The Girl Child in the Life, Lore and Literature of Bengal: Selected Writings of Sibaji Bandyopadhyay

By:

Sign Up Now! Already a Member? Log In
You must be logged into Bookshare to access this title. Learn about membership options, or view our freely available titles.

Synopsis
Contemporary children’s literature in Bangla celebrates irreverent, defiant and deviant boys whose subversive doings critique the parenting and schooling they go through, while the girl child is neglected and marginalised. The rare fictional girls who show resilience and demand a normal childhood are consciously silenced, or contained and assimilated within unwritten masculinist norms. This book –a compilation of translated works of the author, critic and academic, Sibaji Bandyopadhyay –focuses on gender and childhood in Bengal.The book includes a translation of his Bangla Shishusahityer Chhoto Meyera (Little Girls in Bangla Children’s Literature), as well as a translated essay on Thakurma’ Jhuli (Grandma’s Sack), a collection of Bangla folk tales and fairytales from early twentieth century that underscores the subaltern role of adolescent female characters with hardly any agency or voice in the oral legends and folklore of Bengal. The translation of the piece ‘An Incredible Transition’ from Bandyopadhyay’s Abar Shishushiksha (On Children’s Education Again) applauds the role of Indian social reformers and British educationists in initiating women’s education in Bengal, while questioning the erasure of protagonists who are girls in the nineteenth-century primers.Interrogating gendered constructions in diverse genres of literature while revisiting the subject of female education, this book will be of interest to students of children’s literature, comparative literature, popular literature, gender studies, translation studies, culture studies and South Asian writings.
Copyright:
2025

Book Details

Book Quality:
Publisher Quality
ISBN-13:
9781040172285
Related ISBNs:
9781040172216, 9781003368953, 9781032398990
Publisher:
Taylor & Francis
Date of Addition:
Copyrighted By:
selection and editorial matter, Nivedita Sen
Adult content:
No
Language:
English
Has Image Descriptions:
No
Categories:
Children's Books, Nonfiction, Teens, Literature and Fiction, Social Studies, Language Arts
Submitted By:
Bookshare Staff
Usage Restrictions:
This is a copyrighted book.
Edited by:
Nivedita Sen

Reviews

No Rating Yet