ABSTRACT
Some months after our arrival in 1982, Nisar and his wife, Najma, were among those Jhakri couples we selected to be the focus of our research. They were Sheikhs, the dominant Muslim landowning community in the area. Nisar’s paternal great-grandfather had had two sons, who each had four sons, one of whom had already died before we arrived. These “cousin-brothers” and their wives and children lived in houses around two linked courtyards in the center of Jhakri. Altogether, they were about one-eighth of Jhakri’s population, and they farmed somewhat over thirty acres. They were one of the most powerful and prominent extended families in the village.
