India in the Age of Globalisation: Contemporary Discourses and Texts edited by Suman Gupta, Tapan Basu and Subarno Chattarji; Nehru Museum and Library, New Delhi, 2003;
The Commercialisation of Intimate Life: Notes from Home and Work by Arlie Russell Hochschild; University of California Press, Berkeley, 2003; pp 322, $ 16.95
The experiences recounted in this essay of Asian Indian women on an H-1B or H 4 visa highlight the deepening contradiction between economic restructuring and the emancipatory potential it offers women in the labour market. The women respondents in this study are either confined to the domestic sphere in conformance to ideals of 'Hindu' motherhood or suffer from the assumption of the labour market that an ideal worker has no family - an assumption that makes their software programmer husbands in contrast rise to dizzying heights in their profession. What emerges in turn is the perpetuation of masculinity myths and gender stereotypes in guiding behavioural and thought patterns even in a hi-tech sector as the software industry.
Work Experience and Identity: A Historical Account of Class, Caste, and Gender among the Cashew Workers of Kerala, 1930-2000by Anna Lindberg; Lund University, Lund, Sweden, 2001; pp xvii + 384, price not mentioned.
