Publication date:
12 July 2017Length of book:
328 pagesPublisher
Lehigh University PressISBN-13: 9781611462210
This book examines the varied influences and accomplishments of the Indian Ladies’ Magazine, the first Indian magazine established and edited by an Indian woman—Kamala Satthianadhan—in English, written by women, for women. Influences include Victorian, Edwardian, and Modern literature and culture as well as traditional Indian literature and culture during the late colonial, pre-independence period. More than a literary journal, this publication also addressed social reforms, from “ladies’ philanthropy” to “women’s mission to women”; the emergence of Indian “identity politics” in response to the nationalist and independence movements; the Indian Woman Question in the context of female education debates and shifting concepts of “womanliness”; cultural exchanges recorded by Indian travelers to America; and the emergence of Indian nationalism, between World Wars I and II, leading to independence. This publication recorded and participated in the most pivotal moment in modern Indian history and did so by appealing to both the conservative and progressive socio-political urges marking the era.
This pioneering study of The Indian Ladies Magazine provides fresh and valuable insight into periodical culture in India under British rule during the early decades of the twentieth century . . . .. The author carefully uncovers the complexity of the imperial experience for the Indian woman reader who was conversant with English and Western models of femininity. This book is necessary reading for anyone interested in the periodical's role in formulating class, gender, and national identities . . .