Indira Singh, Week 7

Of Rasoi Ka Kaam/Bathroom Ka Kaam

Perspective of Women Domestic Workers

Summary

Practices of purity and pollution have been a critical area of inquiry in paid domestic work relations in India. This paper revisits the idea of purity and pollution in the space of the home in paid domestic work, but with the intent to turn the gaze around. It shifts the focus by looking at workers as the subjects and examining their responses. It argues that the existing frameworks for looking at the space of home and the practices of purity and pollution are limiting and have to be revisited to develop a dynamic understanding of the everyday reality of domestic work and caste hierarchies at work. Domestic Work in India has done much to highlight practices of purity and pollution as an aspect governing relations between employer and worker. Here, the employer being the origin or the “doer” of the practice and worker as passive objects, always at the receiving ends of these practices. It is narrative that assumes congruence between class and caste, imagining the world in which the employer is always upper caste and the worker always lower caste.

Caste finds mention in two distinct ways in contemporary discourse on paid domestic work in India: first, domestic workers’ and employers’ caste, as an identity, becomes important to understand the organisation of work. The symbolic practices, of segregating “dirty” from the clean, on the basis of “hygiene” or “pollution,” are key to the social construction of space. Practices of segregation by middle class employers in their household space in the name of privacy, hygiene, pollution and intimacy, shed light on some of the ways in which boundaries of “home” and “outside” are (re)drawn. These are responses to the intimate interactions of otherwise two distant social classes who tend to inhabit different social and physical spaces.

In this paper, workers’ narratives that reflect caste-based practices of purity/pollution are thematically arranged in two categories: the first section explores the practices of caste and enquires about the increasing specialisation/segregation of tasks under the dominant arrangement of part-time work, and  the second section examines workers’ perceptions about their employers and the household space that they work in. It is not just employers who identify workers based on their caste and function through popularly held notions of purity/pollution: often, workers themselves practise untouchability towards employers.

Namrata Goswami- Week 7

Sonal Sharma in her article ‘Rasoi ka Kaam/Bathroom ka kaam’ reexamines the concepts of purity and pollution within the purview of the domestic workplace and how these concepts affect the woek relations of females in correlations to concepts such as class and caste. Sharma points out the fact that the very creation of the concept of ‘dirt’ in opposition to that of hygeine is a creation of caste division. The term ‘ganda’ in itself means something that is not supposed to be in the place and is meant to be removed. Lower caste people who are engaged in the cleaning of toilets are usually not let to enter the kitchen even for purposes such as drinking water. Thus the word ‘ganda’ is used to refer to impure things. Further Sharma points to the fact how workers are also divided on the basis of their religion, which can be seen in the examples of Jummi and Henna, as they are not allowed to enter the kitchen. Here is how the author brings home the fact how work is divided in Rasoi ka kaam and bathroom ka kaam. The concept of equality comes into question as we reflect upon the logical analysis by Sharma in terms of caste and economic gains. 

Amaan Syed Week 7

Gender and Society Summary

Week 7

The article, “Rasoi ka Kaam / Bathroom ka Kaam” by Sonal Sharma talks about domestic workers who work in households in Delhi. There is visible segregation between the workers and employers. The article discusses how some work is considered to be much higher than ‘work’. Those who work and clean bathrooms are considered to be much lower than the people who are associated with the work related to the kitchen or the rasoi. The employers make sure that the ‘dirty’ work is given to people belonging to the lower caste. The system is followed in our university where the workers from Sodexo are from a lower caste than the workers and the cooks who work in our kitchen mess. The article also talks about how a Hindu woman is considered to be impure when she works in a Muslim household. There are many stereotypes that come along the differentiation in the caste and the religion system. We see that there is certain intersectionality going on with these domestic workers. All these leads to create a social hierarchy which impacts the way people assert power over people is considered ‘lower.’

