Mothering Nations and Nationalizing Mothers: Reading the Fairytales of Colonial Bengal

Translation Today, Volume 12, Issue 1, 2018

22 Pages Posted: 3 Jun 2019

Date Written: June 30, 2018

Abstract

This paper argues how the fairytales of colonial Bengal resist closure in absorbing the very silences of the gendered discourse of nationalism of which the genre is a product. The paper will try to address how the nineteenth century Bengali fairytales registered subversive moments in the process of the evolution of a new historical consciousness, one that both accepted and rejected the dominant categories of available gender identities. The paper deals broadly with issues of pregnancy and its representation in fairytales. It will examine how particular socio-cultural meanings of pregnancy play a vital role in the understanding of our fairy stories. The working definition of fairytale provided by Vladimir Propp insists that the functional axis of fairytale proceeds from lack toward fulfillment. While poverty has been the traditional marker of this lack in fairy tales from distant parts of the world, nineteenth-century Bengali fairytales have defined this lack especially in terms of childlessness. This is something symptomatic of the contemporary discourses of gender roles. This paper analyzes stories from collections like Thakumar Jhuli and Folktales of Bengal involving discourses of pregnancy and childbirth, motherhood and fatherhood in ways varied and critical, and exposes the very instability of the cultural meanings of these concepts.

Keywords: Fairytales, gender, pregnancy, labour room, male-impotency, breastfeeding, nationalism, colonial Bengal

Suggested Citation

Roy, Sarani, Mothering Nations and Nationalizing Mothers: Reading the Fairytales of Colonial Bengal (June 30, 2018). Translation Today, Volume 12, Issue 1, 2018, Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=3386119

Do you have negative results from your research you’d like to share?

Paper statistics

Downloads
58
Abstract Views
351
Rank
653,722
PlumX Metrics