Purdah (The Status of Indian Women)

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There is ample evidence to show that there is a keen demand both on the part of the parents and the public for the education of their girls. Even in the so-called purdah tradition.

EXPECTED that the present volume will be the precursor of a book enviIsaged but not yet written. I had hoped that an occasion would present itself for an early return to India, for the purpose of making on the spot a protracted study of the Indian Woman's Movement of this century, particularly of the developments of the immediate, most vital present. Pending this. I have ac- ceded to the demand to share with others such knowledge as I have at my command.

It has not been my intention, within the short compass of this book, sharply to separate historical fact from legend, as both equally express the truths relevant to the present Nor have I aimed at a consistent chronological presentation of later historical factors involved in the determining of women's position The value of the book will lie mainly in a viewpoint and presentation conditioned by fresh personal experience, that, at least, is what friends think, who urge that my life has placed me in a position which leaves me comparatively free from the racial, national, or imperial bias to which most ordinary white sojourners in India are prone

Born and brought up in Switzerland, I completed my academic studies at Leland Stanford University in California, then attended the California Institute of Art, and later went to India as the wife of a Hindu graduate in agricultural industries of the University of California

In India, by virtue of this unusual position, I had the chance of being for eight years in intimate contact with Indian family life in all grades of society and in many different sections of the country. In the welter of social and British- Indian problems and conflicts, it has been my endeavour to side not with partisans, but only with truth, as I saw it This truth I tried to express in my former book, A Marriage to India, as well as in the present one Leap-Home and Gentlebrawn, a series of linked tales to appear this autumn, will, beneath their superstructure of fiction, also be based on this foundation of actuality and experience.

Book's Contents and Sample Pages