新作坊

Hinduism, Empowerment of Women, and Development in India

摘要：

6 A. Sen & S. Sengupta, "Malnutrition of Rural Children and the Sex Bias," in D. Jain & N.Banerjee, eds., Tyranny of the Household: Investigative Essays on Women's Work (Delhi: Shakti Books, 1985), pp. 3-24; B.D. Miller, "Son Preference, the Household and Public Health Programme in North India," pp. 191-208 in M. Krishnaraj & K. Chanana, eds., Gender and the Household Domain: Social and Cultural Dimensions (New Delhi: Sage Publications, 1989); M. Desai and M. Krishnaraj, Women and Society in India (Delhi: Ajanta, 1987), pp.219-253; B. Agarwal, ed., Structures of Patriarchy: State, Community and Household in Modernizing Asia, (London: Zed Books Ltd., 1991), pp. 83-120. Historically, some Indian reformers have argued that gender and caste inequality are integrally related. Such a view parallels some arguments from the Marxist tradition that class and gender inequality are closely related and addressing class inequality will result in gender equality. Based on this analysis, the goal of resistance movements was to bring down the hegemony of upper castes. There is evidence to suggest that upper castes have been able to convert their caste advantages to class advantages. There is a high correlation between upper caste status and better access to economic and political resources in modernizing India. In general even though it is the upper caste men that have gained the most advantage, upper caste women also have benefited to some extent. Some of these women have been influenced by the value orientations of modernization, and their lives have become more secular. This has helped them to shed some of the gender disadvantages of upper caste preoccupations with domestication of women and control of their sexuality. But most upper caste women are still constrained by Sanskritic traditions. 23 For the lower castes, gaining of political advantage has meant better access to economic resources, mostly for lower caste men. Women in these castes have been left behind because the leaders of the resistance movements are usually men who work towards betterment of their own life chances. Lower caste men have also benefited because of gender bias in development policies and practices. As has been shown, development policies are framed within a patriarchal ideological context. In addition, lower caste men who have raised their economic status are eager to raise their social status as well. This has meant selectively embracing the Sanskritic tradition of Hinduism. While lower caste men reject the Sanskritic tradition of caste hierarchy, they are eager to maintain gender hierarchy -- an integral part of this tradition. This has meant a preoccupation with domestication of lower caste women and control of their sexuality. Lower caste women, compared to their upper caste counterparts had some advantages in gender relations due to the influence of woman-friendly Dravidian traditions. For example, widow remarriage, divorce, polyandry and levirate were common customary practices among lower castes in many regions of India, particularly in the South, where the legacy of the Dravidian tradition is more pronounced. The Sanskritization of lower caste men, that is their imitation of upper caste male behavioural patterns has meant denial of the few gender advantages lower caste women have had historically.