One Woman’s India

One Woman’s India
Author: Anna Varki
Publisher: Notion Press
Total Pages: 109
Release: 2018-05-23
Genre: Biography & Autobiography
ISBN: 1643240722

These memoirs of ninety six years of my life include many momentous experiences via my famous journalist father Pothan Joseph and his connections to Gandhiji (Mahatma Gandhi), my life raising a family in the Indian Railway system in post-Independence times, beginning a career as a teacher when I was well past youth and, finally, retiring with full access to the internet, email and other benefits of the Cyber Age

Being Single in India

Being Single in India
Author: Sarah Lamb
Publisher: Univ of California Press
Total Pages: 236
Release: 2022-06-07
Genre: History
ISBN: 0520389425

Today, the majority of the world's population lives in a country with falling marriage rates, a phenomenon with profound impacts on women, gender, and sexuality. In this exceptionally crafted ethnography, Sarah Lamb probes the gendered trend of single women in India, examining what makes living outside of marriage for women increasingly possible and yet incredibly challenging. Featuring the stories of never-married women as young as 35 and as old as 92, this book offers a remarkable portrait of a way of life experienced by women across class and caste divides. For women in India, complex social-cultural and political-economic contexts are foundational to their lives and decisions, and remaining unmarried is often an unintended consequence of other pressing life priorities. Arguing that never-married women are able to illuminate their society's broader social-cultural values, Lamb offers a new and startling look at prevailing systems in India today. "This pathbreaking book offers a vital analysis of the rising but unrecognized category of single women in a marriage-minded society such as India. Through beautifully rendered and diverse stories, Sarah Lamb challenges conventional wisdom." -MARCIA C. INHORN, William K. Lanman, Jr. Professor of Anthropology and International Affairs, Yale University "For fans of Lamb's evocative narratives on Bengali widows, her new book provides another rich look at the negative space of marriage: the rare demographic of single women in Bengal across class and caste." -SRIMATI BASU, author of The Trouble with Marriage: Feminists Confront Law and Violence in India "This lively ethnographic account makes several key contributions to feminist anthropological appraisals of marriage as an institution. Lamb renders a compelling, detailed, and sensitive portrait of compulsory heterosexuality and patriliny as seen from the margins." -LUCINDA RAMBERG, Associate Professor of Anthropology and Feminist, Gender, and Sexuality Studies, Cornell University.

Status Single

Status Single
Author: Sreemoyee Piu Kundu
Publisher: Amaryllis - an imprint of Manjul Publishing House
Total Pages: 262
Release: 2018-02-12
Genre: Biography & Autobiography
ISBN: 9381506906

Marriage. It’s the obvious path for every girl in India. It’s supposed to define us, shape us and give meaning to our life. But does it, really? Figures show that nearly 74.1 million women in India are either divorced, separated, widowed or have never been married. And the number is on the rise. In what promises to be a path-breaking work on female identity, Sreemoyee Piu Kundu, a proud-to-be-single woman herself, spills the beans on what it is like being over 30 and unattached in India, through her own compelling story and the chequered lives and journeys of nearly 3,000 urban single Indian women from all walks of life. Women, whether single by choice or circumstance, are under scathing societal pressure, invasive scrutiny and pervasive criticism. Be it the difficulty in renting an apartment, being character-assassinated by your gynaecologist, or being slut- shamed as having slept your way to the top, even when you’re successful professionally, a single woman’s life choices are the easiest to dissect. From one of the most powerful voices in contemporary Indian writing, comes a passionate narrative of grit and gumption, anger and loneliness and the daily struggle of being single in a country where the highest validation of your gender remains marriage and motherhood. Fiercely honest and painfully vulnerable, Status Single is a book that every woman and man—single or otherwise—must read.

