कामवाली आंटी

In this chapter, students of Hindi will acquire the vocabulary, cultural knowledge, and reading skills necessary to understand and discuss the life of maids and domestic helpers in India. Most middle-class families in India hire a maid to help with household chores such as cleaning floors and washing dishes. A maid will often work for several families in a neighborhood and rotate among their homes during the day. Some families hire a live-in maid to help with more time-consuming tasks like cooking, laundry, and childcare. Most of these arrangements are informal and unregulated; as a result, wages for maids remain quite low. The chapter includes pre-reading questions that ask the reader to imagine how they might interact with a maid, a glossary of relevant vocabulary, and a story in which a maid talks about her workday, her children, employers, and their treatment of her. The notes on culture elucidate issues related to domestic helpers, and the activities guide students in their comprehension of the story and in applying this knowledge to a scheduling activity.