Sociology

Identities Constructed and Reconstructed: Representations of Asian Women 1 in Britain

Document Type

Book Chapter

Abstract

On the whole, white feminists stress oppression by the patriarchy, the imposition of purdah, the control exercised by their men and capitalist producers in the economy, and the constraints of their cultural values. Non-white socialist feminists (Brah 1987 and 1988, Parmar 1984 and 1988, Amos and Parmar 1984, Carby 1984, Foster-Carter 1987 and 1988, Bhagavani and Coulson 1986), have reacted against these constructions and pointed to their ethnocentrism, the lack of understanding of the race and class dimensions of the lives of Asian and black women, the diversity of their experiences in the diaspora (Parmar 1989) and the heterogeneity of their populations in Britain (Brah 1987). A number of anthropologists (mostly white and women) writing on these issues in Britain and die United States have come under fire for representing the cultural values of Asian women as oppressive without taking account of them as active agents. Countering such representations, black feminists have pointed to the militancy of Asian women, particularly salient in Britain through their organisation of strikes, to show that this is not a new phenomenon (Trivedi 1984) in the subcontinent and Britain. 2 This militancy is further manifested in the present in the struggles and resistances in which British Asians women are engaged against racism and imperialism on both the economic and political fronts. 3 Despite this, representations of these women as politically inactive, shy and powerless are common and persist.

Publication Title

Migrant Women: Crossing Boundaries and Changing Identities

Publication Date

1993

First Page

99

Last Page

117

ISBN

9781040290996

DOI

10.4324/9781003575313-6

Keywords

migrant women, women's studies

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