Representations of Women in Colonial India, 1886-1936

'In the introduction to the jointly edited book, Representations of Women in Colonial India, 1886-1936, Subhadra Chana paints a wide canvas, capturing an era when religion, colonialism, and gender ideology collided in multiple ways. In this compelling portrait, the editors put together a powerful collection of articles dealing with a range of issues from witchcraft to the glorification of women into goddesses, and the tragic grandeur of sati or widow burning. There is also childbirth, motherhood, domesticity, women dressing as men, daughters taking the role of sons in funerary ceremonies, and women in a variety of roles that populated colonial India. Taken from the Journal of the Anthropological Society of Bombay, spanning the years 1886-1936, a powerful gender narrative unfolds into an unflinching exploration and a chilling allegory of the mechanics and the gender ideology of British colonialism in India. We are taken back in time to a place that casts a new light and confronts modern society while providing valuable context for appreciating the multiple faces of womanhood in India. An eye-opening narrative of what it is to come in a journey of much interest for academics of gender studies.'

- Patricia Tovar, Professor Emerita, Anthropology Department, John Jay College, Graduate Center, CUNY

'Representations of Women in Colonial India, 1886–1936 offers an unprecedented reinterpretation of early anthropological works published in the Journal of the Anthropological Society of Bombay. Rather than treating these works merely as historical sources, in her Introduction, Subhadra Mitra Channa guides readers to interpret how colonialism influenced the formation of anthropological knowledge, while making them aware of the three-dimensional relationship among the readers, the content of the papers, and their authors. The book unravels how male anthropologists, educated in Britain and having internalised the colonial mindset, redefined and reclassified various images of Indian women. This book is not only highly insightful and valuable for those interested in anthropology, Indian studies, postcolonial studies, and gender studies, but also for anyone considering how the production of knowledge itself is profoundly influenced by social backgrounds and positionalities of the researchers and how this, in turn, can have a significant impact on subsequent gender relations and other social relations.'

- Yasuko Takezawa, Professor Emerita of Kyoto University and Director of the International Research Institute of Kansai Gaidai University, Japan.

'By engaging with these archival pages, readers are invited to explore the lives of Indian women in the past—a world mediated through the lens of colonial ideology and narrated predominantly from a male perspective.
For educators today, these historical sources offer both an opportunity and a responsibility: to critically reassess that perspective by fostering respect for cultural diversity, local knowledge systems, and multiple ways of understanding the world. In doing so, we can recover the wisdom of past generations and bring to light the contributions of Indian women whose knowledge, agency, and leadership have too often remained invisible.'

- Giovanna Guslini,Chair of the IUAES Commission on Anthropology and Education, Chair of the WCAA Task Force on Anthropological Education and New Audiences, EASA Teaching Anthropology Network Co-Convenor, Royal Anthropological Institute Fellow, Lecturer in Public Contexts, Writer for New Audiences, Artist, Formerly in Education and Cooperation Projects of the Italian Ministry of Foreign Affairs , Formerly of the Italian Ministry of Education, University and Research

'How women are represented tells us much about society and perhaps even more about who has the power to represent them. I find Representations of Women in Colonial India: 1886–1936 a compelling archival collection.
This collection is made particularly significant by what it reveals about the production of knowledge itself. British and English-educated Indian men largely held the authority to observe, classify and interpret, while women were predominantly objects of study, their own voices largely absent and invisible. The archive therefore reflects not only women's lives but also the intersecting power of colonialism, patriarchy and scholarship. This volume brings a critical, historically grounded lens to an archive shaped by colonial and patriarchal knowledge systems, illuminating its silences, assumptions and overlooked forms of women’s agency.'

- Sabina Faiz Rashid, PhD, Professor, Mushtaque Chowdhury Chair in Health and Poverty (Endowed by the BRAC Founder, Late Sir F.H. Abed), Director, Center of Excellence for Gender, Sexual and Reproductive Health and Rights (CGSRHR), BRAC James P Grant School of Public Health, BRAC University and Honorary Professor, International Public Health, at the Liverpool School of Tropical Medicine, UK.