Negotiating Middle-class Respectable Femininity: Bangladeshi Women and their Families

Hussein, Nazia

doi:10.4000/samaj.4397

Cited by 14 publications

(14 citation statements)

References 47 publications

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“…Participants' motivations for silence were rooted in the middle-class notion of respectability, based on the importance of youth's education and sexual abstinence before marriage. Respectability has long been understood as an important element of the construction of middle-classness in South Asia (Chatterjee, 1989;Donner, 2011;Hussein, 2017). Young people's responses indicate that they value respectability, as it is an important element of middle-class identity.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Ainul et al, 2017;Amin, 2015). The scholars who have focused on the growing middle class in Bangladesh have indicated that sexuality and gender norms are strongly connected to this social status (Hussein, 2017;Karim, 2012), which suggests that this group has more to lose when those norms are transgressed. On the one hand, middle-class young people have increased access to SRH education at school and global information on sexuality through the Internet and social media.…”

Section: Boymentioning

confidence: 99%

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Beyond the talking imperative: The value of silence on sexuality in youth-parent relations in Bangladesh

Camellia

Rommes

Jansen

2020

Global Public Health

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Research conducted in various parts of the globe suggests that young people who can openly communicate with their parents about sexuality benefit in many ways. Correspondingly, in Bangladesh, the lack of an open communication on sexuality in the youth-parent relationship is considered a barrier to ensuring young people's sexual and reproductive health and overall well-being. Taking 'silence' as a core concept, this paper investigates what silence on sexuality means to Bangladeshi young people in their relationship with parents. It draws on findings from an ethnographic study conducted among 72 middle-class boys and girls aged between 15 and 19 years and 18 parents living in Dhaka over a year between 2016 and 2017. The findings suggest that silence is not always perceived as problematic by young people, and this is particularly true for topics related to sexual pleasure. This paper challenges the monolithic understanding that silence is necessarily bad and hinders young people from getting what they need. It offers an additional conceptual understanding to silence for studying sexuality among youths and designing interventions for their sexual and reproductive well-being.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Boymentioning

confidence: 99%

Beyond the talking imperative: The value of silence on sexuality in youth-parent relations in Bangladesh

Camellia

Rommes

Jansen

2020

Global Public Health

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“…By using the word ‘respectable’, they were assuaging anxieties associated with divorce and simultaneously communicating the fact that they adhere to normative standards. In a related research, Hussein highlights how middle-class women in the Indian subcontinent make assurances of their ‘respectable femininity’: ‘The normative conception of middle-class women’s respectability is measured against women prioritising family above work by performing their domestic, care, and socialising roles and by maintaining moral propriety’ (Hussein, 2017).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Remarriage in India: Online Presentation Strategies of Men and Women on an Indian Remarriage Website

Mishra

Jayakar

2019

Indian Journal of Gender Studies

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Traditionally, attitudes towards remarriage in India have been characterised by scepticism and suspicion, especially in the case of women. Online remarriage sites promised to open up new possibilities for Indians seeking remarriage. A study of self-presentation strategies adopted by men and women in their online profiles posted on a popular remarriage site shows that while the new technology may have made it easier for divorced and widowed individuals to search for partners, profiles presented emphasise caste and community affiliations, and reinforce gendered roles and expectations. Those seeking remarriage, especially women, engaged in substantial efforts to allay fears and concerns associated with divorce and remarriage in India by adhering to normative standards characteristic of a deeply patriarchal society. While many profiles of men highlighted a sense of male entitlement and privilege, an account of the circumstances of divorce was missing from the profiles of both men and women even as the Indian family as a site of harmony and respectability was emphasised by both. Furthermore, while men made consumerist promises in their statements, women used their online profiles to express their consumerist dreams, simultaneously adhering to gendered expectations. Finally, both men and women engaged in selective self-presentation emphasising socially desirable traits such as a light skin tone or a desirable body type in a neoliberal context marked by consumerist modernity.

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“…Khurshid (2015) and Hussein (2017) draw on their research on middle-class Muslim families in rural Pakistan and Bangladesh, suggesting that women actively choose certain Muslim subjectivities, including gender conservatism, to earn respectable femininity. In Kandiyoti’s (1988) terms, these women “bargain with patriarchy.” Gender conservatism enables them to cultivate the boundaries of interclass distinctions.…”

Section: Middle Class Middle-class Consciousness and Veiling In Bangl...mentioning

confidence: 99%

Gender, Veiling, and Class: Symbolic Boundaries and Veiling in Bengali Muslim Families

Sabur

2022

Gender & Society

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In Bangladesh, due to economic growth and greater access to education, more girls and women are veiling, even as they are also more likely to be in school or employed. Some scholars identify this trend of women appearing both “more modern” and “more religious” as paradoxical. On the basis of 114 in-depth interviews with Bangladeshi migrant workers ( n = 57) in Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Singapore, and South Korea and their wives ( n = 57) in rural Bangladesh, I claim that Muslim women in middle-class Bengali families who veil are cultivating symbolic boundaries guided by an accountability structure of middle-class religiosity and gender conservatism. The increasing tendency of middle-class Muslim women to appear both “more modern” and “more religious” can be explained by examining the role that veiling plays in signaling class status through conspicuous consumption, moral superiority, and respectable femininity, differentiating them from lower class women. I conclude that “doing gender” through veiling must be understood as also “doing middle-class difference” in Bengali Muslim families in rural Bangladesh.

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Negotiating Middle-class Respectable Femininity: Bangladeshi Women and their Families

Cited by 14 publications

References 47 publications

Beyond the talking imperative: The value of silence on sexuality in youth-parent relations in Bangladesh

Beyond the talking imperative: The value of silence on sexuality in youth-parent relations in Bangladesh

Remarriage in India: Online Presentation Strategies of Men and Women on an Indian Remarriage Website

Gender, Veiling, and Class: Symbolic Boundaries and Veiling in Bengali Muslim Families

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