By Alankrita Anand
You must have noticed, like I did, that the movie Pink made a reference to the ‘bindiwali fauj’, a clear reference to women activists, the stereotype of which is defined by cotton sarees, bindis on the forehead and an angry temperament. I belong to a sub-category, that of on-campus bindi-walis.
In the higher education scene in India, Women’s Studies and/or Gender Studies as a discipline andan area of research has existed for some four decades now, with taught Master’s courses emerging in the last couple of years. India has over 80 centres teaching this course. The discipline has mostly maintained a close association with the women’s movements and there have been calls from feminists for a more activist and interventionist role for the discipline and for social sciences at large. And this is where we on-campus ‘bindiwalis’ come in.
Being a social sciences student in this country is relatively less prestigious but being a student of Women’s Studies is pretty much incomprehensible. We are famously known as home-breakers, FabIndia feminists, feminazis, amongst other things. I’ve even been called a Fem-maratha. We have also been mistaken for being Home Science students! Women and home, synonyms, aren’t they? Simultaneously we are also home-wreckers. My classmate in Women’s Studies at TISS was told by a student from another course, the first time they met, that while other courses teach social service, in Women’s Studies, they send you with a burning torch to destroy homes. Because what else would a discipline that examines gender, the social status of women and power be interested in other than burning undergarments and wrecking marriages?
Within the academic spaces that we inhabit, we’ve heard that people have to be particularly careful around us and not crack sexist jokes (arduous, isn’t it?), we’ve also heard that people are scared of us. The spectacle of people seeking equality must be a scary affair for many.
When people hear there are men in our class, the immediate conclusion is: must be gay or effeminate.
And there is also the belief that over time, our course ‘gets into us’, I don’t see how that’s a bad thing but the phrase is a quick clue to what people imagine happens to Women’s Studies students: indocrination or demonic possession.
While we’re happy to address any and all genuine questions about our discipline, it gets a bit tiresome to hear the endless jokes about what Women’s Studies must entail or why one must pursue it. A student who had just been admitted into the course was asked “Oh, so there’s a course now that teaches bra burning?” In a conversation once overheard, a student of Mental Health was ‘jokingly’ asked if she decided on the course because she had some mental illness. It’s easy to imagine one of us being asked if we decided on the course because we had been sexually harassed. How often have we heard the “why have all only these feminists been sexually harassed” statement. It only seems a natural progression to that joke.
All this in the social sciences world. Outside of this world, Women’s Studies has often not been heard of. Fair enough. I am often baffled by unconventional STEM courses (Computational Neuroscience/ Complex Systems) and am inquisitive about what they entail.
But I would argue that nanotechnology doesn’t inspire the hostility from strangers that feminism or its academic sisterhood inspires. Feminism is everybody’s favourite punching bag, and a discipline that draws from and gives to feminism will not be left alone. The inquisitiveness, therefore, is not always so simple. People I have spent hours explaining what Women’s Studies is about still call me ‘Women’s Studies’, with more than just a tinge of sarcasm. I have no problem with the course becoming the primary marker of my identities, but there is a problem in the pleasure people derive in asking you your sustenance plans after the course. Of course, among ourselves we also crack jokes about it too while trying to crack the NET exam often mandatory for those who want to teach in universities.
We are happy to explain what we’re doing to friends and relatives alike, but to hear someone say “Women’s Studies has made you like this” or “what things are they teaching you, you will lose your sense of humour” is a trivialization of all that might have gone into the need and conceptualization of the course, and of its members’ experiences.
The fear of ‘isms’ is not unheard of. And I believe that closed academic circles are also to be blamed. We’ve had a tendency to get into jargon; we learn of many things devoid of context.
But Women’s Studies has not been only about textbook feminism and conferences in air-conditioned rooms, it does allow for a space where we can all come together and engage, and we strive to be as intersectional as it gets.
But increasingly, my class of 17 women has been discussing how we will be left with few friends other than each other if this is how hostile most spaces outside of our comfort zone are.
Unfollowing people on social media (to prevent a continuous sense of despair at the sexism in the world), the failure of our repeated attempts at‘dialogue’, becoming the outcast in family gatherings and social circles because we are told we don’t take ‘jokes’ well, being told we’re always angry. These are our common experiences
But we are slowly gearing up to leave our comfort zones, ready to deal with the world’s inquisitiveness and apprehensions.
A degree in Women’s Studies does not make one a superior feminist, much as the field of study is rooted in feminist ideologies. But bindi or not, we have all some answers to the casual hecklers who say “Hey, Women’s Studies, what does your feminism say now?”, believe me. If only the hecklers would stop talking long enough to listen.
Alankrita Anand is a student of Women’s Studies at Tata Institute of Social Sciences, Mumbai. She has a keen interest in issues of gender, particularly gender and the media, and pursues them through academics as well as practice.