GENDER LENS: Women’s Issues and Perspectives

Gender equality is about equal valuing of women and men—of their similarities and their differences. We need equal, respectful partnerships between men and women for the creation of an equitable society in which gender justice is realized. Gender is a complex and multifaceted array of experiences and meanings that cannot be understood without examining through a lens considering the social context within which they are situated. Gender lens then become the spectacles.

Gender Lens: Women’s Issues and Perspectives explores the cultural meanings of gender and gender differences. It makes us think critically not only about gender but about other social divisions as well. The aim is to expand our knowledge and understanding of women in our own society and also those living in societies very different from ours. This book is an interdisciplinary work that places gender at the intersection of society, caste, race, sexuality and work.

The book highlights on themes related to the women’s movement; governance, caste, class and race; work and labour; violence and sexual harassment; women in margins; and health issues. It is a challenge to incorporate all the varieties that characterize the diverse issues related to women in today’s world. This task becomes even more difficult in the developing world, which is a byword for diversity. Therefore, we now have a rainbow of struggles to reclaim women’s space in all these domains that make a colourful mosaic. The challenge here is to give voice to the narratives which use very different categories, that cannot be understood without the contexts and also cannot be fully reduced to writing and yet explore the varied cultural meanings of gender and gender differences.

Contents
1 Feminism and Women’s Movement in India / Rekha Pande
2 South African Women’s Movements / U. Joan Fairhurst
3 Women’s Movement in the Netherlands, 1870–2009 41 / N.A. Flipsen and Th.P. van der Weide
4 Barriers, Breakthroughs and Backlash / Shauna Wilton
5 Building Budgets from Below / Indira Mahendravada
6 Functionality of the Dominant Ideology of Gender in Traditional Hindu Society / Smarak Swain
7 The Feminization of Poverty in Brazil / Leila Bijos
8 Women Entrepreneurs in the Era of Free Enterprise / Sita Vanka
9 Women on the Ramp: Bollywood in the Regime of Consumption / Lalit Joshi
10 Women and the Knowledge Economy: Seizing the Open Moment / M.N. Rajesh
11 Divorced Women in Bangladesh / Neaz Ahmed
12 Why Legal Efforts Towards the Abolition of Violence against the Nigerian Women Remain an Illusion / Olugu Ukpai
13 Nowhere Girls / Lipi Ghosh
14 Stalking in Andhra Pradesh and Intervention Strategies / B. Ratna Kumari
15 Desertion of Married Women by Non-Resident Indians / R. Jayasree
16 Perceptions and Institutional Responses to Sexual Harassment / Rebecca John
17 Politics of Gender / K.M. Ziyauddin
18 Gender Among the Nagas of North East India / Ajailiu Niumai
19 Bride Price and Patriarchal Hegemony in the Mizo Society / Hminthanzuali
20 How Socio-cultural Factors Influence the Health-Seeking Behaviour of Women during Pregnancy in Rural Bangladesh / Faisal Ahmmed and Tofayel Ahmed