LANGUAGE IN INDIA

Strength for Today and Bright Hope for Tomorrow

Volume 22:9 September 2022
ISSN 1930-2940

Editors:
         Sam Mohanlal, Ph.D.
         B. Mallikarjun, Ph.D.
         A. R. Fatihi, Ph.D.
         G. Baskaran, Ph.D.
         T. Deivasigamani, Ph.D.
         Pammi Pavan Kumar, Ph.D.
         Soibam Rebika Devi, M.Sc., Ph.D.

Managing Editor & Publisher: M. S. Thirumalai, Ph.D.

Celebrate India!
Unity in Diversity!!

HOME PAGE

Click Here for Back Issues of Language in India - From 2001

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REFERENCE MATERIALS

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  • E-mail your articles and book-length reports in Microsoft Word to languageinindiaUSA@gmail.com.

  • PLEASE READ THE GUIDELINES GIVEN IN HOME PAGE IMMEDIATELY AFTER THE LIST OF CONTENTS.

  • Your articles and book-length reports should be written following the APA, MLA, LSA, or IJDL Stylesheet.

  • The Editorial Board has the right to accept, reject, or suggest modifications to the articles submitted for publication, and to make suitable stylistic adjustments. High quality, academic integrity, ethics and morals are expected from the authors and discussants.

Copyright © 2022
M. S. Thirumalai

Publisher: M. S. Thirumalai, Ph.D.
11249 Oregon Circle
Bloomington, MN 55438
USA
Custom Search

Resisting from Below:
A Critical Reading of Female Subaltern Voices in
Mahasweta Devi’s Short Story "Giribala" and
Baby Halder’s Autobiography A Life Less Ordinary

Richa Dawar, M.Phil.

Abstract

The socio-economic marginalization faced by the subaltern domestic worker woman is a unique position in which class, caste and gender intersect to create a multiply marginalized subject who is marked by a sense of precariousness experienced on a daily basis. In the short story “Giribala'' written by the renowned writer and activist Mahasweta Devi, and in the autobiography A Life Less Ordinary by Baby Halder, the central female characters are subaltern women who fight against gender based and economic marginalization to develop an individual identity. This paper closely analyses the intersectional nature of the overlapping marginalizations faced by subaltern women like the fictional character Giribala and the real person Baby, to draw parallels in the challenges they face from their unique socio-economically subaltern position. This paper focuses on the power struggle of negotiating/creating a space for themselves by the women subjugated by the male-dominated social structures and enquires whether it is even a possibility for a woman belonging to the economically marginalized class.

Keywords: Mahasweta Devi, “Giribala", Baby Halder, A Life Less Ordinary, Third world women, class, feminism, subaltern, intersectionality.

Introduction

Chandra Talpade Mohanty talks about how the ‘third world women’- the real, material subjects of their collective histories are formed (in opposition to the western feminism’s representation of the monolithic oppressed “average third world woman” (337)) not in an ahistorical space, but are “produced” (340) through their social relations as well as by being implicated in forming these relations. Taking into consideration the heterogeneous social relations and economic marginalization that form the subjectivity of women in Mahasweta Devi’s “Giribala”, and the domestic worker Baby Halder’s autobiography A Life Less Ordinary (2008), Talpade’s postulation stands true for the women, both the fictional characters in Devi’s story as well as for the domestic worker Baby Halder. The subjects of these two powerful narratives are exposed to the hardships involved in the working life of a lower-class woman, and their struggle for finding space for thriving is unique in its socio- economic location. Striving to negotiate their way midst a quagmire of hegemonic male relations and exploitative employers, both women, fictional and real, share the ethics of courage in the face of hardships that life has to offer; and resist the gendered status quo in their own social spaces despite all attempts by society to appropriate them in the hierarchical heterosexual relationship. This paper focuses on the power struggle of negotiating/creating a space for themselves by the women subjugated by the male-dominated social structures and enquires whether it is even a possibility for a woman belonging to the economically marginalized class.

This is only the beginning part of the article. PLEASE CLICK HERE TO READ THE ENTIRE ARTICLE IN PRINTER-FRIENDLY VERSION.

Richa Dawar, M.Phil.
Assistant Professor, Daulat Ram College
University of Delhi
richaadawarr@gmail.com
Custom Search
  • Click Here to Go to Creative Writing Section

  • Send your articles
    as an attachment
    to your e-mail to
    languageinindiaUSA@gmail.com.
  • Please ensure that your name, academic degrees, institutional affiliation and institutional address, and your e-mail address are all given in the first page of your article. Also include a declaration that your article or work submitted for publication in LANGUAGE IN INDIA is an original work by you and that you have duly acknowledged the work or works of others you used in writing your articles, etc. Remember that by maintaining academic integrity we not only do the right thing but also help the growth, development and recognition of Indian/South Asian scholarship.
     
