ABSTRACT
This chapter adopts an intersectional analytic framework to explore the autobiographical narratives of five North Indian women with regard to their association of their Hindi-medium education with their socioeconomic marginalization in the personal and social domains. The analysis of participants’ stories collected in face-to-face interviews reveals how these women constructed specific worldviews, within which they reported multiple subordinations resulting from their Hindi education, gender, and location in a traditional patriarchal society increasingly influenced by material considerations. They re-imagined the long-established practice of dowry as incorporating “good” jobs and salaries, which were portrayed as crucial for successful marriage negotiations and for agreeable post-marital relationships. The women linked Hindi education to an inability to secure “good” jobs and salaries, thus arguing that it deepened their gender- and class-based marginalization. This analysis also reveals the varying degrees to which these women resisted such subordinations.
