Gender and Masculinities by Doron, Assa; Broom, Alex;

Short description:

The book engages key concepts in the social sciences, through the prism of gender and masculinity, and the way these interact with other forms of inequality, as well as wider prevailing discourses and practices of Nationalism, Development, Colonialism, Migration, Modernity and Religion.

This book was published as a special issue of South Asian History and Culture.

Long description:

Gender persists as a key site of social inequality globally, and within contemporary south Asian contexts, the cultural practices which make up ‘masculinities’ remain vital for understanding everyday life and social relations. Yet masculinities, and their discontents, are an understudied and often misrepresented facet of gender relations and cultural dynamics. Gender and Masculinities offers a collection of chapters that seek to unravel the complex ideas, practices and concepts revolving around gender structures and masculinities in India and Sri Lanka.

The contributions to this volume draw on a range of disciplines, including history, comparative literatures, religion, anthropology, and development studies to illuminate the key issues that have shaped our understanding of gender relations and masculinities over time and across a range of geographical areas. By carefully attending to historical and contemporary gender ideologies and practices in South Asia, this book provides a critical exploration of masculinities in their plurality, as shifting, culturally located and embedded in religious ideologies, power relations, the politics of nationalism, globalisation and economic struggles. The volume will attract scholars interested in history, anthropology, sociology, nationalism, colonialism, religion and kinship, and popular culture.

This book was published as a special issue of South Asian History and Culture.

Table of Contents:

1. Introduction: Gender and Masculinities: History, Ideologies and Daily Life  Assa Doron and Alex Broom  Part I: History and Society  2. "What Durga Bhabhi Did Next — Or, Was there a Gendered Agenda in Revolutionary Circles?"  Kama Maclean  3. Troubling Bodies: ‘Eunuchs,’ Masculinity and Impotence in Colonial North India  Jessica Hinchy  4. Bodies In/Out of Place: Hegemonic Masculinity and Kamins’ Motherhood in Indian Coal Mines  Kuntala Lahiri-Dutt  Part II: Dislocated Masculinities  5. What’s in it for the Man? Models of Masculinity in the Worship of the Goddess Kāmākhyā  Brenda Dobia  6. Being a Tribal Man: Migration, Morality, and Masculinity  Duncan McDuie-Ra  Part III: Texts and Contexts  7. Perfect Wedding, Penniless Life: Ali and Fatima in a Sri Lankan Malay Text  Ronit Ricci  8. Can the Subaltern Eat? Modernity, Masculinity and Consumption in the Indian Family  Ira Raja