Everyday Life in South Asia

This anthology provides a lively and stimulating view of the lives of ordinary citizens in India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Nepal, and Sri Lanka. For the second edition of this popular textbook, readings have been updated and new essays added. The result is a timely collection that explores key themes in understanding the region, including gender, caste, class, religion, globalization, economic liberalization, nationalism, and emerging modernities. New readings focus attention on the experiences of the middle classes, migrant workers, and IT professionals, and on media, consumerism, and youth culture. Clear and engaged writing makes this text particularly valuable for general and student readers, while the range of new and classic scholarship provides a useful resource for specialists.

"Mines and Lamb have once again provided an eminently readable, highly engaging and varied set of case studies, organized along major axes of current concern, both practical and intellectual.... [A] real joy to teach!" --Margaret Mills, The Ohio State University Indiana University Press

"Richly informative but accessible and user friendly for classroom use.... This excellent volume of essays belongs in many places--on the shelves of specialists and non-specialists alike." --Journal of Asian Studies Indiana University Press Indiana University Press

"[T]he book offers keenly observed ethnographic snapshots, theorized by the authors and contextualized by the engaging section introductions. Indeed, the varied, rich, and sensitive portrayal of the ordinary (and extraordinary) lives of South Asians of vastly diverse backgrounds is just one of the volume's many strengths." --Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute

"This wonderful collection serves as a unique introduction to cultural life in contemporary South Asia. The essays included here provide insights into everyday life that are unavailable from any other single source. This text will be of great interest to scholars and students in anthropology, sociology, gender studies, religious studies, geography, and communication studies." --Akhil Gupta, University of California, Los Angeles

"Everyday Life in South Asia... is extremely accessible and has plenty to offer as introductory material for a wide range of topics." --New Asia Books

Diane P. Mines is Associate Professor of Anthropology at Appalachian State University. She is author of Fierce Gods: Inequality, Ritual, and the Politics of Dignity in a South Indian Village (IUP, 2005).

Sarah Lamb is Associate Professor and Chair of Anthropology at Brandeis University. She is author of White Saris and Sweet Mangoes: Aging, Gender and Body in North India and Aging and the Indian Diaspora: Cosmopolitan Families in India and Abroad (IUP, 2009).

Acknowledgments

Note on Transliteration

Introduction

Map

I. The Family and the Life Course

Introduction

1. One Straw from a Broom Cannot Sweep: The Ideology and Practice of the Joint Family in Rural North India Susan S. Wadley

2. Allah Gives Both Boys and Girls Patricia Jeffery and Roger Jeffery

3. "Out Here in Kathmandu": Youth and the Contradictions of Modernity in Urban Nepal Mark Liechty

4. Rethinking Courtship, Marriage and Divorce in an Indian Call Center Cari Costanzo Kapur

5. Love and Aging in Bengali Families Sarah Lamb

II. Genders

Introduction

6. New Light in the House: Schooling Girls in Rural North India Ann Grodzins Gold

7. Offstage with Special Drama Actresses in Tamilnadu, South India: Roadwork Susan Seizer

8. Breadwinners No More: Identities in Flux Michele Ruth Gamburd

9. Life on the Margins: A Hijra's Story Serena Nanda

10. Crossing "Lines" of Difference: Transnational Movements and Sexual Subjectivities in Hyderabad, India Gayatri Reddy

III. Caste, Class and Community

Introduction

11. Seven Prevalent Misconceptions about India's Caste System

12. God-Chariots in a Garden of Castes: Hierarchy and Festival in a Hindu City Steven M. Parish

13. High and Low Castes in Karani Viramma, with Josiane Racine and Jean Luc Racine

14. Weakness, Worry Illness, and Poverty in the Slums of Dhaka Sabina Faiz Rashid

15. Anjali's Alliance: Class Mobility in Urban India Sara Dickey

16. Recasting the Secular: Religion and Education in Kerala, India Ritty Lukose

IV. Practicing Religion

Introduction

17. The Hindu Gods in a South Indian Village Diane P. Mines

18. The Feast of Love McKim Marriott

19. The Delusion of Gender and Renunciation in Buddhist Kashmir Kim Gutschow

20. Muslim Village Intellectuals: The Life of the Mind in Northern Pakistan Magnus Marsden

21. In Friendship: A Father, a Daughter and a Jinn Naveeda Khan

22. Vernacular Islam at a Healing Crossroads in Hyderabad Joyce Burkhalter Flueckiger

V. Nation-making

Introduction

23. Voices from the Partition Urvashi Butalia

24. A Day in the Life Laura Ring

25. Living and Dying for Mother India: Hindu Nationalist Female Renouncers and Sacred Duty Kalyani Devaki Menon

26. Political Praise in Tamil Newspapers: The Poetry and Iconography of Democratic Power Bernard Bate

27. Mala's Dream: Economic Policies, National Debates, and Sri Lankan Garment Workers Caitrin Lynch

28. Interviews with High School Students in Eastern Sri Lanka Margaret Trawick

VI. Globalization, Public Culture and the South Asian Diaspora

Introduction

29. Cinema in the Countryside: Popular Tamil Film and the Remaking of Rural Life Anand Pandian

30. Dangerous Desires: Erotics, Public Culture, and Identity in Late-Twentieth-Century India Purnima Mankekar

31. A Diaspora Ramayana in Southall Paula Richman

32. British Sikh Lives, Lived in Translation Kathleen Hall

33. Examining the "Global" Indian Middle Class: Gender and Culture in the Silicon Valley/Bangalore Circuit Smitha Radhakrishnan

34. Placing Lives through Stories: Second Generation South Asian Americans Kirin Narayan

35. Unexpected Destinations E. Valentine Daniel

References

Contributors

Index