Lessons in Self-Fashioning: "Bamabodhini Patrika" and the Education of Women in Colonial Bengal Author(s): Krishna Sen Source: Victorian

Periodicals Review, Vol. 37, No. 2, The Nineteenth-Century Press in India (Summer, 2004), pp. 176-191 Published by: The Johns Hopkins University Press on behalf of the Research Society for Victorian Periodicals Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/20084005 Accessed: 21/06/2010 04:05
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Lessons

in Self-Fashioning:

Bamabodhini Patrika and the Education ofWomen inColonial Bengal

KRISHNA SEN

In The History of Sexuality Foucault speaks of the intellectual obligation to locate theoretical speculation within specific material conditions, of the need "to discover who does the speaking, the positions and viewpoints from which them to speak prompt they speak, the institutions which store and distribute about it [sexuality under various names] and which " I: n). The nineteenth-century the things that are said ... (Foucault the New Indian Woman (an enterprise primarily project of constructing associated with Bengal, a hub of liberal thought) had its share of illustri ous male catalysts, such as Raja Rammohan Roy and Iswarchandra Vid inflections of this radically-gendered yasagar. But to uncover variegated for the new dis discourse one can to turn to Bengali women's magazines or "genteel woman." Meredith cursive social icon of the bhadramahila, lists nineteenth-century Borthwick Bengali journals devoted to creating a as part of the nationalist reformed female subjectivity agenda for a resur gent India and describes their extensive readership, both male and female, centers of Calcutta in sub in the metropolitan (now Kolkata) and Dhaka, in small district towns, and even in the villages of urban communities, were men as well as undivided 15 sff). Contributors Bengal (Borthwick a discursive women. forum in These publications collectively provided as well as the desirability to probe the parameters, which (or otherwise), female sensibility. From their pages we can identify not of a reinscribed and "who does the speaking" but, more importantly, "the positions only from which they speak." viewpoints a Bamabodhini Patrika (Journal for the Enlightenment of Women), in Bengali continuously for women from Calcutta published periodical between 1863 and 1922, was not only the longest running but one of the earliest Sakha, of such journals that included Bharati, Sahitya, Pradip, Mukul, and others. Itwas preceded only by the short-lived Tattwabodhini

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Patrika

1843) and Masik Patrika (Journal for Inculcating Knowledge, 1854-55). The steps leading to the creation o? Bama (Monthly Magazine, an historical bodhini Patrika constitute capsule of the reformist agenda women in Bengal. The main dilemma confronting the reformists was for the claims of the antahpur that of accommodating (the inner space of the call of the bahir with the woman's home, synonymous arena) with of how (the space outside the home, or the male domain): the conundrum to be both in line with Western-oriented inwhich women modernization

to know of the outside world and in line with indigenous tradition in a part of it. Bamabodhinini as an functioned which they were not to be out to resolve this of the novel solution worked integral component were thorny problem. In 1862, The Brahmo1 Sen inaugurated intellectual Keshub Chunder Sabha (Association the Brahmobondhu Ideals), with inspired by Brahmo as one of its primary objectives. In an era when the uplift of women women were not exposed to the non-kindred male gaze, when just a few ladies were learning their letters at home, and lady tutors and aristocratic schools for girls were few and far between, Brahmobondhu championed in the the then-pioneering concept of antahpur schools, that is, schooling or women's inner living quarters within the family home. andarmahal in the family from young girls to The students could be all the women older matriarchs, husbands, ducting instructing examinations and the teachers would be their fathers, brothers, and to a prescribed them according syllabus and con at fixed intervals. Several such schools were set up

in Calcutta homes and Dhaka. As the during the century at well-to-do Sabha gradually shifted its focus to other social issues, it Brahmobondhu Sabha (Society for the Enlight passed on this mantle to the Bamabodhini enment of Women), founded 1863 and kd by tne Young Turks of the Brahmo Samaj, Umesh Chandra Datta (b. 1840) and Bejoy Krishna Gos wami (b. 1841). Bamabodhini the mouthpiece of this new Soci Patrika, was Datta's brainchild and the main purveyor of antahpur schooling, ety, as well as of the many and diatribes which debates this movement provoked. Bamabodhini copies a month publication with a print run of a hundred at one anna each. For decades, until competitors priced appeared at the turn of the century, every issue sold out. The first issue the 1270) carried Datta's manifesto (August 1863/B.S. Bhadra dedicating ("bama," the old Sanskritised Bengali journal to the service of the woman term): was a monthly

