Hostname: page-component-745bb68f8f-b95js Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2025-01-30T05:51:07.486Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

What Women Learned When Men Gave Them Advice: Rewriting Patriarchy in Late-Nineteenth-Century Bengal

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  24 March 2024

Judith E. Walsh

Extract

Core share and HTML view are not available for this content. However, as you have access to this content, a full PDF is available via the ‘Save PDF’ action button.

Here are two passages chosen from a genre of Bengali domestic science/advice manuals for women in late-nineteenth-century Bengal. The first passage is from Strir sahit kathopakathan [“Conversations with the Wife”], one of the most popular of all advice manuals, first published in 1884 and reissued eight subsequent times, the last in 1909. Its author was Dhirendranath Pal, a prolific writer who published seven books in Bengali and eleven in English between the 1880s and the early twentieth century. The second passage is from Nari dharma [“Woman's Dharma”], a manual of advice for women written by Nagendrabala (Mustaphi) Dasi in 1900, and one of only two advice manuals authored by women I have found in this period. Its author was born in 1878, and, by her death in 1906 at the age of twenty-eight, she had published numerous collections of poetry, two books of advice for women, and one novel.

Type
Research Article
Information
The Journal of Asian Studies , Volume 56 , Issue 3 , August 1997 , pp. 641 - 677
Copyright
Copyright © The Association for Asian Studies, Inc. 1997

