ABSTRACT
“Tradition” and “modernity” are ubiquitous terms in the lexicon of contemporary nationhood. Domestic space and practice are implicated in nationalist formulations of tradition and modernity in India. Feminist theorists and activists concerned with India have contributed to scholarship on the practical constitution of gender and the ways in which different systems of structural inequality become enmeshed with it. Smarta disparagement of urban life was tempered by the conviction that something identifiable as tradition continued to exist in the midst of contempory urban life. Domestic rituals, like other cultural practices, have been transformed by contestatory nationalisms, transnational processes, commodification, and class formation—the same forces that have shaped other areas of life. With respect to domestic ritual, the impacts of changes in elite women’s domestic labor and consumption have been significant. The chapter also presents an overview of the key concepts discussed in this book.
