Author Description

Product DescriptionThe book studies the interplay of gender, caste, and religious identities in colonial Punjab. It focuses on the middle-class and how it brings into play gender and caste norms to counter the erosion of its economic advatages, and the subservience of its social and religious institutions under colonialism.Review"A lucid feminist prehistory of the Partition"-- The Historian"In this stimulating study, Malhotra explores the shaping of a new middle-class identity among Hindus and Sikhs in late nineteenth-century India. The focus on universal categories, such as class and gender, with her questioning of the meaning of the 'modern' in the colonial setting make Malhotra's study of interest to comparative sociologists and theorists of postcolonialism."--Journal of Interdisciplinary HistoryAbout the AuthorAnshu Malhotra is Senior Lecturer in History, Sri Venkatesware College, Delhi University.