soma dey | University of Dhaka, Bangladesh (original) (raw)
Papers by soma dey
Journal of International Women's Studies, 2021
This article explores the gendered impact of the COVID-19 crisis in Bangladesh by analysing every... more This article explores the gendered impact of the COVID-19 crisis in Bangladesh by analysing everyday practices within the household. Conceptually, we have followed R.W. Connell's model of the structures of gender and Naila Kabeer's perspective on women's power to examine how a normative gender order involving heterosexual marital partners tends to be sustained during 'normal' times but can often be destabilised in the context of an unprecedented crisis. Based on an analysis of data collected through an online survey and in-depth interviews, our findings show that the COVID-19 crisis has generated an opportunity for challenging gender inequalities by diminishing the public-private divide and expanding the horizon of responsibility sharing between women and men. Facing this 'new normal' reality, some women have been able to consider life choices and revise unequal relationships with spouses. In contrast, others have reproduced pre-existing inequalities and ...
Asian Journal of Women's Studies, 2019
Riverbank erosion is one of the major natural hazards that have long-term consequences for human ... more Riverbank erosion is one of the major natural hazards that have long-term consequences for human life. Bangladesh, a riverine country, regularly suffers from serious riverbank erosion. As a result, thousands of people, living near or along riverbanks, are displaced every year. Based on a field investigation undertaken in a village of Southern Bangladesh, this study examines how rural women cope with riverbank erosion. It reveals that women remain highly dependent on their surrounding environment to perform a wide range of activities. As a result, displacement due to riverbank erosion severely affects them. This article also shows that despite the socioeconomic , cultural and gender barriers, women build diverse strategies to carry on with their lives in a new environment. Our findings identify women's capacity to face adversities due to natural hazards and how they use their own agency to influence social transformation.
Asian Journal of Women's Studies, 2021
ABSTRACT Livelihood management is a severe challenge in the coastal area near the Sundarbans mang... more ABSTRACT Livelihood management is a severe challenge in the coastal area near the Sundarbans mangrove forests of Bangladesh. Human-tiger conflict in the area further complicates the situation and generates a group of women known as tiger widows who have lost their husbands because of attacks by tigers. They are therefore socially stigmatized as cursed and harbingers of bad luck. As a result, the lives of these widows in rural and geographically remote locations are full of suffering and hardships, especially with respect to their being able to manage livelihoods. This article discusses their vulnerabilities and difficult lives in this antagonistic eco-social setting. It also reveals their adoption of different livelihood strategies backed by some NGOs’ development assistance, whereby they become able to secure the survival and well-being of their families. Furthermore, our findings show how the widows have developed capacities to transform their own lives from utter misery to gain socioeconomic stability by fighting patriarchal constraints and also influencing other women to become self-reliant.
The practice of Mothering is largely persuaded by some specific expectations whether the woman is... more The practice of Mothering is largely persuaded by some specific expectations whether the woman is employed or not. Such assertions are more provident in case of care work and particularly for Child care work. Present study explores the dynamics of child care options for service holder urban mothers in Bangladesh. Available formal and non-formal options to raise pre-school children are brought in to focus. Government policy interventions are also examined in this regard. The large-scale entry of women into the work force in last two decades has vitally changed the fabric of work and family life in Bangladesh. Present study investigates the other side of economic empowerment; the space of mothers in between family and work. In fact it is an attempt to unlash, how care works pave the way from a successful, long aspired career to non-employment and downward occupational mobility; how an employed mother pays to perform politically induced set of social roles centered on care work? Finall...
Gender, Technology and Development, 2012
This edited volume addresses the population debates that characterized the United Nations (UN) In... more This edited volume addresses the population debates that characterized the United Nations (UN) International Conference on Population and Development (ICPD) held in Cairo in 1994, and the trajectories of those debates since that landmark event. The chapters are wide ranging in their geographical coverage, with an eminently insightful introduction to population, health, and gender in neoliberal times. Although most contributors are from the Western world and much emphasis is laid on India, case studies are also drawn from China, Tanzania, Uganda, Argentina, and Peru to provide the readers with an Asian, African, and Latin American context. The ICPD’s Program of Action (POA) called for providing women with adequate resources so as to enable them to take into their own hands decisions regarding their reproductive health, a charter of action that signaled a distinct break from the neo-Malthusian argument for population control. Prominent political economist Malthus attributed the high fertility rate among “Third World” women to poverty, environmental degradation, and their ignorance of methods of birth control. Needless to say, he hypothesized that they could not be trusted to be in charge of birth control. Since the 1994 ICPD, it has become rare to hear women or health groups complain or protest against a country’s population policy. But does this silence signify the success of the Cairo Program of Action (POA)? Gender, Technology and Development 16(2) 247–252 © 2012 Asian Institute of Technology SAGE Publications Los Angeles, London, New Delhi, Singapore, Washington DC DOI: 10.1177/097185241201600206 http://gtd.sagepub.com
Focusing on women’s significant roles as dairy farmers and managers of nutrition for their famili... more Focusing on women’s significant roles as dairy farmers and managers of nutrition for their families,this research analyses the real needs of women dairy farmers of Shahjadpur, Bangladesh by collecting individual-level information about their constraints to securing sustainable income and managing family nutrition. Through this study, it is revealed that scarcity of feed and fodder, inadequate veterinary services, lack of extension services, lack of access to improved breeds and artificial insemination, lack of suitable marketing facilities, and complex terms and condition for institutional credit are significant constraints the dairy cow-rearing community faces. Although cow rearing can enable rural women to be involved in income generating activities, they have little control over how their household uses that income. Also, socio-cultural practices are such that those in the farming community do not recognize women as earners or breadwinners, so most women are still not able to visit local markets; overall, the local community members and dairy firms see this value chain as men's domain.
