Unit 2 Gender and Folklore: Concept and Characterization
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The ‘Folk’ and Modern Narratives UNIT 2 GENDER AND FOLKLORE: CONCEPT AND CHARACTERIZATION Structure 2.0 Objectives 2.1 Introduction 2.2 Women in patriarchy 2.2.1 Fertility 2.2.2 Chaste wife dedicated to husband 2.2.3 Motherhood 2.3 Women’s tales 2.3.1 Brothers and sisters 2.3.2 Parents and daughters 2.4 Masculinity and characterization of men 2.5 Love and mysticism 2.6 Role reversals and other characterizations 2.6.1 Some well-known characterizations 2.6.2 Mother-deities 2.6.3 Tales of Intermarriage 2.7 Let us sum up 2.8 Activity 2.9 References and further reading 2.10 Glossary 2.11 Check your progress: possible answers 2.0 OBJECTIVES After reading this Unit you will be able to: x understand some basic ideas of what constitutes gender; x identify how gender is projected through characterization in folklore; x identify the prescribed image of women and men; x identify the prescribed space, role, and values for women; x see the implicit protest against the above imposition; and x know the reaction of patriarchy against the protest and assertion of individual identity involving gender. 2.1 INTRODUCTION There are many obvious and visible differences between men and women. Starting from biological and physical differences, there are many more differences in the 102 social roles they are supposed to play. Gender refers to this social role demarcation ‘Folk’ Representations by/ and perception of the roles, wishes and desires that men and women take on. of Dalits and Tribals However there may not be a passive acceptance of the roles imposed by society upon individuals. There may be resistance to what is thought appropriate for each gender. The relationship between biological sex and socially constructed gender is multi-layered and complex. Folklore contains many narratives of individuals coming to accept or subvert or openly question the socially gender- appropriate roles prescribed for them. While we hear of Arjuna taking on the role of ‘Brihannala’, a eunuch dance-master in the Mahabharata, during the exile period of the Pandavas, it is our folk literature and culture that is rich in characterization of individuals and heroes who take on gender roles or defy them. If we look for the image of women in our folklore it would seem to arise from many tales of hurt and suffering. Yet, it is no simple single pattern regarding gender which emerges from our folklore. Rather it appears to be a complex picture embracing contraries. Two major gender paradigms can be found across the world and through ages; one is the passive submissive woman who is valorized and the other is the defiant assertive woman who is held in suspicion and awe. The ‘angel in the house’ corresponds to the image of the long-suffering, all-enduring passive woman valorized by the teller and listener. It is the good woman who suffers for most of the narrative span, though she is restored to home and happiness at the end. The good woman is necessarily passive represented by the sleeping princess or a captive rendered immobile, passively waiting to be rescued by some prince or heroic youth. Another common type of the ‘good’ woman is the unquestioning long-suffering type, the wronged woman who never questions the wrongdoer, i.e., the husband or in-laws, and passively endures her lot. This is one of the most popular images of women, which is loved, adored, and valorized by the folk. We find indeed an extraordinary insistence on the image of the suffering woman. At the centre of many a folktale there is a sad innocent woman who suffers for no fault of her own, but remains unflinching in her loyalty to husband or in-laws. Dakshinaranjan MitraMajumdar’s Thâkurdâdâr Jhuli(Grandpa’s Bag), a collection and faithful transcription of oral narratives still extant in rural Bengal in the late nineteenth century is replete with such images of women. We can try to guess the purpose of such tales, Is it sensitizing the listener to the many sufferings women have to undergo? Or is it aimed at preparing women for the kind of cast they should get fitted in? The loyal, passive, unquestioning women are rendered immobile within a severely restricted space. Literally speaking, it is just the homestead. Variations on the same image of immobility can be found in various folk forms: x Bârah Mâsa – popular songs in Assam and Eastern India. The unvarying form is a woman lamenting the absence of her husband/beloved/son. x Jat’sar— songs of the mill; jat is wheat-mill; women while grinding wheat sing these songs which are in sad melody: refrain of a jatsar: “The river is deep, and the water flows bottomless. My beloved has gone to the Morang, and my bosom is being cleft asunder” (Grierson) While the images of women in folklore may evoke feelings of discontent and sorrow, characterizations of men offer explorations of social space in various ways. Self-reliance and valour seem to be the dominant features of folk hero. 103 The ‘Folk’ and Modern Love and mysticism and their relationship with socially defined gender roles Narratives will also be looked at briefly. 