By the grace of God many people in this country have turned their attention towards bettering the lot of our women. That they need to be educated just as
much as men, that without this there is no advancement either for women or for

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is now girls But [i.e., here very only as an

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gentlemen setting benevolent for can a lim enter ... up

accepted and few there,

fact. We an

find public-spirited encouraged also

schools Government.

activity

by

the

ited period the antahpur

girls avail as they long little chance

of this opportunity and that, too, are unmarried]. Unless the school of benefiting the majority

there

is very

of our women

. This

journal will

cover all topics which

are relevant to its readers. We will

of true utmost our learning attention easily and our

to eradicate error and the radiance attempt superstition through so as to nurture the finer qualities of their minds, and we will pay to the basic accessible kinds to women, of knowledge we shall which endeavor they to require.... our keep To make subject matter

articles chaste

... . If language simple by the will of God this effort of ours is accepted by our cultured society and found to be of use to itswomen, then itwill have served its
purpose. (Ray 1-2)2

The second editorial that the periodical 1863) declared (September would be as far as possible of, by, and for women, instead of being (as was more usual at that time) composed of solely by men for the edification women: women will be very welcome "Contributions and will be by if considered suitable. Ladies are requested to send in their con published tributions to the Editor along with their names and addresses" (Ray xvi). to write, the January 1864 issue announced an essay To encourage women on any one of these topics - (a) "The benefits that for women competition can be expected from women's education, and the evil effects of not edu that need to cating them," or (b) "The harmful customs and superstitions be eradicated before the women of our country can improve their status"; the three judges, Dwarkanath and Peary Churn Mitter, Vidyabhushan, Keshub Chunder and Sen, were leading liberal intellectuals of Calcutta, prizes were to be awarded (Ray 24-25). The best essay on the first topic of Shaligram loca (a non-metropolitan by Madhumati Mukhopadhyay was published was in September tion) 1865 (Ray 31-32). Bamabodhini thus from its inception a platform for women's self-expression. During the second half of the nineteenth century, there were many private publi in Bengali in English) cations of volumes (and infrequently by upper/ middleand middle-class ladies, so the editor's solici antabpur-educzted at tations fell on fertile ground. A later editorial expressed astonishment the quantity and quality of women's submission, most as articulate and as if written the injunc thought-provoking by men, perhaps provoking tion: "Those ladies who are desirous of publishing in Bam their writings ... should abodhini any means possible send us such proof by immediately are indeed that we may be absolutely convinced that their compositions their own" (Ray xl). The preparation of a blueprint for antahpur schooling was taken very seriously: "recently Bamabodhini Sabha [Society for the Enlightenment

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edu of propagating women's has taken up the responsibility of Women] cation in the antahpur.... To facilitate educational opportunities for older women within the home is the goal of this Society" (December 1865; see a five-year 1866 issue outlined The April for home Ray 33). syllabus textbooks and study, covering a variety of subjects, with recommended and for every year. Moral Science, embroidery, topics for examination be handicrafts would be taught, and the academic curriculum would and writing Bengali the first year; Bengali grammar, geog graded: reading raphy, and arithmetic the second year; advanced Bengali grammar and lit erature, geography, history, and algebra the third year; the same subjects and hygiene the fourth year; the same subjects and botany and biology the fifth year (Ray 34-36). This syllabus, reprinted with minor alterations and the addition of an optional sixth year course covering more advanced topics in the earlier disciplines together with geometry and basic physics, was given in September as this was, and 1870 (Ray 93-95). Ambitious an editorial in July 1867 lamenting that most Hindus were less despite than Brahmos and Christians enthusiastic about educating their women there were concrete results. The May 1870 issue printed two answer scripts3 from the fourth year examinations prize-winning by Deentarini and Dakshayani Ghosh (Ray 87-90). The Mukhopadhyay in 1870 in a sepa award-winning scripts were published by Bamabodhini rate volume entitled Narishiksha, or Women's Education (Ray 90). were equally alert to the necessity The editors of Bamabodhini for for (Ray 42), mal schooling. The Editorial for July 1867 regretted the existence of "a mere three schools for [local] girls" in Calcutta, of which only one had been established by a native gentleman Bamabodhini described (Ray 46). the progress and the annual prize-giving ceremonies of the Bethune Col in central Calcutta in the late 1840s legiate School for Girls (established An editorial in December 1866 champi Drinkwater Bethune). by John as proposed for Women oned setting up a Teacher Training College by 1866 editorial on this Mary Carpenter (Ray 37-38; 47-52 for the October to women's The August editorial lists four obstacles educa 1867 topic). tion: misconceptions about its aims among the local populace, child mar teachers, and lack of dedication among riage, lack of qualified women students and teachers alike. The demand for teacher training institutions was raised again in December 1870, bolstered by a letter to the editor Schools Division. The edito Inspector of the Middle a Training College for Nurses (Ray 102-05). is also a prime source of documentation Bamabodhini regarding the dis increase in girls' schools, including antahpur schools, in undi trict-wide vided Bengal, with statistics relating to the number of entrants and the in both formal and home-based number of successful examinees schools in primary schools for and data on the number of young girls studying from H. Woodrow, rial also advocated

