Gender, Law, and Resistance in IndiaTheft, poisoning, affairs, flights home, refusals to work, eat or have sex, threats to divide the joint household, and sly acts of sabotage are some of the domestic warfare tactics employed by Muslim women attempting to resist patriarchy. Gender, Law, and Resistance in India dramatically illustrates how a patriarchal ideology is upheld and reinforced through male-governed social and legal institutions and how women defy that control. Based on anthropological fieldwork in rural Rajasthan in northern India, Erin Moore's book details the life of an extended Muslim family she has known for twenty years. In many ways the plight of the central character, Hunni, is representative of dilemmas experienced by the majority of north Indian peasant women. Ultimately an account of cultural hegemony and defiance, Gender, Law, and Resistance in India reveals how so-called "modern" state institutions and practices reinforce traditional arrangements, resulting in women being silenced, deprived of equal rights before the law, and returned to their male guardians. Still, women resist in overt and covert ways. The first ethnographic work to focus principally on the law and legal institutions of gender and agency in South Asia, this unique volume examines the interpenetrations of north India's pluralistic legal systems. Moore adeptly connects engrossing case histories to national dialogues over women's rights, discussing these issues in terms of Muslim personal laws, secularism, and communal violence. Gender, Law, and Resistance in India is a rich and truly significant contribution to gender studies, South Asian studies, and sociolegal studies. |
Contents
The Case of the Stolen Wife | 63 |
Legal Pluralism | 87 |
Gendered Justice | 140 |
Notes | 173 |
Bibliography | 181 |
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Common terms and phrases
Aggarwal Alwar amulet Anthropology argued asked Asru beat boys Brahman British buffalo bungalow called caste Chachi chayat court cultural daughter-in-law daughters decision Delhi discourse dispute divorce dominant dowry ERIN female fled Gender girls give harvest Hassina Hindu honor hookah household hundred rupees Hunni and Rahiman Hunni's father Hunni's uncle husband husband's village ideology ILIAS in-laws Islamic Jeffery jewelry Joru justice Kalif Kamir Kandi kill Kishangarh land Legal Pluralism lineage live Mahum male marriage married maulavi Mewat milk mother mother-in-law Muslim natal village neighbor night north India parents party personal laws police political purdah Rahiman's brothers Rajasthan refused relationship resistance return to Nara rural Sabat Sayed Shah Bano share Sikh sister social Society Solome stay stick Studies Sumo thousand rupees Tijara tion took University Press village panchayat wanted wedding wife woman women Zoya Hasan