Understanding Women’s Embodiment and Agency in Diverse Contexts

This edited volume makes a serious and welcome contribution to the field of gender and embodiment in the South Asian region. There are twenty-two essays, as well as an introduction, in thematically grouped areas: Negotiation, Struggle, Resistance, Critique, Protest and Representations and New Directions. Established authors, senior practitioners and emerging scholars are included among the contributors, which is an excellent way to develop and encourage research and writing skills among younger scholars. It is also necessary to state at the outset that, despite the theme being complex and intense in a number of ways, the editors have kept the title relatively straightforward, and have been able to elicit several meaningful contributions. Apart from a well-researched and lucid introduction, the book takes account of multiple dimensions of gender and the body in South Asia. Locating their argument in the context of the women’s movement in India in the introduction, the editors signal the significance of protest, negotiation and resistance. They also take serious note of the feminist position on embodiment as well as, through the essays, question the rigidity of a solely feminist approach that perhaps elides women’s voice as ‘submissive’ or passive in some contexts.