Moulya Subbaramaiah Week 7

The Lace Makers of Narsapur: Indian Housewives Produce for the World Market

Maria Mies

Mies’s paper studies in detail the involvement of women in the lace making industry of Narsapur. This case study discusses the historical development of the lace industry in India and also analyses the production relations within the industry and their effects on women. Mies iterates that the lack of official data like census etc on women depicts the nature of their work as being part of the informal sector or as Mies says that it makes up the ‘shadow economy.’ More often than not, women’s work is not considered as work that is contributing to the economy but merely housework. Mies terms this phenomena as ‘housewifization’ of labor. This phenomena results in women’s labor to be viewed and deemed as natural or subsistence work and is not thought to be a part of the production of capital. Mies highlights the clash between ideological views and economic principles through the example of the lace making industry. She elaborates how in Naraspur, women are considered to belong to a high caste if the women of the family stay at home instead of going out to work, implying that they are not required to bring in income to the household. This is an established status symbol. As a result, the poorer women took to lace making. While they thought it would bring them a higher sense of status as they were bringing capital into the house, it was not considered as productive work and was looked at something that women did in the confines of their homes in their spare time. Therefore, even if society is profiting economically from women’s labour, the ideological views that are present prevent their roles from being viewed as work. The women lace-workers of Naraspur are defined socially as housewives. This ideology that rejects them as breadwinners, allows for these women to be subjected to extremely high levels of exploitation. 

Aadya Gupta, Week 7

Commentary on: Dynamics of Sexual Division of Labour and Capital Accumulation: Women Lace Workers of Narsapur, by Maria Mies.

This article deals with the plight of women lace workers in Nursapur in Andhra Pradesh.The irony in the article is that these women produce luxury items that they will never use, whose high market value does not translate to higher wage rates for the workers. The sexual division of labour is not only polarising along the gender binary, but also polarising in terms of class.

The corporatisation of lace making- by breaking apart the finished product into small sections and paying wage rates per pattern- has condemned these women to a life of poverty. Seclusion and purdah is a sign of class/caste superiority in certain communities, but is also a way of controlling feminine agency. These oppressive norms have insidiously strong holds. These women are not even included in the census statistics, which makes them officially invisible, so the focus is on ‘men’ who seem to be the makers and producers of lace. It is interesting to observe how the Kapu women refused to do the field work that Harijan women did- even if it meant that they had to live in poverty just to have a higher status in the eyes of society. 

The true evil of the industry is that it has managed to convince these women they are good at nothing else but making lace. This also serves to divide women as a community amongst themselves- through classification into hierarchy.The process of pauperization of these poor peasants due to capitalism has another conclusion- the capitalist system is designed to suck you dry of your wealth- and then, left with no options, you end up taking the job the industry determines most profitable for itself and the most ruinous for its workers.

The dynamics of the division of labor between men and women has been constantly changing, but a common thread remains the exploitation of women by men. Men feed off women’s labor, which remains unrecognized and unregulated. The fieldwork for this article was done in 1978-79 period, implying that the current state of lace workers in Andhra Pradesh might have significantly changed since then. However, this article has opened my eyes to the various industries that exist in India that feed off the productivity of women, and the dire need for the regularization of the same.

Aarnav Tapan Deshpande- Week 7

One of the contributions brought to the table by an inherently capitalist societal and economic system is the practice of measuring the worth of one’s work and its significance in monetary terms. This practice also leaves the door open to exploitation in the form of challenging one’s authority by a constant propagation of their insignificance and inferiority. The large contributions of women in the labor force and income shares of households have more often than not fallen prey to this prejudice. In her piece ‘Dynamics of Sexual Division of Labour and Capital Accumulation’ Maria Mies brings to the fore the wage discrimination that is faced by women owing to a constant demeaning of the work that is done by them and promoting the stock image of a ‘housewife’ in a woman, which also leads to alteration of their own perception of the work they do as being something that is of less importance than that done by a man.

Another aspect that Mies seeks to highlight is that majority of the work put in by rural women is into the production of goods that are never to be consumed or used by them, most of which is produced and consumed by upper class individuals. It is here that Miles also ropes in the Marxist idea of Alienation from their product that these rural women are faced with. Mies ends off her piece showcasing the disparity that is brought on by the division of the sexes into the ‘housewife’ and the ‘breadwinner’ helps propagate the exploitation of working women, for their work is very simply labelled as insignificant and only worth a meagre remuneration.

Ritika Sharma Week 7

The 'Dirt' in The Dirty picture- Jenny Rowena


With the break up of old kinship structures and the opening up of new spaces for intermingling of the sexes in modern India, Cinema has worked most significantly to maintain endogamy. This is one fact that has not been recognized about Indian cinema even though it has been legitimizing this caste regulation for almost a century now. 
Regularly the account of a film calls upon the upper standing man to demonstrate his duty to his position profound quality by dismissing this vamp figure. So the nearness of the vamp in the films of India isn't simply identified with the man centric control of female sexuality. Rather it was her degenerate and rebellious body that featured the rank immaculateness of the mild, upper station female body. Silk Smitha was one such Vamp.
Be that as it may, she not just kept up the white cleaned virginal excellence of the upper standing lady, with her sultry brown complexion and her hot articulations. She additionally conveyed forward rank Hindu customs like Okali and Siddi Aattu (portrayed in the start of this paper) wherein she turned into the new current display that was erotically appreciated towards the open festival of the debased and sexualized status of the lower position lady in a standing Hindu society. This is the thing that The Dirty Picture and its women's activist supporters neglect to carry out as to Silk Smitha.

vanshika kundra- week 7

Practices of immaculateness and contamination have been a basic zone of request in paid household work relations in India. This paper returns to the possibility of virtue and contamination in the space of the home in paid local work, however with the aim to turn the look around. It moves the concentration by taking a gander at laborers as the subjects and analyzing their reactions. It contends that the current systems for taking a gander at the space of the home and the acts of virtue and contamination are constraining and must be returned to build up a powerful comprehension of the regular truth of household work and position pecking orders grinding away. existing grant on residential work in India has done a lot to feature practices of immaculateness and contamination as a perspective overseeing connection among boss and specialist. Researchers, nonetheless, have when all is said in done regarded the business as the root and "practitioner" of the training, and laborer as uninvolved articles, consistently at the less than desirable finish of these practices. This direct, well-known account doesn't do equity to the complexities of the acts of immaculateness and contamination established in station relations in India. It is an account that expects consistency among position and class, envisioning a world in which the business is constantly upper station and the specialist lower standing. To completely see how thoughts of immaculateness and contamination shape residential work in India, we should inspect laborers' points of view on these practices. Such points of view uncover a completely extraordinary part of the "embeddedness" of these work relations in standing and class pecking orders and disrupt the predominant account of lower-class and lower-station laborers utilized by white-collar class and upper-position businesses. The shapes of rank in local work relations are unpredictable and converge with different types of social differentiation, similar to religion. These various and crossing characters make frequently confounding and stratified contrasts even among laborers. Taking a gander at these crossing social structures, we understand that subordinate class position is only one piece of residential laborers' social area as a rule, and in relation to their white-collar class bosses, specifically.

Parshva Shah week 7

Miles and Sharma both touch upon the concept of labor and caste with respect to women. However Miles explores the rural handicraft Industry of India , while Sharma observes the plight of house help in modern day Delhi. Miles shows women look at caste as a form of separation of labor. Upper Caste women are subject to greater household work and production of lace , while the lower caste women work in the field. Here if one were to apply Sharma’s understanding of what is “ganda” , field work , which was predominantly male, is the “ganda” work , while the work at home is sacrosanct. Therefore the homework being pure is an essential concept brought out by Miles, however it is juxtaposed to Sharmas stand that both Upperer caste and dalit women were both hired for the same position of house help, showing that class distinction may not translate to caste distinction. However Miles considers the encroachment of men into the lace industry as a manner of phasing out of women. Similarly male household help is a manner of phasing out of women from the sphere of employment.

Amal Sheheen- week 7

In this paper, Maria Miles examines the role of “non working housewife”, and the necessity of this perception in the capitalist economy for keeping their wages low, while using them for production in the global capitalist economy, through the context of the lace workers of Narsapur.

Marx and Engels have discussed the plight of lace makers. Marx assumed that lace production would have to shift to factories, because of unsustainably low wages, but did not predict that production would simply shift.

Lace makers in Narsapur earn extremely poor wages, as they are forced into the bracket of being a “housewife”. As they are technically kshatriyas, they see it as a loss of social standing to do agricultural work. They have to resort to making lace to run the household, though they already do all the work required to run it, from collecting firewood to feeding their husbands. However, they are paid a pittance, as they are housewives, and their work is considered as “leisure”, since they do not work in the fields, and though they may be the breadwinners, their income is considered supplementary. This label also subjugates them socially, as it implies an inherent inferiority to the “real” breadwinners.

Anusha Sinha Week 7

The following is a comment on the piece written by Sonal Sharma titled ‘Of rasoi ka kaam/ bathroom ka kaam: Perspectives of Women Domestic Workers.

In this article, Sonal Sharma talks about the practices of purity and pollution on domestic work in Indian society. She sheds light on surrounding women domestic workers, which become far more complicated when they are viewed from the perspectives of the workers themselves. It reflects upon the working of caste system in the form of hierarchy as well as gender bias. Employers often ask for a domestic workers’ caste to make sure certain blacklisted castes considered as 'polluted' don't enter their 'pure' realm of household. Segregating the ‘dirty’ from the ‘clean’ contributes to the social construction of space. It is also the workers who perpetuate and reinforce these practices, as well, i.e. hierarchies exists among workers as well. But this is a different form untouchability and cannot be equated with those of employers because of power dynamics. Sharma's ethnographic survey enables the readers to witness the graded hierarchy of caste as reflected by the workers’ views themselves. Non dalit workers even though in a disadvantaged position due to their economic conditions have a say in what work they want to carry out due to their advantaged caste position in the hierarchy. This leads to unequal access within the household space as jobs relates to cleaning bathrooms are carried out by dalit workers due to age old practices.

Surya Sushil Sarwan Week 7

Sonal Sharma (2013) in a study ‘Of Rasoi ka kaam/ Bathroom ka kaam’ points out the traditional thinking of the families regarding the categorisation of the workers. Employers segregate tasks for their notions of “purity” and “pollution,” which has often been seen as reproducing caste relations. Interview with OBC caste workers indicates that people from her caste do only rasoi ka kaam (kitchen-related work) and not bathroom ka kaam (any task involving bathroom). These responses clearly indicate that sometimes workers do not only know what they should or should not do, but also, in their schema of task-segregation, who should do it. The caste factor is very crucial in the selection of domestic worker. As if she is dalit/ tribe then she is only supposed to clean bathroom and not enter in the kitchen.

It is settled that all specialists have confronted distance somewhat in their lives and it is exceptionally unavoidable in the Indian setting. For example, most assistants are asked their position before enlistment or their station is unlawfully assumed or concluded based on their inception. Laborers' practices show that station assumes an essential job in organizing the relations, it isn't the main personality busy working and features the significance of religion and area. Thoughts of contamination as "evasion" apply to laborers just as they "maintain a strategic distance from" specific exercises just as specific places in the family relying upon their rank. Like, laborers higher in the order of rank don't incline toward doing "humble/tainted" errands like cleaning the washroom and partner these assignments with those having a place with the most minimal crosspiece; others, similar to Muslims or laborers having a place with various religions, are not allowed in the kitchen. The equivalent is replicated by the businesses as they isolate errands. In any case, it ought not be reasoned that laborers' acts of unapproachability can be likened with those of managers due to control disparities with genuine financial results.

Sejal Choudhary Week 7

Of Rasoi Ka Kaam/ Bathroom Ka Kaam

-       Sonal Sharma

In the article – “Of Rasoi Ka Kaam/ Bathroom Ka Kaam”, the author Sonal Sharma focuses on the domestic sector of the Indian Society. She primarily talks about ‘purity’ and ‘pollution’ and the way in which they have influenced households, the domestic workers of our society. What the author tries to argue in her piece is the manner in which the relationship between employers and employees, of the domestic sector are strongly influenced by class and caste. These employers segregate work and the employees on the basis of ‘hygiene’ and ‘dirt’ which in itself is a reason leading to the creation of these social classes.

The author has based her observation in Delhi to depict how such domestic spheres function. She illustrates one such perspective of these domestic employers wherein the work which involves dealing with ‘dirt’ belongs to the lower classes, therefore the workers are selected on the basis of the class group they belong to. Sharma talks about how such perspectives lead to discrimination at workplace of basis on class and caste, wherein the work and position of a domestic worker is decided by them only and the class they belong to and such class is defined by the notion of ‘pure’ and ‘polluted’.

Anushri Joshi Week 7

Opinion on Perspectives of Women Domestic workers

Despite claims by upper middle class and caste that the caste system does not exist there are certain practices that continue that seem to reflect caste biases. Having a separate tumbler for domestic workers is one I see most commonly in private spaces that otherwise boast of being above it all. The author of the piece tries to show how the notion of 'purity' and 'pollution', something that was often related back to the caste hierarchy, fits perfectly when describing perspectives of women workers. The public and private space have always had a distinction and an individual is always seeking to protect his or her private sphere. Women are generally segregated into this private sphere and the cleaning of dirt seems to reproduce their feminity. Women domestic workers on the other hand are not just essential to the private sphere but are, apart from their work, treated like the dirt they clean. There is a clear power dynamic between the master and the worker but it must be important to remember the paradox that the master continues to subscribe to; the plates cleaned by the worker are used as though clean but the tumbler used by her is dirty despite being cleaned by the same hands subsequently. Domestic sexual workers are paid for services, thereby valuing their work but are otherwise termed gandi ladkiyan so as to attach dirt to them alone. Intersectionality of religion, caste and gender naturally, also play a large role in making someone dirtier or undesirable for certain jobs.

It is this notion of dirt that can never be brushed away and doesn't stick to those from certain classes or caste that ultimately lead to creation of a different discourse within the private sphere

Deveshi Chand Week 7

 The easiest way to keep someone from challenging your authority or superior status is to constantly remind them of how inferior or insignificant they are intrinsically. This is a technique employed when speaking of the contribution of women to the labor force and the income share of the household. Maria Mies in her piece Dynamics of Sexual Division of Labour and Capital Accumulation  has shed light upon this practice of paying lesser wages to women by belittling the work they do and maintaining the typical 'housewife' image of a woman, that also leads them to believe that the work they do is of less significance as compared to a man.

Mies also sheds light upon how most of the production that rural women do is of products that shall never be consumed by them, such as lace and handicrafts that are made for exporting or consumption by the upper classes. Although, the Marxist idea of alienation from their product isn't the only capitalist evil that these women face, for Mies also explains how these women play the role of the underpaid and unrecognised worker who is overworked by the bourgeoise, that despite doing none of the work reaps a majority of the benefits. The division of the sexes into 'housewife' and 'breadwinner' further help in this exploitation of working women, for their work can be easily labelled as unimportant and worthy only of a lower wage. 

Akshara Singh, Week-7

Sonal Sharma’s ‘Of Rasoi ka Kaam/Bathroom ka Kaam’ talks about the domestic work roles of the women in our society. It throws light on the relationship between the employers and the domestic workers with the help of interviews and surveys that are done in the city of Delhi. Through these methods, the author has tried to explain the issue of untouchability that all workers have faced at least once in their lives. The author has described in great detail how most of these workers are asked which caste they belong to and are also questioned about their class before they are selected for recruitment. Also, in a lot of cases, they are treated in an absolutely unjust and biased manner by their subordinates on the pretext of them being unhygienic and insanitary. There is a certain presence of segregation, in the sense that people belonging to the same social strata communicate more and engage into conversations, leaving the people from a lower social standing behind and isolated. Even though they have to interact with each other on some levels due to their profession, but usually this interaction is kept at minimal and is done only when required. There are a lot of examples of class and caste divisions that the author has briefly acknowledged in her piece but to put all of them together and conclude, what can be said is that there is some kind of social hierarchy that is very present in our society among workers at all levels where the stronger group asserts power on the weaker one. 

Durlabh Agrawal, Week 7

In this post, I'll be analyzing the research paper cum article Of Rasoi ka Kaam or Bathroom ka Kaam by Sonal Sharma who looks in the space of women employed in domestic labour as maids and cleaners. In this piece the author explores the intersectionality between caste and class in domestic labour which is composed of mainly lower class and caste women in India, and how the reason which is deprived of logos, is masqueraded with the domestic help being 'dirty' or 'unhygienic' to discriminate and dominate the other.

The intriguing part of the article is the scope of caste explored. Instead of discussing the notion of caste and untouchability with varna or jati system, author identifies purity and pollution in practicing caste system thus, expanding the view caste in observed in the social structure, presenting them in two sections. First is practice of caste and inquiries about specialization/segregation in tasks, and second, workers' perception of their employers, while maintaining heterogeneity between workers' for sampling purposes.

The discourse presents complex and nuanced ideas of practicing caste in society with implications of task being assigned based on caste and religion in the facade of cleanliness and hygiene. For a non-dalit, is considered pure and is allowed to serve the employer (usually middle/upper class families') by cooking but person belonging to a Dalit community is prohibited to enter and is most likely fired from work for they are considered dirty. In the piece, an interview of Raj and Geeta is given where this distinction is clearly exhibited. 

The piece necessitates the understanding and relation of dirty and clean keeping household spaces in context, which shapes identity within the household by reinforcing caste hierarchy and promoting caste based anxieties'.   

Pranav D Week 7

Sharma lays down the two prevailing theories about the the dichotomy between purity and pollution. The first is that caste is a deciding factor at the inception, and the second interrogates caste within those relationships. She brings in Mary Douglas' argument that ideas of dirt and pure are relative and the positionally is dependent on the relationships caste, class and gender have with each other. The creation of a social space that is exclusive to the employer and his/her family in the name of cleanliness/safety eventually manifests itself into a larger problem of division, one that is coloured by caste and class. This rhetoric of intimacy just feeds into the divide of space.This monopolisation of space by the upper castes has led to the creation of many of these spheres, with this arbitrary delegation of certain tasks as menial and filthy, which is then pushed onto those at the lower end of the spectrum, perpetuating the caste hierarchy.

Manasvi Singh week 7

“Of Rasoi ka Kaam/Bathroom ka Kaam” - Perspectives of Women Domestic Workers

Sonal Sharma

When we talk about the workers, we think of lower caste people who are of the lower class as well. These two assumptions fall in together to become a perfect worker. We imagine lower caste people and especially the ones who are needy to come and work for us at our homes as domestic work doing all kinds of work for us and making our lives easier. We sometimes cannot imagine our lives without them but still tend to think of them as someone who is below us and who is a “they” versus “us”. The author tries to first remove our instinct regarding who is the “doer” and their relations with their employer especially the middle class. She then explains what “dirt” and “pollution” means and to whom it is meant for. Then she talks about receiving end and their reactions to those name callings and different treatment. The sample size and the methodology somewhat make the author’s writing believable as its based-on facts based on several interviews and discussions and not assumptions. Some revealing things were that employers always have a preference in caste especially over “jamadar” and “Muslims” when they employ which is true if I observe around me but doesn’t make sense if we think about it. To my surprise, there are ways how people not ask but find out new ways to find out the other person caste which is even more unbelievable than separating utensils of the employer and the employee. In addition, what is astounding but true is that there isn’t just one section defining and redefining the difference, the difference is made between who have differentiated also about who is preferred more to do the “polluting task” and over who. In all the author mentions a lot of examples of people who share their experiences with them through which they made these logical conclusions.