2.2 WOMEN IN PATRIARCHY Under the patriarchal ethos the woman’s cultural space is severely cramped. Women’s folksongs are concerned mostly with rites and ceremonies centering round joyous events such as birth and marriage or sad occasions like bidding farewell to the departing daughter. You can contrast this with menfolk’s songs containing ballads of bravery or philosophical-religious themes of birth-rebirth, detachment from this world, etc. Domesticity is generally considered the only proper field for women. Of course there too they are seen only in relation to the family. The patriarchal ethos that limits the space of women also defines them in terms of roles such as Daughter, Sister, Wife and Mother. Woman is perceived to be of lower status than the male in the domestic structure. In Uttar Pradesh Sohar songs are sung on the occasion of the birth of a son. But these are never sung on the birth of a daughter in the family. The daughter is unwelcome. ‘Pumsavanam’ is a rite observed by women in Kerala in the third month of pregnancy for begetting a male child. Even the lullaby is in tune with the social constructs about gender which have been imposed from infancy. ‘Ghum ay ghum, nishîth nijhum … Khokan âamâr juddhe jâbe lâl ghodâte code Anbe kato taka mohar des bidese ghure. … Khukun amar ajke jabe natun sasur badi, Parbe kato sona dana rang –berang-er sadi…’ (Deb, 125) [While invoking sleep in the deep silent night the singer weaves her images of the future when the boy child will go to war riding red horse, will go out to the big world and return home with treasure, whereas the girl will before long leave for the in-laws’ house, wearing gold ornaments and colourful saris.] Proverbs in the Kuru region (cited in Arya 88) bear out this phenomenon as follows, “Jis din laado tera janam hua hai, Hui hai bajar ki raat…” (the day the daughter was born a gloom fell upon the parents, it has been difficult to bear since the very first night). “Ladki ka baap kamata hi mar jaa hai” (the daughter’s father can never hope to prosper) is another such folk observation. Women are often punished for no fault of their own. Though being innately chaste like Sita in the Ramayana, they are rejected by their consorts due to some perceived defilement. Dinendrakumar Roy wrote in 1905 about a fair in Trihatta village, by Khadia river, a few miles off Krishnanagar town near a huge temple of Krishnaroy, held in the month of Magh. “Krishnaroy had been without his divine consort since long years. Long ago some miscreants had broken open the temple door and stolen the gold ornaments on her body. It was rumoured that the burglars were not Hindu but Muslims, and therefore outside the jurisdiction of the lord. So he could not punish them. How to give vent to the male anger? The god divorced his consort as she had been touched by Muslims and therefore rendered unholy. Since then the goddess deity, in her dejection, had made the tank near the temple her abode. After this the god had not taken a second wife. 104 We don’t know whether it was due to the lack of a suitable girl or owing to the ‘Folk’ Representations by/ lack of initiative on the part of the priest”(Roy rpt 1992: 160-1). of Dalits and Tribals A greater social rejection and belittlement falls to the lot of the widow. Krappe writes, “…the death of the husband imposed certain observations upon the surviving wife, whilst the death of the wife imposed none whatever upon the surviving husband, so that the latter distinguished himself very little from the rest of the males of the community and no word was needed to designate him especially.”(277) Women were the common repositories of these oral folk narratives. It is possible that the female narrators too internalized the patriarchal ideology and paid a major role in enforcing taboos against women. Women have often been at the receiving end of domestic cruelty. Here is a Patgeeti about ‘Gopalan’ which shows even cattle were held as more precious than women. Barid Baran Ghosh cites the following tale (excerpt no 12), A householder had lost his cattle owing to the lack of adequate care on part of his seven daughters-in-law.