From the Seams of History

The ten essays which make up the body of this book are drawn from a wide variety of disciplines and weave a complex pattern of the experiences of women. Beginning with the debate on widow remarriage in Bengal and Haryana, the book moves on to examine how the new attire of the Bengali gentlewoman in the nineteenth century was tailored according to the values and anxieties of their dominant male counterparts. One essay takes the argument of male domination further and points out that male oppression in Indian society was in fact remarkable similar to that of the colonial masters. The remaining essays are concerned with the role of education in reinforcing the value system of the larger society; the questioning of socially legitimized assumptions; the organized militancy of the peasant women of Bihar and the marginalization of women in the economic sphere.