18o

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Eurasian, con

boys

(Ray

28-30,

^6-6y,

i6y,

181-86,

220-22,

324-26).

in verted Christian, and Brahmo girls outnumber Hindus and Muslims schools. The enterprise of women's education reaches a kind of cli regular max in the celebratory Editorial of May the University 1877, commending of Calcutta for allowing women candidates, (established 1857) including to sit for its degree examinations and for educated applicants, privately secluded examination halls with women "specially invigilators" providing (Ray 161-62). The "Annual Education Survey," dated April 1889, lists one M.A. for Girls (set up in 1878) and student studying at Bethune College one woman doctor, Kadambini Ganguly, graduating from Calcutta Med ical College chronicles the 221). In January 1887, Bamabodhini (Ray inMadras, Bombay, admission of women and Cal into Medical Colleges cutta. Two women while the had entered Calcutta Medical College, Campbell Medical Training School at Calcutta opened its doors to women who were exempt from tuition fees, offered secluded seating areas in class rooms and laboratories and access to dormitory facilities and a special to transport them to and from class "omnibus" with "shaded windows" to encourage "If native women do not their enrollment: (Ray 211-16) women will arrive here to fill the void, and then medicine, study foreign we shall not have any grounds to protest" (Ray 212). These Patrika.
out

voice of the Bamabodhini editorials the official represent is played The real drama surrounding the "Woman Question"
voluntary submissions. Many ordinary women, not belong

through

ing to aristocratic families of Calcutta and Dhaka but hailing rather from and rural areas, took an active interest in, and offered non-metropolitan of antahpur educa creative suggestions for, the syllabus and pedagogy writes of many tion. Susamasundari Dasi from Ghoshpara, Krishnanagar, to in-house of the practical obstacles study: older unlettered women household toward literate younger women and "burn with jealousy" obstruct them; women joint families with their tradi living in crowded as compared to those who can go tional ambience are at a disadvantage to their distant places of work; men, too, often their husbands away from the extra load of tutoring their women. The writer's pana shy cea for these ills (she invites debate on her proposal) is the creation of a to be paid out of public funds cadre of peripatetic schoolmistresses every household must allow a teacher to hold classes indoors on specific a monthly or pay the Government penalty of five days of the week a princely sum in those days (Ray 221-22). Another correspon rupees, of the dent, identified by the initial "S," suggests that educated women make better antahpur teachers than men because of their family might and recounts the story of womanly qualities of patience and gentleness one such school in a village outside Dhaka (Ray 215). away with Despite these encouraging portents, the major controversy raging in

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concerns the rationale and usefulness of women's education Bamabodhini on this con In impartially projecting all three current viewpoints itself. not and conservative tentious issue - radical, moderate, Bamabodhini demonstrates the liberal spirit of its editors but also reveals the com only in the plex interplay of gender, culture, class, and colonial interpellation discourse on women. formation of the contemporary battle was not an easy one, for it had to struggle against of a reified and traditional Hindu patriarchy that garnered selective reading of the Shastras or Smritis to support from an extremely exercise hegemonic and the Muslim control over its women patriarchy similar strategies in their motivated that employed interpretation of their sacred texts: "The worst crime which our brothers commit against us is to .... Can they quote from the holy Quran or Hadis deprive us of education women from obtaining knowledge?" any injunction prohibiting (Hossain an emancipatory car 497). Furthermore, ideology with respect to women or capitulation to an alien ethos. ried the stigma of Westernization ambivalent stand on this matter, coming more than half a cen Gandhi's Bamabodhini's the shibboleth tury after Bamabodhini
... it is sad from men the mother name of to think who of that

began
the Smritis the liberty

its campaign,
contain of woman

illustrates
can own

the complexities:
command and who no regard is printed inspired respect her as

texts which as their

cherish the race. need

... I have not be

scriptures

taken

suggested already as the word of God

... that what or as the

in the word.

