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The aim of this thesis is to explain the existence and coexistence of diverse hired labour arrangements in two contrasting localities in rural West Bengal (India). Hired labour arrangements for seasonal migrants are included in the analysis, the methods for which are drawn from a review of the contractual arrangements literature. One study locality, in Bardhaman District, was characterised by double-cropping of paddy facilitated by groundwater irrigation, the other, in Purulia District, by rainfed paddy cultivation. The structure of landownership was skewed - more so in the Bardhaman locality. Daily employment records were kept by ninety-two sampled households over two seasons. In each locality six different indigenous types of hired labour arrangement were identified. Analysis of the rationales for the existence and coexistence of these labour arrangements and of the variation within each type confirmed the embeddedness of the terms and conditions of labour hire (including those for migrant labour) in the land-holding structure, in ideologies of gender and caste, and in party political allegiances. Possibilities for and constraints on hiring out labour in particular arrangements are explained in part by the logic of deployment of household labour to unwaged reproductive and productive work, which is also socially embedded in the same way. The thesis thus sets a new agenda for research. It questions the received wisdom on rural labour exchange in India: i) that villages tend to have just one wage rate for 'casual' labour determined by supply and demand alone, ii) that stylised labour arrangements (eg 'casual' and 'attached') are appropriate occupational classifications for individuals and households, and iii) that rural labour is immobile. If the coexistence of diverse labour arrangements is to be explained, more, careful microstudies are required, so that a typology of socio-economic, political and agro-ecological contexts can be developed.

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The study investigates the constructed relationship between gender, language, and power in a type of conventional, informal discussion, commonly referred to as adda in Bengal. This research focuses on everyday contestations of authority and some ways that are differently framed by men and women, and as well as some implications of these strategies as they negotiate and position themselves within the setting of adda in Austin, Texas, a place away from Bengal. The corpus consists of a segment of recorded data within mixed-group interaction, including both men and women, among native Bengalis who are currently from Texas as well as from Bengal. I use conversation analysis as a methodology to analyze the sequential production of meaning, and study how participant roles emerge and are negotiated through the lens of an adda setting. The study investigates the transformation of a discussion between men and women into a format of debate, which is common in adda, and the strategies employed by the participants to seize the floor. The strategies analyzed include: collaboration between women to disagree with the male participants’ positions and vice-versa. Questioning as a practice can be a very powerful device within the situated space, as it demands a response from the recipient. The study builds on the recent scholarship on the multifunctional use of tag questions and contributes by adding a new perspective on how the tag-questions are employed by women as an interactional strategy to become co-tellers in the discussion. From the very outset, the study focuses on the use of tag-questions and how they are implemented in an interactional framework (by either men or women). The broader aim of this report is to use tag-question as a primary data set because of their complexity. The act of questioning is a very complex activity as it involves the context and positioning of the speaker as well as the recipient and how they both act and react to the question. In the segment analyzed in the report, women use tag question to question the men’s authority claims, but the questions are interpreted by men as a re-framing to a teacher-student paradigm, and undermine the women’s position. The female participants also create interruptions to redirect and reformulate the topic, in order to become co-tellers in the discussion. In exploring these strategies, I examine both the embodied behavior and the speech styles of both men and women. / text

Thesis (Ph. D.)--UCLA, 2005. / Vita. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 258-266).

Thesis (Ph. D.)--Columbia University. / Vita on label mounted on leaf at end. Bibliography: p. 253-260.

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No description available.