Defying Delhi’s enclosures: strategies for managing a difficult city

Abstract

Reflecting wider debates on the city as a site of coercion and opportunity, Delhi is marked by the coordinates of both cultural nationalism and neo-liberal aspiration. The former positions the city as a site of cultural pollution, at times claiming 'western lifestyles' have contributed to gendered assault. In juxtaposition, Delhi's neo-liberal landscape positions the female body as a valued commodity, iconic of 'globalised living', embedded in discourses of autonomy and modernity. This paper will argue that these entangled cultural constructs have created a city of threat and discomfort that problematizes women's access, be it for livelihood or leisure, enclosing women within coordinates not of their making. Yet rather than acquiesce to this urban topology, the agency of the single, middle-aged, middle-class women in this ethnographic study extends our understanding of the agonistic relationships within urban space, and the capacity to negotiate them using practices of avoidance, deception, adaptation, defiance, and care, at times creating their own enclosures in the process that enabled access to the city. Age and class as well as gendered expectations impacted on the available resources and outcomes of these negotiations, revealing the diverse possibilities of urban living that can enable pockets of social and political flourishing even within a difficult city.

‘Sir, it was my right of way!’ Examining cultural change and the contested entitlements of automobility

“…The limitations noted by Lakshmi illustrate a social context within Delhi's landscape of power that has privileged men's mobility and access to public space. This context underpins descriptions of the city as 'difficult' for women (Bernroider 2018;Butcher 2018;Amrute 2015). While several in this study noted positive changes, such as increased mobility, no longer being an oddity to be a woman driving alone in Delhi, and that added security has come with having more women on the road, simultaneously there is the stickiness of extant cultural norms.…”

“…However, as Phadke et al (2011) argue, access to public space can be conditional on the enactment of normative purpose (e.g. consuming, mothering, etc), as the mobility of women meets the restraint of extant cultural norms, gendered expectations and forms of moral governance that can restrict mobility (Butcher 2018). In addition, if driving is an act of turbulence (Cresswell 2014) that allows some women to challenge or negotiate patriarchy, this mobility is positioned within a wider context of classed inequality.…”

Rape Myth Acceptance in Contemporary Times: A Comparative Study of University Students in India and the United Kingdom

“…India, as an emerging modern economy, is experiencing vast change through the processes of globalization, neoliberalism, urbanization, and women's entry into the labor market and public spaces. The greater visibility of women in former "male spaces" is not only challenging gender roles and male dominance, but female "Western" lifestyles are also being equated with an invitation to rape (Butcher, 2018). Male resistance to such processes is likely to strengthen patriarchal beliefs about a woman's place.…”

Crossing boundaries: bras, lingerie and rape myths in postcolonial urban middle-class India

“…With the processes of globalization, urbanization and neo-liberalism, and as an increasing number of Indian women enter public urban spaces, their presence in the workplace and in spaces of leisure is being deemed as problematic where 'western' lifestyles are being equated with an invitation to rape (Butcher 2017). Indeed, the BBC documentary, India's Daughter, testifies to this in the convict's portrayal of Nirbhaya as 'westernized', and therefore worthy of rape as punishment for her transgression (Barn, Barn & Raimondi 2018;Barn and Powers, 2018).…”

“…One of the ways in which control was exercized was through the opposition to visibly western lifestyles for Indian women. Thus reflecting how the fear of globalization and 'the loss of economic changes is displaced onto the women's sexuality and bodies', therefore containment requires 'securing the female body and sexuality against transgression'(Oza 2001(Oza , 1079, included reinstating myths that displace blame upon bodies outside of this transgression(Butcher 2017;Menon 2012). This is explored through rape myths attached to non-traditional, perceived western and sexualized clothing items such as the bra and lingerie.…”