(Gandhi85)
as mother is troubling. The inherent image of the woman in a speech Gandhi delivered at the "Bhagini ambiguity becomes clearer (now Pune), printed in the March Samaj" (Society of Sisters) at Poona a Hindi Mirror for Women), issue of Stree Darpan (A 1918 journal for women's from Allahabad Rameshwari Nehru of the by uplift published celebrated Nehru invoked the revered triad of epic and Gandhi family. names and Draupadi heroines whose Sita, Damyanti, mythological were bywords to and unwavering for woman's devotion self-abnegation husband and home, and who were equated with devis or goddesses: His central
In order to rectify ... social inequities ... we shall have to reimbue women with the

purity, firmness, resolve and the spirit of self-sacrifice of Sita, Damyanti

Draupadi. same respect [T]hen in Hindu today's society women, as was pure enjoyed as satis, would by their to command begin ancient prototypes.

and
the

(Qtd. in Talwar 231; sati here refers to its etymological self-immolation) The cultural politics underlying the nationalist

sense of faithful wife, not

elevation

of the Hindu

182 woman

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to the status of a devi, or goddess, and idealized as the Grihalak or "goddess of the home," has been regarded as for shmi, compensation forms of social control that this analogy colonial emasculation.4 New women who saw implied were apparent even to contemporary through in Stree Darpan, Uma Nehru, stance.5 Writing this equivocatory daugh that such lofty expectations ter-in-law of the Nehru family, quips Indian male "attired in coat, pant, col scarcely become the contemporary "A Sita or a Savitri is conceivable only in the context of a lar and necktie": a Bharat a Krishna, and a Yudhisthir" Ramchandra, (Talwar 228).

Decades had appeared in earlier, these arguments and counter-arguments Bamabodhini. In the Battle of the Ancients and the Moderns, the issue of women's sensitive as it addressed emotionally education was particularly fraught questions of the mind and its attitudes and values. For the Ancients (para the whole issue doxically including many upper class literate women), could be reduced to the tidy cultural binary or opposition between station in life) and adharma (roughly, one's cosmically-ordained or Western (zn?-dharma, usually equated with a subversive modernity 1870 translates into Bengali ization). A lengthy anonymous piece inMay a couplet from "a poet named Pope" to the effect that a little learning is a liberation gained dangerous thing and expresses the fear that the mental in license and defiance towards duly education may be dissipated through runs the risk of turning into a bibi constituted authority. Such a woman or a dolled-up memsahib (European lady), absolutely useless for house hold chores and the care of the children (bibi was a pejorative term among The article lists ten cardinal points of a woman's dharma: conservatives). of both paternal and conjugal families piety, charity, caring for members absolute fidel truthfulness, benevolence, self-sacrifice, (samsar dharma), to the husband in body and mind, an abstemious faith in God, and life, ity for the afterlife (Ray 83-87). Several correspon belief in and preparation aver that a woman needs only religious dents, including named women, dharma instead of academic subjects (Ray 16, 83, 13 iff). in many cases is not a regressive obscu Interestingly, what is at work a genuine fear of social destabilization. A woman rantism but from Bhat women have been whether who para, Prasannatara Gupta, wonders can handle their sudden access to knowledge for generations repressed themselves and freedom of thought without compromising (July 1872; are not ini declares, "If women 130). An anonymous Ray correspondent if they deviate from tiated into religious studies from the very beginning, as a result of an unnatural education, then we can well imagine religion the terrible chaos that will engulf human society" (April 1873; ^ay I31) even among these skeptics. A three-part There is a genuine uncertainty honorific "devi" signifies an aristocratic article by Kulabala Devi (the education

