A perspective on roles of Indian Women

A perspective on roles of Indian Women

Posted Today at 10:06 AM by Lady1
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Here is my perspective fellow ILites!
Indian Women's Roles? Okay, we haven't figured them out yet because,
We do too much and everything without letting anything go to replace new responsibilities:
I am an Indian woman to my core. Let's just look at my life and see what I mean:
I was born in a happy middle-class Indian family as the tenth child and at that --a daughter. Great upbringing and an early marriage to a professional at age 19 and an immediate move to the western hemisphere with my husband. In the 40 years that passed after that we had and raised two children, a boy & a girl and saw them get married, had orthodox, demanding and culturally endowed mother-in-law live with us in the U.S., saw through the divorce and remarriage of our son and the births of four grandchildren from my daughter and a grandson from my son. All through this, I had continued studying and became a professional myself and as I near retiremnt today, hold a prestigious job with a salary above the one hundred thousand dollar mark. What are some of the roles I filled doing all of this and continue to, and how was the experience? I am able to sit back. look back and, try and define some of them here:
A young girl child who is expected to learn some fine arts like music, drawing & painting, tailoring etc in addition to demanding school work since an education to be able to earn a decent salary either as your own or to supplement the family's has become even more important in the past few decades. Throughout this phase she also gets trained in helping out with household chores-I had my own duties of maintaining the dining room and the Worship area. In the teen years and young adult phase the whole focus is on growing up to match the expectations of whomever will be your life-partner and his family [Of Course, in the current background of choosing life-partner from your own gender, getting artificial insemination as per genetic traits desired etc., this account is going to sound archaic, but because it is my perspective developed from my experience, so it is]. Another important role you play at this time is one of valiant restraint at the approaches by eligible bachelors that abound around you in college. Family values, elders' expectations and your own if you had the guidance in your formative years to do it, warn you when the limits come up in any relation beyond good-friendship. Your desires to be beautiful and have a monetary bounty growing along with you make you put your sight on dual goals to achieve a career and at the same time address and manage your parents' desire to see you settled. Again, there are of course, households where the decision to let the girl first do this is made in consensus, but in mine, if a good prospective match came in sight, we knew we would get married when our parents were still healthy and able.

Moving to a foreign country & culture doubles the intensity of your 'nurturing' and 'safe-guarding the family values' roles. You learn to accept others more. You learn more flexibility in your approaches-
The 'home-manager,' and simultaneous 'academic student in a structured study program'-- in you emerges: it is at once like [at the home-front] the monkey-mother gathering food while her baby clings to her belly, and [in the career-front] a cocoon waiting to burst open so that the encaged butterfly may take its first flight putting on the fabulous display of its multi-colored wings ...
The kids growing up, dating, marrying see the Indian Woman alternatingly, a worried and concerned mother hen, elated and proud lioness, and a great ant or bee-like team-mate for her beloved husband. She is also probably taking care of parents or in laws who may have come to visit on a long-time basis, repeating the loving 'daughter' role once again in her life.
When something goes awry and there is a break up of one off-spring's marriage, her heart breaks and she stops living fully. She is in an introspective role, questioning all the decisions that had been taked with or without her involvement and toils to no end to make things right once again like a little, lone yet tireless warrior. Often she finds herself quite alone in this but succeeds for that's how she is. She helps her child reset his thinking and approaches to become functional, and helps him find a suitable mate once again-she is now playing the role of a leader, a mentor and a true guide. She is also a bit of a martyr in that she is holding back her own hurt and rising above, in being able to do this fete. Well this is a new role for Indian women and one her western sisters are unfortunately just a bit more experienced in. Once again, this perspective will sound archaic to someone in whose Indian or Eastern family, a lot of break ups may have taken place and managed well but just one in mine aged me by decades for sure. The very 'Indian' woman learns to be very attentive and intuitive to the broken child's needs and feelings in many new ways heretofore unknown to her. Is she becoming a nurse, a doctor, more universal than Indian?
She certainly becomes somewhat more resigned, practical and gets a whiff of what may be involved in the role of an ascetic. Comes the time to retire and enjoy the lovely grands--is she able to?
If she has done her worker-role well, they don't want to let her go and her hubby doesn't either, and for many good reasons she sees eye to eye. So, she doesn't. Finds ways to adjust her time to work well for the home-life as well as in her career. I may be able to add the role of an Indian Woman in retirement can be an oximoron. At least, I have figured a way out. Not to wait to bathe in the ocean after the waves stop...as a Tamil saying goes. I have set up my blog on libraries (my profession); a square-foot garden; my drawing and painting studio & sewing corner; and, the reading/writing shelf, while I could still afford to, and do all of these things I really like, a little whenever I can make time for them without waiting for a time when my life as the mother, grand-mother, wife and co-provider may slow down some...
I am sure Indian Women could learn to delegate more, replace old with new responsibilities and even drop some, and perhaps, put themselves ahead of anyone or anything else-but then I ask WHY?!

I tag: madhuraleckshmi ravimohan, ranjini murali, vasudha suresh

 

Thank you!