Breaking Out

Breaking Out
Author: Padma Desai
Publisher: MIT Press
Total Pages: 277
Release: 2013-09-13
Genre: Biography & Autobiography
ISBN: 0262019973

The brave and moving memoir of a woman's journey of transformation: from a sheltered Indian upbringing to success and academic eminence in America. Padma Desai grew up in the 1930s in the provincial world of Surat, India, where she had a sheltered and strict upbringing in a traditional Gujarati Anavil Brahmin family. Her academic brilliance won her a scholarship to Bombay University, where the first heady taste of freedom in the big city led to tragic consequences—seduction by a fellow student whom she was then compelled to marry. In a failed attempt to end this disastrous first marriage, she converted to Christianity. A scholarship to America in 1955 launched her on her long journey to liberation from the burdens and constraints of her life in India. With a growing self-awareness and transformation at many levels, she made a new life for herself, met and married the celebrated economist Jagdish Bhagwati, became a mother, and rose to academic eminence at Harvard and Columbia. How did she navigate the tumultuous road to assimilation in American society and culture? And what did she retain of her Indian upbringing in the process? This brave and moving memoir—written with a novelist's skill at evoking personalities, places, and atmosphere, and a scholar's insights into culture and society, community, and family—tells a compelling and thought-provoking human story that will resonate with readers everywhere.

Its Always Possible: Transforming One of the Largest Prisons in the World

Its Always Possible: Transforming One of the Largest Prisons in the World
Author: Kiran Bedi
Publisher: Sterling Publishers Pvt. Ltd
Total Pages: 444
Release: 2005-12-01
Genre: Social Science
ISBN: 9788120728868

Motivation, persistence and perseverance are the distinct traits of determined and dedicated individuals who can make things happen. It's always possible, even when the task is awesome -- transforming the mindset of human beings. Located in India's capital, New Delhi, Tihar is one of the largest prisons in the world. Within a prison complex of over 200 acres are housed over 9,700 inmates -- men, women, adolescents, children; Indians and foreigners. They comprise unconvicted alleged offenders, convicts and remandees. Tihar was a limping, languishing institution, condemned by the media, and its inmates were isolated from the community, exploited, used and abused, yet 'housed'. Dr Kiran Bedi was appointed Inspector General of Tihar Prison in 1993. She brought about fundamental changes, giving a human face to the administrative structure and creating an exemplary system covering every possible aspect of prison management. The whole objective was to collectively and individually manage the transition from a moribund system to a responsive and sensitive administration. Hence her efforts unfolded the process of reformation involving prison administration, prisoners and the community, toward one common goal -- Correction through a collective approach. Dr Bedi's account is enhanced by input from the prisoners themselves, expressing their feelings in letters and sketches, in petitions and poetry. This book is a graphic portrayal of an holistic process of conversion, a metamorphosis from criminality to humanity, achieved within a restrictive legal framework.

No Woman's Land

No Woman's Land
Author: Ritu Menon
Publisher:
Total Pages: 216
Release: 2004
Genre: History
ISBN:

Never Before Has A Single Volume Featured Non-Fiction Writing By Women From Pakistan, India And Bangladesh On The Partion Of India. Here, For The First Time Are Ismat Chughtai, Sara Suleri, Anees Kidwai, Phulrenu Guha, Meghna Guha-Thakurta, Shehla Shibli, Manikuntala Sen, Kamlaben Patel And Many Others, Speaking And Writing About Communalisma Nd Literature, What They Learnt From Refugees, What Partition Means To Them 50 Years Later, And How They Define Themselves--Hindus? Muslims? Indians? Pakistanis? All Of These Or None? Either Or Neither? Not-Indian Not-Pakistani? Bangladeshi Not Pakistani? Above Al, Their Accounts Raise That Most Troubling Question: Do Women Have A Country? An Unusual Mix Of Memoirs, Interviews, Reminiscences And Reflective Essays, This Anthology Is The First Attempt To Present Women`S Voices On The Partion Of India Based On The Experience Of Three Countries.