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Woman's Education "The Hindu and her Subjugation" o Paradhinata"), Ramanir Vidyashiksha serialized inApril, May, ("Hindu and November 1892 (Ray 229-36), admits that lack of knowledge makes and that a well-educated and superstitious women, for narrow-minded woman vocation of being a good best fulfills the woman's greatest but then asks whether wisdom and learning are synonymous and mother, woman), will perform household duties. These educated woman even into the twentieth In February 1915, century. Devi distinguishes between external or superficial and Hemantakumari internal or true education and laments that whereas women's education is a noble ideal, it has produced a breed of precocious, haughty, and luxury women more proud of their ability to read novels than their ability loving to cook. The kind of education dispensed struck at the roots of traditional whether doubts an continued virtues of kindness, womanly diligence, gentleness, decorum, propriety, from and selflessness Girija Prasanna Sen, a gentleman (Ray 316-19). in Bamabodhini's in Calcutta, Kumartuli suggests changes antahpur syl labus to include childcare and cookery (Ray 306). Authors expressed baf An unnamed in of women. contributor flement over the education women 1880 claims that highly-educated American suffer September an argument supported with statistics gathered severe health problems, by an American, Dr. Clark. The correspondent piously hopes that a large sur in the curriculum will help Bengali women dose of moral education rate of excessive learning (Ray 225-27). vive the high mortality of those who voiced doubts or opposition towards women's Many ill education were really more concerned with its anticipated or perceived caveats effects on women, the family, and society than with ideological against the endeavor per se. Those who sought to allay these misgivings without and the consequent rejec falling into the trap of Westernization tion of their proposals were caught in a double bind like that expressed by Tennyson Yet more in In Memoriam: "Let knowledge grow from more to more / of reverence in us dwell." By propagating the inherently contra to produce nothing more ideal of antahpur education designed dictory than well-informed and mothers housewives rather than independent

shared the ambivalence of Gandhi and many other women, Bamabodhini national leaders, male and female. The February and March 1870 numbers Sen's English the two-part Bengali translation of Keshub Chunder carry address to the Social Sciences Association (Samajik Vigyan Sabha) at Cal for the Improvement of Our Women" cutta, "Proposal (Ray 106-20). It is allusions, a char replete with Sanskrit slokas and Vedic and Upanishadic to the service of modernity. Sen docu acteristic co-opting of tradition as well as shortcomings ments achievements of the women's education movement and proposes institutional (e.g., teacher training improvements of Schools, better text books, of an Inspectress colleges, appointment

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on mar Government intervention). James Mill's Quoting disquisition asserts that educated women make better wives, a riages in England, Sen to the new liberal ideology of companionate, as opposed to reference men would be hierarchical, marriage that assumed thatWestern-educated partners than with illiterate happier with literate, somewhat sophisticated wives. He writes that by teaching women "the value of truth, science and "confer on them social equality and purity," and religion," men will India in a way which is not superficial. If you through this "reconstruct to establish a civil society in India, you must search for the truly wish means to instill in our women the qualities of purity and dutifulness" rhetoric that 120). This is one of the earliest phases of nationalist (Ray central to a culturally India able to withstand made women resurgent But this conferring was a gift from men rather colonial interpellation. the woman's than a right and required traditional ideals of fulfilling with the extra qualification Indian womanhood of education. Similarly, in the Bengali intellectual, Amritalal Gupta, writes of the bhadramahila to that women "no longer as housemaids the April-May 1903 number ... are their husbands endowed with all the good qualities that completely . ... an educated husband expects in his wife Just as, like Hindu women, are devoted to their husbands, so too, like English women, they they can be for their husbands comrades of the mind, partners at work, and com love rather panions of the heart" (Ray 244). The reference to conjugal Yet in conceptualizing than wifely the New Woman duty isWestern. the liberal (always the creation of man and cast in his chosen mould), strained to escape any suggestion Indian male of colonial hegemony. Even in Bamabodhini's idealistic discourse, the goal of the newly liber is not self-fashioning but to fashion a (relatively mod ated bhadramahila ern) self to please her husband. on Bamabodhini to the Commentators and on women's responses to women's to what was "Woman Question" have pointed acquiescence benevolent form of patriarchy.7 Despite Bamabodhini's only a more contributors' debates on women's education and mainly Hindu women women's the verdict often was that however social and cultural worth, she must never forget her dharma of being a good educated the woman, was mandated But some compromise and mother. for daughter, wife, to become universally innovation accepted. Even the fiery founder of the Sakhawat Memorial School Sakhawat Hossain, Roquiah observed that "the future of India lies in its girls," for Girls in Calcutta, but added, "In short, our girls would not only obtain University degrees, - or I but must be ideal daughters, wives and mothers may say, obedient ("Edu loving sisters, dutiful wives, and instructive mothers" daughters, Indian Girls," The Mussalman, March cational Ideals for Modern 5 1931;
Hossain 501-02).

