The Historical Journal (2021), 1–23 doi:10.1017/S0018246X21000406 ARTICLE Gender, Power, and Cricket Spectators in Calcutta, 1960s–1990s Souvik Naha Department of History, Durham University, Durham, UK Email:
[email protected] Abstract Historians of modern India have emphasized the reflexivity of men and women in the making of womanhood, paying attention to notions of gender difference emerging from both primordial, restrictive codes of behaviour and contrarian impulses towards what was popularly called progress. There have been relatively few attempts to trace gender interaction in outdoor leisure activities, public displays of femininity, and male regula- tory anxieties in the post-colonial context. By studying the symbolism of women’s pres- ence in the Eden Gardens, the international cricket stadium in Calcutta, from the 1960s to the 1990s, this article reflects on the nature of power, authority, and gender hier- archy in urban Indian society. This study of questions of gender hierarchy, women’s mannerisms, social identity, and informal resistance through a historical lens will enable us to understand the trajectory of women’s outsider status in urban public spaces. Through a reading of the mediated parti pris impressions of female spectators, it will also map the transition in society’s approach to sport from a structured homo- social community activity to a relatively unstructured field of shared experience. I A cartoon published in the Hindustan Standard newspaper during the India– England Test match at the Eden Gardens, Calcutta, in 1961–2 featured two women. They were seated on the back row and enjoying themselves, chatting and knitting sweaters, with visible disregard to the innings in progress.