Language in India

LANGUAGE IN INDIA

Strength for Today and Bright Hope for Tomorrow

Volume 22:9 September 2022
ISSN 1930-2940

Editors:
         Sam Mohanlal, Ph.D.
         B. Mallikarjun, Ph.D.
         A. R. Fatihi, Ph.D.
         G. Baskaran, Ph.D.
         T. Deivasigamani, Ph.D.
         Pammi Pavan Kumar, Ph.D.
         Soibam Rebika Devi, M.Sc., Ph.D.

Managing Editor & Publisher: M. S. Thirumalai, Ph.D.

Celebrate India!
Unity in Diversity!!

HOME PAGE

Click Here for Back Issues of Language in India - From 2001

BOOKS FOR YOU TO READ AND DOWNLOAD FREE!

REFERENCE MATERIALS

BACK ISSUES

  • E-mail your articles and book-length reports in Microsoft Word to languageinindiaUSA@gmail.com.

  • PLEASE READ THE GUIDELINES GIVEN IN HOME PAGE IMMEDIATELY AFTER THE LIST OF CONTENTS.

  • Your articles and book-length reports should be written following the APA, MLA, LSA, or IJDL Stylesheet.

  • The Editorial Board has the right to accept, reject, or suggest modifications to the articles submitted for publication, and to make suitable stylistic adjustments. High quality, academic integrity, ethics and morals are expected from the authors and discussants.

Copyright © 2022
M. S. Thirumalai

Publisher: M. S. Thirumalai, Ph.D.
11249 Oregon Circle
Bloomington, MN 55438
USA
Custom Search

Resisting from Below:
A Critical Reading of Female Subaltern Voices in
Mahasweta Devi’s Short Story "Giribala" and
Baby Halder’s Autobiography A Life Less Ordinary

Richa Dawar, M.Phil.

Abstract

The socio-economic marginalization faced by the subaltern domestic worker woman is a unique position in which class, caste and gender intersect to create a multiply marginalized subject who is marked by a sense of precariousness experienced on a daily basis. In the short story “Giribala'' written by the renowned writer and activist Mahasweta Devi, and in the autobiography A Life Less Ordinary by Baby Halder, the central female characters are subaltern women who fight against gender based and economic marginalization to develop an individual identity. This paper closely analyses the intersectional nature of the overlapping marginalizations faced by subaltern women like the fictional character Giribala and the real person Baby, to draw parallels in the challenges they face from their unique socio-economically subaltern position. This paper focuses on the power struggle of negotiating/creating a space for themselves by the women subjugated by the male-dominated social structures and enquires whether it is even a possibility for a woman belonging to the economically marginalized class.

Keywords: Mahasweta Devi, “Giribala'', Baby Halder, A Life Less Ordinary, Third world women, class, feminism, subaltern, intersectionality.

Introduction

Chandra Talpade Mohanty talks about how the ‘third world women’- the real, material subjects of their collective histories are formed (in opposition to the western feminism’s representation of the monolithic oppressed “average third world woman” (337)) not in an ahistorical space, but are “produced” (340) through their social relations as well as by being implicated in forming these relations. Taking into consideration the heterogeneous social relations and economic marginalization that form the subjectivity of women in Mahasweta Devi’s “Giribala”, and the domestic worker Baby Halder’s autobiography A Life Less Ordinary (2008), Talpade’s postulation stands true for the women, both the fictional characters in Devi’s story as well as for the domestic worker Baby Halder. The subjects of these two powerful narratives are exposed to the hardships involved in the working life of a lower-class woman, and their struggle for finding space for thriving is unique in its socio- economic location. Striving to negotiate their way midst a quagmire of hegemonic male relations and exploitative employers, both women, fictional and real, share the ethics of courage in the face of hardships that life has to offer; and resist the gendered status quo in their own social spaces despite all attempts by society to appropriate them in the hierarchical heterosexual relationship. This paper focuses on the power struggle of negotiating/creating a space for themselves by the women subjugated by the male-dominated social structures and enquires whether it is even a possibility for a woman belonging to the economically marginalized class.

This is only the beginning part of the article. PLEASE CLICK HERE TO READ THE ENTIRE ARTICLE IN PRINTER-FRIENDLY VERSION.

Richa Dawar, M.Phil.
Assistant Professor, Daulat Ram College
University of Delhi
richaadawarr@gmail.com
Custom Search
  • Click Here to Go to Creative Writing Section

  • Send your articles
    as an attachment
    to your e-mail to
    languageinindiaUSA@gmail.com.
  • Please ensure that your name, academic degrees, institutional affiliation and institutional address, and your e-mail address are all given in the first page of your article. Also include a declaration that your article or work submitted for publication in LANGUAGE IN INDIA is an original work by you and that you have duly acknowledged the work or works of others you used in writing your articles, etc. Remember that by maintaining academic integrity we not only do the right thing but also help the growth, development and recognition of Indian/South Asian scholarship.