such a radical

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in fact contoured the para The newly articulated liberation discourses than ever before. The edu of "woman" in more demanding ways digm from her whose woman, cated, upper-class/caste badge of difference sisters was her literacy and "liberated" access to com lower-class/caste as serve her man. In Koyl panionate marriage, must now please as well in "On the Education of Hindu aschandra Bose's trenchant observation the earliest stages of discourse Females" (1846), an English tract marking is as of Indian women, the New Woman formation on the empowerment of man (in a different way) as the traditional woman: much the possession "She [the genteel woman] must be refined, reorganized, recast, regener ated" (Sangari and Vaid, "Epigraph"). Sister Nivedita (Margaret Noble) of the cultured yet domesticated this typology upper-class projected to the global ideal of the family in her Indian wife as India's contribution at the First Universal of Women," paper entitled "The Present Position in 1911. in London Races Congress to turn to the evidence, we Foucault's Yet, remembering injunction women toward self-fashioning find in Bamabodhini struggling through to socialization and independent opinions and radical choices in contrast collusion. student of Srimati Bibi Tahren Lechha, a first year Muslim Boda Girls' School, asserts that education will make women better moth ers by teaching them to be less superstitious 1864; Ray 26). (February to patriar Soudamini Devi of Bakhargunge feels that death is preferable Kamini Datta of Khoipara que chal exploitation (April 1865; Ray 27-28). ries whether God could have created knowledge solely for men (August S. D. from Konnagar laments, "Have we been born in this 1867; Ray 46). country only to live like animals?" (May 1868; Ray 55). Mrs Mahalanobis throws down the gauntlet: "If the need arises and the (Mahalanobisjaj woman is capable, then why should she not work outside the house? Is it to earn her living?" (September for a woman impossible or unnatural 1878; Ray 154). Kamini Kumari Gupta of Mahilara, Barisal (now in Bang in "Women's and Women's Liberation" Education ladesh) concludes o Striswadhinata") with a ringing challenge to "all unscru ("Strishiksha ... be the case, ifHindu Whatever ladies are not pulcus and selfish men. in every sphere, Hindu with men society will be given equal liberty in the conflagration caused by their curses" (December 1882; destroyed the received wisdom about the degeneration 181). One "L" questions Ray of literate European women by giving the example of Mother Teresa and her Little Sisters of the Poor (August-September 1914; Ray 260-61). Amala Devi asks, "Are women not part of the human race?" (April 1917; their rights will bring Ray 322). "Srimati" ("Miss") says, "Giving women 1917; Ray 339). Charushila Mitra suggests peace to the world" (December can manage her own property that an educated woman 1922; (November Prasad Ray 339-43). There are supportive male voices as well. Niranjan

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of society speaks of the need for a total transformation Chakraborty can be given their due (July 1919; Ray 332). Men before women and women did not merely relive socialized, interiorized paradigms. It is diffi cult to agree completely with Himani Bannerji's reading of Bamabodhini and Althusserian solely in terms of Gramscian "hegemony" "interpella what scattered and some (Bannerji 135-78). Individual voices, however a break through the barrier of collusion. Providing unformulated, forum for such voices was Bamabodhini's its edi contribution, although torial policy was not fully aligned with these radical voices. In some essays there is a lively awareness of woman's unique subjectiv 1868 ity or mon (mind or inclination). An anonymous piece in August featured an imaginary conversation between Gyanada wise woman) (the tion"

To Gyanada's and Sarala (the simple woman). query as to why she will not learn to read and write, Sarala replies, "Friend, I have heard that there is a taboo against women's in the [Hindu] Shastras. Is it right to education the Shastras}" She cites commonly held beliefs about educating disregard women: itwill bring on the curse of widowhood, make women immoral, them to ridicule, and undermine society's foundations. Gyanada replies, "Whenever we do not understand anything we turn to the Shas tras to justify our ignorance." She then quotes Sanskrit verses from the Vedas that exhort parents to educate daughters, names several highly edu and cated Hindu women of yore (Lilavati, Khana, Gargi, and Rukmini), to blind, deaf, and dumb animals unaware unlettered women compares even of their surroundings. an "historical" follows this up with for the Gyanada explanation in India: excesses of Mughal education rule drove decline of women's conser Hindu (and ultimately society into a self-defensive self-defeating) expose vatism, and only liberal ideas filtering down from British rule provoked so they can become better moth the need to broaden women's outlook, and mistresses She adds a final caveat: the of households. ers, wives, of learning is difficult, so women must cultivate the mon and acquisition and cutting down on frivolous improve by culling time from housework to buy books. Though many enlightened men are now willing to expenses women must help themselves In a second dia (Ray 2-6). help women, between 1868, Gyanada literacy and logue in September distinguishes the object of is only familiarity with language, whereas learning. Literacy of the mon. So women must learning is to draw out inner potentialities cur develop their minds through study of various subjects (the antahpur and its values: history, riculum) that will acquaint her with her world and biographies of great men astronomy, geography, biology, zoology, (Rayn-13). two dialogues The crystallize women's education and consequent major arguments for and against of a gendered social

