The principal aim of this thesis is to elaborate a politicized reading of Amartya Sen's Capability Approach. It explores how capabilities are augmented through the forging of contentious political subjectivities. In it, I build on the criticism that Sen's framework can be more sensitive to questions of power and politics. Against some of his critics, however, I argue that its 'politicization' must focus analytical attention on politics as the struggle to produce subjects rather than limiting its understanding to negotiations over authority, resources and allocations. I draw on quantitative and qualitative analysis of ethnographic data from rural eastern India to substantiate my argument. The first two chapters outline the contours of the debates and introduce the social, economic and political life of the study localities. Each of the four subsequent chapters elucidates the manner in which the contentious processes through which political subjectivity are forged augments capabilities. In Chapter 3 I advance the case that any discussion on capabilities needs to analyze how subjects interrogate the relations of domination and subordination which they have hitherto been compelled to inhabit. Based on an analysis of the contentions spawned by the Indian Government's National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme, I point to how the notion of cooperative conflict is helpful in understanding these processes. In Chapter 4, I draw attention to the analytic importance that needs to be accorded to 'voice' in order to understand how subjects contest and reconstitute these relationships: I base my analysis on the claims made on elected representatives by different groups of people in respect to 'poverty cards'. This emphasis leads in Chapter 5 to an investigation of the ways in which agonistic exchanges in public spaces augments capabilities: this I do through an examination of two specific disputes involving a variety of local actors. I develop these insights further in Chapter 6 to show how our understanding of the processes through which capabilities may be enhanced gains analytically from an analysis of the manner in which subjects construct their identities. Chapter 7 concludes.

This study of early years services in India explores the take-up of the government ICDS (Integrated Child Development Services Scheme) and RGNCS (Rajiv Gandhi National Crèche Scheme), and the factors affecting their uptake by working mothers in a Delhi slum. Policy cannot assess programme outcomes effectively without understanding how services are implemented. Existing literature indicates that programme impact is related to programme take-up, with non-take-up being a complex phenomenon affected by factors operating at multiple levels of the policy process. The study makes original contributions by examining user perspectives on early childhood education and care (ECEC) in the Indian context; in being the first to research any aspect of the RGNCS; and in utilizing Critical Realism as the underlying philosophical, theoretical and methodological paradigm for studying programme uptake. It poses five research questions that examine mothers' childcare arrangements and needs/expectations from services, their take-up of government programmes and component services, and the combination of factors affecting uptake. Study findings are based on surveys with 200 working mothers and 37 children's centre workers, and interviews with 15 policy experts. Findings reveal childcare arrangements and needs/expectations to vary by family structure, child's age, and mother's age and employment. ICDS uptake is found to be higher (54.3% of all mothers), than RGNCS (18.6%). An explanatory framework for analysing take-up reveals that low take-up results from a combination of multiple factors, most significantly programme characteristics for the ICDS, and participant characteristics for the RGNCS. Two theoretical frameworks frame this analysis - Wolman's (1981) determinants of programme success and failure, and the 'barriers and bridges' to programme uptake. Critical policy analysis further identifies the effects of the policy meaning-making processes, and the role of local 'street-level bureaucrats' in take-up. Both programmes display 'conflicted policy success' vis-à-vis take-up when categorised using McConnell's (2010) criteria for programme 'success' and 'failure'. Policy implications include strategies for increasing programme uptake, and a policy focus upon service users and women in the informal economy, recognition of the dual role of ECEC, and the importance of evidence-creation for interactive governance.

This doctoral thesis explores the entanglement of religion and identity politics in the Indo-Burma borderlands and the indigenisation of Christianity there through grassroots processes of cultural revivalism. The ethnographic focus is on the Sumi Naga from the state of Nagaland in Northeast India. While the Sumi started converting to Baptist Christianity at the beginning of the twentieth century, conversion rates accelerated especially in the 1950s and again in the 1970s when two evangelical revivals swept across the lands of the Sumi and resulted in their conversion en masse. Significantly, these Great Revivals coincided in time with the most turbulent political history of this borderland region, as the Sumi, alongside all other Naga, were waging an armed struggle against the Indian nation-state for their right to self-determination and independence. While this struggle is now largely being fought with political rather than military means, it remains ideologically motivated by Naga perceptions of their distinct ethnic identity, history and culture compared to the rest of India. Baptist Christianity has played a central role in shaping and sustaining these perceptions. Over the past several decades following the Second Great Revival in the 1970s there has been a movement from within Sumi society to reconstruct and redefine their identity by drawing heavily on both their contemporary religion (Baptist Christianity) and their 'good' pre-Christian culture, which had been demonised and rejected in the course of earlier conversions. Discourses have been circulating in public space on the urgent need to reconceptualise collective Sumi identity by reviving, or preserving, those aspects of pre-Christian Sumi culture that are perceived as 'good' and constitutive of Sumi-ness but are currently 'under threat' of being gradually lost to modernity and foreign influences. These discourses are directly linked to processes of cultural revivalism across Nagaland, which have been motivated by a sense of the perceived loss of 'good' cultural heritage and cultural roots. This thesis is an ethnographic study of these processes of identity (re)construction within a Sumi Naga community. It sets out to examine the ways in which Baptist Christianity is central to everyday life in a Sumi village and how it plays an important role in forging group cohesion and solidarity through ritual practice and various forms of fellowship. The thesis then proceeds to study the phenomenon of cultural revivalism in both its discursive and practical manifestations. The thesis argues that the cultural revival has not reduced the centrality of Baptist Christianity to Sumi self-ascriptions and perceptions of identity, but is rather thought to have enriched it and given it a stronger cultural foundation. Hence, a Sumi Naga Christianity is being created which is perceived as unique, indigenous and distinct in its own right. The thesis attempts to explore the essence of this vernacular Christianity against the backdrop of its specific historical, economic, political and spiritual context and the all-encompassing Naga struggle against the Indian nation-state. In pursuing these issues, the thesis locates itself within debates on the intersection between religion and identity politics, which prevail in many contemporary contributions to the anthropology of Christianity.

