ABSTRACT
Clothes and jewelry have always formed an important aspect of the expected role performance of elites and has been well-documented in the protocols of dressing-up of the royal and political elites. The contemporary housewives of Delhi too are aware of the importance of ‘looking their part’, and actively reify and create the appropriate class and status expectations of appearance. Whilst the ‘rule book’, as it were, of appropriate appearances, leisure, and hobbies that construct elite-ness is detailed and extensive, in this chapter, I focus on two aspects: handbags and travels. By tracing these indulgences, I explain the ways in which elite status is articulated and in due process boundaries within the elites are drawn and reiterated. In doing so, the construction and articulations of appropriate elite femininity are also brought out, which I argue, concerns with both extravagance and high taste as well as prudence and ‘simplicity’. Furthermore, as evident especially in the discussion of travels, this elite femininity positions the family at the centre of women’s identity and also allows for realisations of non-familial and more ‘self’ centred identities.