reconfigurations

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space in nineteenth-century Bengal (with Bengal at the forefront of these concerns voiced across India). Here is a constructed "history" to explain - a Vedic followed by a demonized Indian women's fall from grace idyll Muslim onslaught and a redemptive British liberalism. This nostrum care fully edits out the gendered tyranny of Hindu Brahminical patriarchy and in Bamabodhini is repeated elsewhere too, is a (qtd. in Ray 180). Here, Vedas in place of the Shas selective invocation of Hindu scriptures (the or the Manusamhita tras, especially their most patriarchal representative, to refute British liberal critics such as James Mill (Mill Laws of Manu) is barbaric because it repressed its 445-47), who believed that Hinduism
women.

at the heart of there is an (unintentional) Nevertheless, equivocation are the "women" she is aiming to reform? discourse. Who Gyanada's inflection she speaks? The unavoidable Who are the "women" for whom of households of class directs her remarks to those who will be mistresses in the who are to be educated. This takes us back to Datta's manifesto "If by the will of God this effort of ours is first issue of Bamabodhini: use to its women, accepted by our cultured society and found to be of then itwill have served its purpose." Only women of "our cultured soci ety" are to benefit. This points to a curious anomaly in the stratification of elite classes were the most repressed by patriar of women; the women chal control and needed to learn modalities whereas of self-fashioning, of the menial and agricul non-elite women had always constituted part a tural working classes in India, and therefore had always possessed of agency, if not of formal education. Bamabodhini greater degree sought to inculcate lessons in self-fashioning for elite women whose patriarchally an index of their social privilege. dictated seclusion was paradoxically These lessons had their own motivated trajectories. They rejected exist ing Bengali women's popular oral culture of songs, poems, jingles, stories, from the Hindu tradition. and age-old sayings derived mythological Gauri Viswanathan has cited the Serampore-based Orientalist William Ward to the effect that
... itwas claimed that the chief reason for the Indians' to the education

opposition

of females before the nineteenth

immoral and sensuous and

century was
woman

that Hindu
who

literature was basically

claims to learning

that no Hindu

acquired

could latermake claims to respectability. Within

(Viswanathan 87)

this line of thinking Bamabodhini, too, opted for a formal West to create a lady fit for companionate academic culture designed the only indigenous element in this new curriculum being the marriage, attributes required to run a conventional household. This, indeed, is a ernized curious compromise. Sumanta Banerjee has written:

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Patrika

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a

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... need lesson for naram indicated assertiveness for or

magazine, gentle women and

naram

emphasized ... The for women. clear.... Any

andarmahal

in these

was

sign

of

of departure from their domestic roles that might be inspired by stories about the adulterous Radha or the assertive Vidya, had to be suppressed. Bamabodhini
Patrika by some warned women against who the still tendency read to subvert the objective and panchalis of female education andarmahal. Vidya-Sundar in the

