundamentalism. Maintained by the Association for Women's Rights in Development (AWID), Rights and Democracy and Women Living Under Muslim Laws, the website also contains links to relevant organizations, articles and provides an online research tool specific to fundamentalism.Read more at: http://www.whrnet.org/fundamentalisms/
Women Living Under Muslim Laws
Women Living Under Muslim Laws is an international solidarity network that provides information, support and a collective space for women whose lives are shaped, conditioned or governed by laws and customs said to derive from Islam. Among other resources, the site also provides access to a number of its publications on women living under Islamic law, including works on Bangladesh, India, Pakistan and Sri Lanka.For further information:
http://www.wluml.org/english/index.shtml
Women Against Fundamentalisms
Managed by a London-based organization of the same name (that has been recently resurrected), this online journal provides a space where academics and authors address the impact of religious fundamentalism on women in Bangladesh, India and Pakistan, among other countries.To access the first 8 issues go to: http://waf.gn.apc.org/articles.htm
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