Ideologies of Masculinity and Femininity in the Projection of the ‘National Language’: Gendered Discourse of Hindi–Urdu Dichotomization and Standardization
Restricted accessResearch articleFirst published online September, 2023
Ideologies of Masculinity and Femininity in the Projection of the ‘National Language’: Gendered Discourse of Hindi–Urdu Dichotomization and Standardization
This article takes the linguistic space of North India during the nineteenth and twentieth centuries and tries to see how a nationalistic linguistic ideology that was shaping up at that time, creating Hindi and Urdu linguistic communities, used gender as a tool to portray and assert a masculinist vision of language and nation. It involved not just censoring certain representations of women and their cultural spaces, but also using the issue of ‘vulgar’ representations as a premise to marginalize certain languages and their literature. The article looks at the colonial ideology that worked as an enforcer for the nationalists to work towards achieving what they felt as a sanitized and moral form of literature and culture. The linguistic ideology that accompanied these revisions was of projecting Hindi (Khari Boli) as a national language while limiting spaces of other languages, such as Braj, Urdu and Bhojpuri, in the region, by criticizing either their use of sexual imagery or by stereotyping them in a gendered way. This article investigates the arguments of nationalist writers and highlights their masculinist and patriarchal ideas in their bid for the new national language.
AlterJ. S. (1994). Celibacy, sexuality, and the transformation of gender into nationalism in North India. The Journal of Asian Studies, 53(1), 45–66.
2.
AndersonB. (2006). Imagined communities: Reflections on the origin and spread of nationalism. Verso.
3.
BanerjeeS. (2003). Gender and nationalism: The masculinization of Hinduism and female political participation in India. Women’s Studies International Forum, 26(2), 167–179.
4.
BhattB. (1929). Miss American. Indian Press Ltd.
5.
BrassP. R. (1974). Language, religion and politics in North India. iUniverse Press.
6.
CaplanP. (1987). Celibacy as a solution? Mahatma Gandhi and brahmacharya. In CaplanP. (Ed.), The cultural construction of sexuality. Routledge.
7.
CasanovaP. (2007). The world republic of letters, DeBevoiseM. B. (trans.). Harvard University Press.
8.
ChakravartiU. (1999). Whatever happened to the Vedic Dasi? Orientalism, nationalism, and a script for the past. In SangariK. & VaidS. (Eds.), Recasting women: Essays in colonial history (pp. 27–87). Rutgers University Press.
9.
CowardR., & EllisJ. (1979). Language and materialism: Developments in Semiology and the theory of the subject. Routledge & Kegan Paul Ltd.
10.
DalmiaV. (2010). The nationalisation of Hindu traditions: Bhartendu Harishchandra and nineteenth century Banaras. Permanent Black.
11.
DasR. K. (1902). Hindi–Urdu. Saraswati. Indian Press Ltd.
12.
DonigerW. (2012). From kama to karma: The resurgence of puritanism in contemporary India. In AppaduraiA. & MackA. (Eds), India’s world: The politics of creativity in a globalized society. Rupa Publications.
13.
DwivediM. P. (1925). Hindi bhasha ki utpatti. Indian Press Ltd.
14.
DwivediM. P. (1995). Mahavir Prasad Dwivedi rachnavali (Vol 2). YayavarBharat (Ed., trans.). Kitab Ghar.
15.
EckertP., & McConnell-GinetS. (2003). Language and gender. Cambridge University Press.
16.
ErringtonJ. (2001). Colonial linguistics. Annual Review of Anthropology, 30, 19–39.
17.
FoucaultM. (1978). The history of sexuality, volume 1: An introduction, HurleyRobert (trans). Pantheon Books.
18.
GalS. (1991). Between speech and silence: The problematics of research on language and gender. In di LeonardoM. (Ed.), Gender at the crossroads of knowledge: Feminist anthropology in the postmodern era (pp. 175–203). University of California Press.