(Banerjee 163) to a similar equivocation in Bamabodhini Mrinalini Sinha has pointed Bill (1891) that sought with respect to the controversial Age of Consent to eradicate child marriage, despite its own repeatedly stated opposition to women's to this institution as one main contributor illiteracy: "It was one of the leading journals Patrika, only in 1894 when the Bamabodhini in Bengal, was celebrating for women its thirtieth jubilee that [Ghulam] to the Consent Act" Murshid finds a passing reference (Sinha 170). in general as "hegemonic Himani this approach Bannerji has described somewhat harshly calls social reform" (Bannerji 72-98). Partha Chatterjee resolution of the women's this "the dead end [of] the nationalist question ..." (Chatterjee 252). was located at a This judgment is only partially correct. Bamabodhini of Indian modernity and had particular time and place in the development to grapple with that constituted its own ingrained social preconceptions its endeavors, it did seek to con cultural background. However imperfect ceptualize a third space beyond the reified binaries of civilized/primitive, or rational/irrational. This third discursive modern/traditional, space male-authored nine allows for the gendered inflection of conventional texts in the "Mother and Daughter" teenth century "Advice toWomen" these texts, even those that appear in Bamabodhini. Typically, dialogues assume that women are in the context of companionate written marriage, and in need of male guidance. A well ignorant, frivolous, superstitious, known treatise such as Satyacharan Mitra's Streer Prati Svamir Upadesh to his Wife) assumes a condescending Advice attitude to (A Husband's a progressive who women favors remarriage for being despite Mitra's is widows says, "the husband (Mitra 129). The imaginary husband learned, the wife is stupid, the husband speaks the truth, the wife tells lies. ... are We see this in home after home. ...The cause of this is that women not being educated" (Mitra 140). By contrast, the three-part "Advice to a in Bamabodhini (April, May, and July 1864; Ray 12-21) writes Daughter" natural faculty of the ways education draws out and develops a woman's of reason by eliminating superstition. Patrika ultimately achieve for the cause of What did Bamabodhini in Bengal and elsewhere in India? However women's education fraught

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editors and contributors contradictions, epistemological as a platform to think through the beliefs of an exist used Bamabodhini a new horizon. This discursive ing culture in the hopes of glimpsing the journal's historical vision constitutes importance for the education of not a little to subsequent women. contributed Bamabodhini changes. to the era before for Rasasundari Devi's Amarjibon (My Life) belonged mal antahpur education. She learned to read and write by secretly study to her sons and wrote her autobiography after she ing books belonging with inherent
was sixty:

Wasn't
because

it amatter to be regretted, that I had to go through all this humiliation

I was a woman? It is such days a Shut pleasure of a up like to see single a thief, even trying to learn was considered the women child take enjoying today so much care so much to educate

just
free her.

an offense. dom. These

parents

girl

But we had to struggle so much just for that. The little that I have learned is only because God did me the favor. (Tharu and Lalitha 201-02) Rasasundari Admittedly, with many other along dhini's legacy. is speaking of her own reformers and institutions, class. Nevertheless, this was Bamabo of Calcutta

University

NOTES
i The Brahmo Samaj, founded in Bengal in 1828 by Raja Rammohan Roy, was
an Upanishadic reform movement directed against the conservative and ritual

istic forms of Brahminical Hinduism.

dranath liberals Tagore, who, the father however, of were

Its leaders, including Maharshi Deben

Tagore, but were deeply Western-educated influenced by the

of Rabindranath not Westernised

message spiritual 2 All to Bamabodhini references

the Upanishads. Patrika are from Bharati Ray, ed., Sekaler Nar

ishiksha: Bamabodhini Patrika [Women's Education in Those Days: Bamabo dhini Patrika] (Calcutta: U of Calcutta P, 1994), a collection of all the essays on
women's volume education was sponsored from by Bamabodhini the Women's Patrika Studies between Research 1863 Centre, and 1922. This of University

Calcutta. All translations into English from the original Bengali are mine.
3 Answer 4 On scripts were handwritten and answers tensions to questions in the test. "Education the many ambiguities in the nineteenth-century

in India, see Ghulam Murshid, Reluctant Debutante: Women toModernization, 1849-190f (Rajshahi: Rajshahi Response of Bengali UP, 1983) 19-62; Meredith Borthwick, The Changing Role of Women in Ben of Women Debate"
gal, 1849-190j (Princeton: Princeton UP, 1984).

190

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5 Tanika Sarkar,Hindu Wife, Hindu Nation

2000).

(New Delhi: Permanent Black,

6 A similar sentiment had been expressed earlier by Nistarini Devi (qtd. in Ray 190-1), writing in July 1884 from Kanpur inUttar Pradesh. Sumit Sarkar, "TheWomen's Question in 19 Century Bengal," Women and 7 Culture, ed. Kumkum Sangari and Sudesh Vaid (Bombay: SNDT Women's UP, 1985) 157-72; Partha Chatterjee, "The Nationalist Resolution of the
Women's Question," Recasting Women: Essays in Colonial History, ed. Kum

kum Sangari and Sudesh Vaid (New Delhi: Kali forWomen, 1989) 233-53; Tanika Sarkar,Hindu Wife, Hindu Nation (New Delhi: Permanent Black, 2000); Himani Bannerji, Inventing Subjects: Studies inHegemony, Patriarchy and Colonialism (Delhi: Tulika, 2001) 99-178.

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