Listen to the heron's words : reimagining gender and kinship in North India

By:

Raheja, Gloria Goodwin

Contributor(s):

Gold, Ann Grodzins

Material type: Text

TextPublication details: Berkeley University of California Press 1994Description: xxxvii, 234pISBN:

9780520083714 (pbk.)

Subject(s):

DDC classification:

398.209542 RAH

Summary: In many South Asian oral traditions, herons are viewed as duplicitous and conniving. These traditions tend also to view women as fragmented identities, dangerously split between virtue and virtuosity, between loyalties to their own families and those of their husbands. In women's songs, however, symbolic herons speak, telling of alternative moral perspectives shaped by women. The heron's words—and women's expressive genres more generally—criticize pervasive North Indian ideologies of gender and kinship that place women in subordinate positions. By inviting readers to "listen to the heron's words," the authors convey this shift in moral perspective and suggest that these spoken truths are compelling and consequential for the women in North India.

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Holdings
Item type	Current library	Collection	Call number	Status	Date due	Barcode
Gratis Resources	Plaksha University Library	Social Science	398.209542 RAH (Browse shelf(Opens below))	Available		G000721
Book	Plaksha University Library	Social Science	398.209542 RAH (Browse shelf(Opens below))	Checked out	18/10/2025	003047

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Previous	398.20954 RAM Folktales from India: a selection of oral tales from twenty-two languages	398.20954 SAX Oh my son: a collection of ancient Indian short stories from the puraans	398.2095415 CAP Images of women in the folk songs of garhwal himalyas: a participatory research.	398.209542 RAH Listen to the heron's words : reimagining gender and kinship in North India	398.209542 RAH Listen to the heron's words : reimagining gender and kinship in North India	398.209542 SAX Dancing the self : personhood and performance in the Pandav lila of Garhwal	398.2095451 BUD Where gods dwell : central Himalayan folktales and legends	Next

https://www.ucpress.edu/book/9780520083714/listen-to-the-herons-words

In many South Asian oral traditions, herons are viewed as duplicitous and conniving. These traditions tend also to view women as fragmented identities, dangerously split between virtue and virtuosity, between loyalties to their own families and those of their husbands. In women's songs, however, symbolic herons speak, telling of alternative moral perspectives shaped by women. The heron's words—and women's expressive genres more generally—criticize pervasive North Indian ideologies of gender and kinship that place women in subordinate positions. By inviting readers to "listen to the heron's words," the authors convey this shift in moral perspective and suggest that these spoken truths are compelling and consequential for the women in North India.

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