Stereotype threat is a psychosocial dilemma experienced by members of a negatively stereotyped group in situations where they fear they may confirm the stereotype. This study examined the phenomenon in India, thereby extending previous research to another culture. In addition, with participation by students preparing to be professionals, the results are applicable to organizational settings. Ninety graduate students from a professional training institute viewed common Indian advertisements under three conditions: gender stereotypic (women depicted as homemakers), counter stereotypic (women represented as professionally employed individuals) and neutral (no reference to any gender identity). It was hypothesized that females in the stereotypic condition would be susceptible to stereotype threat effect and thus opt for problem solver over leadership role on a subsequent task, while females in the counter stereotypic condition were expected to choose leadership roles. ANOVA was employed to test for differences across the three conditions. The study also hypothesized mediation of the stereotype threat performance deficits by self-efficacy, evaluation apprehension, anxiety, role conflict, stereotype activation, father's and mother's education levels. Hierarchical multiple regression procedures as recommended by Baron and Kenny (1986) were conducted for mediational analysis. Data analysis provided partial support for the two hypotheses. In support of the stereotype threat theory, condition emerged as a significant variable influencing selection of role choice. In line with previous research, no evidence for mediation by any of the variables studied as potential mediators was found. However role conflict and evaluation apprehension may have functioned as suppressor variables that enhanced the variance in the condition-role choice relationship. The results of the study and their implications, in context of the Indian scenario, are discussed. Certain limitations are identified and suggestions made for future research.

Aging in the new millennium is greatly influenced by both global and region-specific factors. In Asia, the aged population is increasing at a faster rate than both Europe and North America, making issues related to older adults needing immediate attention of researchers & planners. This study aims at identifying the predictors of successful aging. Successful aging as a construct often has an integration of good social engagement, sense of purpose in life, maintaining cognitive capacity and functional autonomy. One hundred fifty participants in India completed the Life Satisfaction Questionnaire, Geriatric Depression Scale, Health Awareness Schedule, and the Leisure Time Activity Record. Firstly, it is mainly evident that social support network is larger for older adults residing in a joint family as compared to a nuclear family setup. Further, married males in a joint family have the largest network size compared to all the other groups. The study however, reveals an interesting reverse trend of widowed females having a larger network size compared to widowed males. Statistical analysis found measures of successful aging to be highly correlated with each other, with subjective health and depression being significant predictors of life satisfaction. Further, life satisfaction, depression levels, and leisure time activities were all significant predictors of subjective health. Significant gender differences were found on life satisfaction and subjective health with married males living in joint families reporting the highest scores on all the above measures. In addition, widowed women showed the highest levels of depression, which relates to their lower life satisfaction, poor ratings of health and low involvement in leisure activities. The study achieved a higher understanding of successful aging and presented a novel finding of educational level being significantly correlated with all measures of successful aging. This study is the first of its kind to measure successful aging in an urban Asian-Indian population. However, more research is needed to examine other age-related variations to enable generalization of results to a larger culturally diverse population.

Includes bibliographical references (leaves 317-341) An ethnography of fakirs' mystical mastery based on fieldwork at the thirteenth century Muslim shrine of Nizamuddin Auliya.

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This analysis addresses the relationship between pre-political cultural identity and political outcomes. It posits that the political mobilization of sub-national groups cannot be understood without an examination of the cultural processes of identity formation. The analysis engages cultural discourse and its organization as an explanatory factor in the examination of the variation in ethnic political outcomes. Hence, important questions about ethnonational conflict can be answered by engaging the levels at which identity is constructed and reshaped through cultural discourse. It shifts the arena of analysis from the state to the ethnic groups themselves. The two empirical cases analyzed are that of Sikh nationalism in Punjab and 'ethnic' Assamese nationalism in Assam.

Thesis (M.Phil.) - University of Queensland, 2005. / Includes bibliography.

Current debates in the anthropology of the Indian middle classes suggest a preponderant theme of balance - between 'Indian' and 'Western'; 'traditional' and 'modern'; 'global' and 'local'. Scholars like Säävälä (2010) Nisbett (2007, 2009), and Donner (2011) demonstrate a range of practices through which the ideal of middle class life is positioned in a precarious median between the imagined decadence of the upper classes and the perceived immorality and lack of responsibility of the working classes. Sexuality and intimacy, it has been observed, are important sites, where this balancing act is played out and risks to its stability are disciplined. Young women have particularly come under a great deal of pressure to position themselves dually as modern representatives of a global nation, who are, at the same time, epitomes of a nationalised narrative of tradition. In this thesis I examine, through an ethnographic study, the ways in which young women's bodies are implicated in the normative reproduction of everyday middle class life, as well as unpacking the social meanings of youth and adulthood for women in this context. Further, locating my study in the context of women's colleges in Chennai, this thesis comments on the significance of educational spaces as sites where normative ideals of middle class life and femininity are both produced and contested. The chief arguments in this thesis are organised into five chapters that draw primarily on ethnographic material to examine categories of risk, danger and pleasure as mutually constituted in young women's lives through everyday practice, as well as the making of the everyday as a precarious and compositional event.