Unveiling India

Unveiling India
Author: Anees Jung
Publisher: Penguin UK
Total Pages: 167
Release: 2000-10-14
Genre: Social Science
ISBN: 9351187950

The women in this book are not extraordinary or famous, and yet their stories and testimonies, narrated here by one of India's best-known women journalists, provide a passionate, often deeply touching, revelation of what it means to be a woman in India today. The women tell of marriage and widowhood, unfair work practices, sexual servitude, the problems of bearing and rearing children in poverty, religion, discrimination, other forms of exploitation ... Yet they also talk of fulfilling relationships, the joys of marriage and children, the exhilaration of breaking free from the bonds of tradition, ritual, caste, religion ... Interwoven with all this is the story of one woman's journey--of how Anees Jung, the author, brought up in purdah, succeeded in shaking off the restricting influences of her traditional upbringing to become a highly successful, independent career woman, still a comparatively rare phenomenon in India. As such, the book is essential reading for anyone wishing to understand the women of India-the silent majority that is now beginning to make itself heard.

I, Rigoberta Menchú

I, Rigoberta Menchú
Author: Rigoberta Menchú
Publisher: Verso
Total Pages: 276
Release: 1984
Genre: Biography & Autobiography
ISBN: 9780860917885

Her story reflects the experiences common to many Indian communities in Latin America today. Rigoberta suffered gross injustice and hardship in her early life: her brother, father and mother were murdered by the Guatemalan military. She learned Spanish and turned to catechist work as an expression of political revolt as well as religious commitment. The anthropologist Elisabeth Burgos-Debray, herself a Latin American woman, conducted a series of interviews with Rigoberta Menchu. The result is a book unique in contemporary literature which records the detail of everyday Indian life. Rigoberta’s gift for striking expression vividly conveys both the religious and superstitious beliefs of her community and her personal response to feminist and socialist ideas. Above all, these pages are illuminated by the enduring courage and passionate sense of justice of an extraordinary woman.

One Part Woman

One Part Woman
Author: Perumal Murugan
Publisher: Pushkin Press
Total Pages: 212
Release: 2019-07-25
Genre: Fiction
ISBN: 1782275479

A vibrant fable of marriage, caste and social convention from a major Indian writer Kali and Ponna are perfectly content in their marriage, aside from one thing, they are unable to conceive. As their childlessness begins to attract local gossip and family disapproval, they try everything from prayers to potions, but none of the offerings or rituals helps. Increasingly unhappy and desperate, they consider a more drastic plan: the annual chariot festival, a celebration of the half-male, half-female god Maadhorubaagan. For one night, the rules of marriage are relaxed, and consensual sex between unmarried men and women is overlooked, for all men are considered gods. But rather than bring them together, this scheme threatens to drive the couple apart. Selling over 100,000 copies in India, where it was published first in the original Tamil and then in this celebrated English translation, One Part Woman has become a cult phenomenon in the subcontinent, jump-starting conversations about caste and female empowerment. Tender, deeply poignant, and bitingly critical, One Part Woman is a powerful exploration of a loving marriage under strain. Perumal Murugan is an Indian author and professor of Tamil literature. He has written six novels and four collections each of short stories and poetry. His best-known novel One Part Woman, highly controversial in India, won the ILF Samanvay Basha Samman, and Aniruddhan Vasudevan's English rendering won the Translation Prize from India's National Academy of Letters.

India Calling

India Calling
Author: Anand Giridharadas
Publisher: ReadHowYouWant.com
Total Pages: 386
Release: 2011-02-28
Genre: Travel
ISBN: 1458763099

Reversing his parents immigrant path, a young writer returns to India and discovers an old country making itself new. Anand Giridharadas sensed something was afoot as his plane prepared to land in Bombay. An elderly passenger looked at him and said, Were all trying to go that way, pointing to the rear. You, youre going this way. Giridharadas was...