19.
GalS., & IrvineJ. (1995). The boundaries of languages and disciplines: How ideologies construct difference. Social Research, 62 (4), 967–1001.
20.
GandhiM. K. (1943). To the students: Gandhi series (Vol. 1), HingoraniAnand T. (Ed., trans.).
21.
GuptM. S. (1984). Bharat bharati. Sahitya Sadan.
22.
GuptaC. (2000). Dirty Hindi literature: Contests about obscenity in the late colonial North India. South Asia Research, 20, 89–118.
23.
GuptaC. (2001a). Sexuality, obscenity, community: Women, Muslims and the Hindu public in colonial India. Permanent Black.
24.
GuptaC. (2001b). The icon of mother in late colonial North India: ‘Bharat mata’, ‘matri bhasha’ and ‘gau mata’. Economic & Political Weekly, 36, 4291–4299.
25.
KachruY. (2008). Hindi–Urdu–Hindustani. In KachruB., KachruY. & SridharS. (Eds.), Language in South Asia (pp. 81–102). Cambridge University Press.
26.
KeayF. E. (1920). A history of Hindi literature. Oxford University Press.
27.
KingC. R. (1992). Forging a new linguistic identity: The Hindi movement in Banaras, 1868–1914. In FreitagS. B. (Ed.), Culture and power in Banaras: Community, performance, and Environment, 1800–1980 (pp. 179–202). University of California Press.
28.
KingC. R. (1994). One language, two scripts. Oxford University Press.
29.
ManjaliF. (2020). Modernity, colonialism and the science of language. In MichaelsA. & WulfC. (Eds.), Science and scientification in South Asia and Europe (pp. 154–172). Routledge.
30.
MetcalfT. R. (1995). Ideologies of the raj. Cambridge University Press.
31.
MillJ. (1826). History of British India (Vol 1). Baldwin, Cradock & Joy.
32.
NakamuraM. (2008). Masculinity and national language: The silent construction of a dominant language ideology. Gender and Language, 2(1), 25–50.
33.
OrsiniF. (2002). The Hindi public sphere 1920–1940: Language and literature in the age of nationalism. Oxford University Press.
34.
ParekhB. (1989) Colonialism, tradition, and reform: An examination of Gandhi’s political discourse. Sage Publications.
35.
Peter-DassR. (2019). Hindi Christian literature in contemporary India. Routledge.
36.
PrasadS. (1868). Memorandum court character in the upper provinces of India. Banaras.
37.
RaiA. (2018). Hindi nationalism: Tracts for the times. Orient Blackswan.
38.
RamaswamyS. (2011). The goddess and the nation: Mapping Mother India. Zubaan.
39.
RatnachandraB. (1890). Hindi Urdu ka natak: Hindee versus Urdu. Hindu Press.
40.
SarangiA. (2009). Language and women: The feminisation of linguistic discourses in colonial north India. Gender & History, 21(2), 287–304.
41.
SarkarT. (1987). Nationalist iconography: Image of women in 19th century Bengali literature. Economics & Political Weekly, 22(47), 2011–2015.
42.
SarkarT. (2005). Hindu wife, Hindu nation: Community, religion and cultural nationalism. Indiana University Press.
43.
SenA. P. (2016). Debates within colonial Hinduism. In HatcherBrian A. (Ed.), Hinduism in the colonial world. Routledge.
44.
ShuklaA. R. (1952). Hindi sahitya ka itihas. Nagari Pracharini Sabha.
45.
SinhaM. (1995). Colonial masculinity: The ‘manly Englishman’ and the ‘effeminate Bengali’ in the late nineteenth century. Manchester University Press.
46.
TharuS., & LalitaK. (1991). Women writing in India: 600 B.C. to the present. The Feminist Press.
47.
VanitaR., & KidwaiS. (2008). Same sex love in India: A literary history. Penguin Random House.