References

List of References

Bandyopadhyaya, Haricharan, ed. 1966. Bangiya sabdakosh [“A Bengali-Bengali Lexicon”]. 2 vols. New Delhi: Sahitya Akademi.Google Scholar
Banerjee, Swapna. 1996. Exploring the World of Domestic Manuals: Bengali Middle-Class Women and Servants in Colonial Calcutta. Sagar: South Asia Graduate Research Journal 3 (1):electronic journal.Google Scholar
Bannerji, Himani. 1991. “Fashioning a Self: Educational Proposals for and by Women in Popular Magazines in Colonial Bengal.” Economic and Political Weekly October 26:ws50–ws62.Google Scholar
Bannerji, Himani. 1995. Attired in Virtue: The Discourse on Shame (lajja) and Clothing of the Bhadramahila in Colonial Bengal. In From the Seams of History: Essays on Indian Women, edited by Ray, B.. Delhi: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Library, Bengal. 1867–1914. Catalogue of Printed Books. Appendix to the Calcutta Gazette. Calcutta: Bengal Government.Google Scholar
Biswas, Taraknath. 1887. Bangiya mahila [“The Bengali Woman”]. 2nd ed. Calcutta: Rajendralal Biswas.Google Scholar
Borthwick, Meredith. 1984. Changing Role of Women in Bengal 1849–1905. Princeton: Princeton University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Chakrabarti, Sambuddha. 1995. Changing Notions of Conjugal Relations in Nineteenth Century Bengal. In Mind, Body and Society: Life and Mentality in Colonial Bengal, edited by Ray, R. K.. Calcutta: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Chakrabarty, Dipesh. 1993. The Difference—Deferral of (a) Colonial Modernity: public debates on domesticity in British Bengal. History Workshop 36 (Autumn 1993): 1–35.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Chakraborty, Usha. 1963. Conditions of Bengali Women around the 2nd Half of the 19th Century. Calcutta: Self-published.Google Scholar
Chakravarti, Uma. 1990. Whatever Happened to the Vedic Dasi? Orientalism, Nationalism and a Script for the Past. In Recasting Women, edited by Sangari, K. and Vaid, S.. New Brunswick, N.J.: Rutgers University Press.Google Scholar
Chatterjee, Partha. 1990. The Nationalist Resolution of the Women's Question. In Recasting Women, edited by Sangari, K. and Vaid, S.. New Brunswick, N.J.: Rutgers University Press.Google Scholar
Chatterjee, Partha. 1993. The Nation and Its Fragments. Princeton: Princeton University Press.Google Scholar
Dasi, Nagendrabala (Mustaphi). 1894. Prayojaniya prarthana [“An Urgent Prayer”]. In Bamabodhini patrika.Google Scholar
Chatterjee, Partha. 1900. Nari dharma [“Woman's Dharma”]. Calcutta: Self-published.Google Scholar
Chatterjee, Partha. 1904. Garhasthya Dharma [“Household Dharma”]. Calcutta: Khagendranath Mustaphi.Google Scholar
Dasi, Navinkali. 1883. Kumari siksha [“Education for Girls”]. Calcutta: Self published.Google Scholar
Gupta, Purnacandra. 1885. Bangali bau [“The Bengali Wife”]. Calcutta: A. K. Banerji.Google Scholar
Jacobsen, Doranne, and Wadley, Susan. 1977. Women in India: Two Perspectives. New Delhi: Manohar.Google Scholar
Kakar, Sudhir. 1978. The Inner World. New Delhi: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Karlekar, Malavika. 1993. Voices from Within: Early Personal Narratives of Bengali Women, Gender / Women's Studies. Delhi: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Manu, . 1991. The Laws of Manu. Translated by Doniger, Wendy and Smith, Brian K.. London: Penguin.Google Scholar
Mitra, Jayakrishna. 1890. Ramanir kartavya [“The Duties of Women”]. Calcutta: Giribala Mitra.Google Scholar
Mitra, Satyacaran. 1884. Strir prati svamir upadesh [“A Husband's Advice to His Wife”]. Calcutta: Victoria Printing Works.Google Scholar
Monier-Williams, Monier. 1960. A Sanskrit-English Dictionary. 2nd ed. Oxford: Clarendon Press.Google Scholar
Murshid, Ghulam. 1983. Reluctant Debutant. Rajshahi: Rajshahi University Press.Google Scholar
National Library. 1963. Author Catalogue of Printed Books in Bengali Language, Volume IV S-Z. 4 vols. Vol. 4. Calcutta: Government of India Press.Google Scholar
Pal, Dhirendranath. 1884a. Songini [“The Female Companion”]. Calcutta: Bengal Publishing Company.Google Scholar
Pal, Dhirendranath. 1884b. Strir sahit kathopakathan [“Conversations with the Wife”]. Calcutta: Vaishnav Charan Vasak.Google Scholar
Pal, Dhirendranath. 1911. The Hindu Wife. Calcutta: Phanindra Nath Pal.Google Scholar
Raheja, Gloria Goodwin. 1994. Women's Speech Genres, Kinship and Contradiction. In Women as Subjects, edited by Kumar, N.. Calcutta: Stree.Google Scholar
Ramani aisarya [“The Glory of Woman”]. 1900. 2 vols. Calcutta: Navakumar Dutt.Google Scholar
Ray, Radhanatha. 1902. Granthakartri sangkshipta [“An Abridged Life of the Authoress”]. In Amiyagatha, edited by Dasi, N. M.. Calcutta: Sharacandra Cakrabarti.Google Scholar
Ray, Rajat Kanta. 1984. Social Conflict and Political Unrest in Bengal, 1875–1927. Delhi: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Raychaudhuri, Girijaprasanna. 1888. Griha lakshmi [“The Lakshmi of the Home”]. 2nd ed. Calcutta: Gurudas Chatterji.Google Scholar
Sarkar, Sumit. 1983. Modern India 1885–1947. Madras: Macmillan India Limited.Google Scholar
Sarkar, Sumit. 1985. A Critique of Colonial India. Calcutta: Papyrus.Google Scholar
Sarkar, Sumit. 1992. ‘Kaliyuga’, ‘Chakri’ and ‘Bhakti’: Ramakrishna and His Times. Economic and Political Weekly 27 (18 July).Google Scholar
Sarkar, Tanika. 1992. The Hindu Wife and the Hindu Nation: Domesticity and Nationalism in 19th Century Bengal. Studies in History 8 (2):213–34.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Tharu, , Susie, , and Lalita, K., eds. 1991. Women Writing in India: 600 B.C. to the Early 20th Century. New York: The Feminist Press.Google Scholar
Walsh, Judith E. 1983. Growing Up in British India. New York: Holmes and Meier.Google Scholar
Walsh, Judith E. 1990. Face to Face: Roles for Bengali Women in Love and Family. Working Papers on Women in International Development #200 (January): 1–23.Google Scholar
Walsh, Judith E. 1995. The Virtuous Wife and the Well-ordered Home. In Mind, Body and Society: Life and Mentality in Colonial Bengal, edited by Ray, R. K.. Calcutta: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar