Suchergebnisse

The shock of Professor A. M. Shah's (AMS) demise is fresh in our minds as is his memory as an interactive, alert, productive and disciplined scholar at the ripe age of 89. This article tries to summarise his enormous contribution to the discipline of sociology in India. First, it takes up his path-breaking, analytically sharp mind towards conceptual clarity to match with empirical data that questioned many prevailing assumptions. He put forth the household dimension as the processual dimension of family in India, caste division as a feature of many urban castes, besides hierarchy, which alone was assumed to characterise caste in India. Next, it looks at his brand of work with historical and contemporary empirical perspective in the areas of kinship, marriage, lineage, old age and family policy, religion and sects through his research publications. Next, it describes AMS as a simple and upright person and a dedicated teacher who enjoyed teaching and focused on clarity and understanding without fashionable jargon. His strict but compassionate and no-nonsense approach towards students contributed also to the high status of sociology in the Delhi University. This is followed by his selfless commitment to academic administration in the Delhi University and wider institution-building acumen that benefitted Indian Sociological Society among others.

M. N. Srinivas, the pioneering Sociologist of India, has contributed immensely to the development of the discipline of sociology and social anthropology through his teaching and research. He combined theory, method and field reality in his body of work. It generated a great deal of interest and critique. This essay looks at his contributions with reference to how I learnt, through my links with rural India, from his sociological writings drawn from intensive fieldwork on caste, village, processes like Sanskritisation and Westernisation and concepts such as vote bank, which gained popular currency.

Male authority and dynamics of power and privilege, and women's 'structural mutedness' seem apparent. However, it is also accepted that wherever there is power there is resistance. In the light of the above issues, the paper explores women's exclusive domain of childbirth in rural Rajasthan in Northern India. It adopts the pro-cessual, life cycle and household development approach to constitute women's fertility career. It highlights the significance of women's agency in their efforts at monouevering their own fertility outcomes without overthrowing mothering or patriarchy.