ABSTRACT
This chapter explores the rural Haryana Jat brotherhood and Punjabi Sikh diaspora providing a number of insights into male-centered social relations of exchange. The community organization based on male lineage has clearly laid out governance mechanisms, norms of reciprocity, communication channels, and processes of exchange codified within the network of relationship that claim male authority over social relations. Decoding shared norms and values has clear implications for gender positioning. Within the genders, however, the male is reference point of all social exchange. Transgressions against accepted gender roles, affinity to collectivity and basic human values are considered important. The construction of communication modes, spatial demarcations, customs, and practices in the bhaichara system further position male dominance to affect the regeneration and demarcation of genders in patterns of social exchange. The rural community in the Jat-dominated areas maintains the social order through defined cultural practices, shared values and norms of exchange within the differentiating bhaichara categorization in which gender relations are practiced.
