Everyday Nationalism: Women of the Hindu Right in India (The Ethnography of Political Violence) [Hardcover]

Kalyani Devaki Menon (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: November 3, 2009 | ISBN-10: 0812241967 | ISBN-13: 978-0812241969

Hindu nationalism has been responsible for acts of extreme violence against religious minorities and is a dominant force on the sociopolitical landscape of contemporary India. How does such a violent and exclusionary movement recruit supporters? How do members navigate the tensions between the normative prescriptions of such movements and competing ideologies?

To understand the expansionary power of Hindu nationalism, Kalyani Menon argues, it is critical to examine the everyday constructions of politics and ideology through which activists garner support at the grassroots level. Based on fieldwork with women in several Hindu nationalist organizations, Menon explores how these activists use gendered constructions of religion, history, national insecurity, and social responsibility to recruit individuals from a variety of backgrounds. As Hindu nationalism extends its reach to appeal to increasingly diverse groups, she explains, it is forced to acknowledge a multiplicity of positions within the movement. She argues that Hindu nationalism's willingness to accommodate dissonance is central to understanding the popularity of the movement.

Everyday Nationalism contends that the Hindu nationalist movement's power to attract and maintain constituencies with incongruous beliefs and practices is key to its growth. The book reveals that the movement's success is facilitated by its ability to become meaningful in people's daily lives, resonating with their constructions of the past, appealing to their fears in the present, presenting itself as the protector of the country's citizens, and inventing traditions through the use of Hindu texts, symbols, and rituals to unite people in a sense of belonging to a nation.

Editorial Reviews

Review

''Menon argues that central to the popularity and success of Hindu nationalism is its willingness to accommodate groups whose beliefs and practices may be incongruous with the movement's mainstream. . . . An excellent study of a timely issue.'--Choice

About the Author

Kalyani Devaki Menon teaches religious studies at DePaul University.

Product Details

• Hardcover: 272 pages
• Publisher: University of Pennsylvania Press (November 3, 2009)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0812241967
• ISBN-13: 978-0812241969
• Product Dimensions: 9.3 x 6.2 x 1.1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.2 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,660,419 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Choice Book Review, April 15, 2011

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A professor - See all my reviews

This review is from: Everyday Nationalism: Women of the Hindu Right in India (The Ethnography of Political Violence) (Hardcover)

I personally found the following book review from Choice magazine quite helpful before adopting the book for a course:

"Religious studies professor Menon (DePaul Univ.) argues that central to the popularity and success of Hindu nationalism is its willingness to accommodate groups whose beliefs and practices may be incongruous with the movement's mainstream. In particular, she argues that Hindu nationalism, which is committed to establish India as a Hindu nation, works well over time because it connects meaningfully with the daily lives of people by developing support at the grassroots level. Her ethnography, based on fieldwork in Delhi in 1999, focuses on women in several Hindu nationalist organizations, including the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS), the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), and the Vishwa Hindu Parishad (VHP), and explores the way activists in these organizations gather support by recruiting followers from a variety of backgrounds by presenting such things as "gendered constructions" of history, religion, and social responsibility. Menon uses case studies to show how the movement draws in women, in particular. Finally, the author's notion of "acceptable transgressions" is a remarkable discussion of why Hindu nationalist women engage in dissonant acts and how the complex ideals and expectations they operate within are both very traditional and very bound to competing ideologies. An excellent study of a timely issue. Summing Up: Recommended. Undergraduate and graduate libraries. -
- E. Findly, Trinity College (CT)"