Gender, Technology and Development
Asian Journal of Women's Studies
International Journal of Green Economics, 2015
International Journal of Green Economics, 2007
The level of destruction of the natural sal (shorea robusta) forest of Modhupur Garh in Banglades... more The level of destruction of the natural sal (shorea robusta) forest of Modhupur Garh in Bangladesh has pushed the forest-dwelling indigenous Garo community into cash crop production, forcing them to move away from their traditional subsistence economy. Cash crop production started in Modhupur region with pineapple cultivation which, in recent years, has been superceded by Banana monoculture. Environmentalists have identified
International Journal of Green Economics, 2009
184 Int. J. Green Economics, Vol. 3, No. 2, 2009 ... The socio-cultural impacts of economic chang... more 184 Int. J. Green Economics, Vol. 3, No. 2, 2009 ... The socio-cultural impacts of economic changes to matrilineal Garo society in Bangladesh ... School of Environment, Resources and Development, Asian Institute of Technology, PO Box 4, Klong Luang, Pathumthani 12120, ...
Social Science Review, 2019
This article analyses the lived experience of first-generation Bangladeshi immigrants to Australi... more This article analyses the lived experience of first-generation Bangladeshi immigrants to Australia to show the role of gender in the migration process and the gendered impacts of migration. The findings demonstrate that until the present, highly educated young Bangladeshi men tend to migrate alone to chase a valued life in a developed country like Australia; they are later followed by their wives. The article, however, marks a notable change to the typical scenario showing the evidence of independent female migration to Australia in the era of globalisation. It also reveals the impacts of migration with reference to the reconstructed gender roles, division of labour and power relations among the married couples in their new place of residence, which mark both continuation and rejection of the life they left behind in Bangladesh.
Export oriented readymade garment (RMG) industry of Bangladesh has flourished at a rapid pace uti... more Export oriented readymade garment (RMG) industry of Bangladesh has flourished at a rapid pace utilising elastic supply of cheap female labour. Despite its grand success and world recognition, this industry encounters criticism for not maintaining minimum safety standard within factories. Industrial hazards are frequent in this sector, often ending the lives of workers and making the survivors and dependent family members vulnerable. Taking Rana Plaza disaster as a case study, this article illustrates how the RMG workers are compensated for the loss of their lives and livelihoods and how much progress has been made until April 2016 to ensure workplace safety in the RMG sector.
Export oriented readymade garment (RMG) industry of Bangladesh has flourished at a rapid pace uti... more Export oriented readymade garment (RMG) industry of Bangladesh has flourished at a rapid pace utilising elastic supply of cheap female labour. Despite its grand success and world recognition, this industry encounters criticism for not maintaining minimum safety standard within factories. Industrial hazards are frequent in this sector, often ending the lives of workers and making the survivors and dependent family members vulnerable. Taking Rana Plaza disaster as a case study, this article illustrates how the RMG workers are compensated for the loss of their lives and livelihoods and how much progress has been made until April 2016 to ensure workplace safety in the RMG sector.
Drawing upon a field investigation conducted over the matrilineal Garo community of Modhupur sal ... more Drawing upon a field investigation conducted over the matrilineal Garo community of Modhupur sal forest, this article analyses the gendered consequences of transforming traditional agriculture. Referring to the role of state forest department, Christian missionaries and neighboring Bengali community, it illustrates how structural constraints and institutional discourses render 'new agriculture' a gendered project targeting men as the recipient of knowledge and prescribing normative gender role in agricultural activities. Ultimately, it is revealed that men are directed towards the center and women are pushed either to the margin or outside the domain of agriculture.
Gender, Place & Culture, 2013
ABSTRACT Based on an ethnographic field investigation conducted on the matrilineal–matrilocal Gar... more ABSTRACT Based on an ethnographic field investigation conducted on the matrilineal–matrilocal Garo community of Bangladesh, this article provides a historical account of local environmental struggles to draw attention to the interconnections between gender, environment and sustainable resource management. From a feminist political ecology perspective, the article argues that interacting with traditional culture, forest ecology and changing processes of centric resource governance, gender remains a salient variable in environmental issues. Local contexts of gender dynamics help configuring local people's mode of participation in environmental struggles as well as being the consequence of those struggles. Findings suggest that Garo women and men have sustained gender specific roles and interests through their struggles to ensure control over forest lands and tree resources. Furthermore, they have developed a class-based relationship with forest ecology which must be acknowledged in forest policies.
In the early 1950s, the forest department imposed sudden restriction upon local access to the sal... more In the early 1950s, the forest department imposed sudden restriction upon local access to the sal forests of Modhupur. To cope, the forest-dwelling indigenous Garo community started encroaching on forest land for habitation and agriculture, contributing to deforestation and biodiversity loss. In the long run, the migratory Garo adopted permanent cultivation system and ownership of land became critical to them. Over generations, competition for private land has aggravated and Garo women, who are traditionally considered owners of household property, are losing land rights to men. At the other end, the state continues to deny Garo people's customary land rights. Based on the case study of a Garo village, this article overviews the community's changing land tenure system and traces out the difficulties the Garo, especially landless women, face in sustaining livelihoods in a degraded forest area.
International Journal of Green Economics, 2009
The construction industry in Bangladesh exhibits gender biases in many respects and for many reas... more The construction industry in Bangladesh exhibits gender biases in many respects and for many reasons. Construction work requires physically strong labourers and that is why it is referred to as masculine work. Women construction workers are considered'weak labour' ...
Journal of International Women's Studies, 2021
This article explores the gendered impact of the COVID-19 crisis in Bangladesh by analysing every... more This article explores the gendered impact of the COVID-19 crisis in Bangladesh by analysing everyday practices within the household. Conceptually, we have followed R.W. Connell's model of the structures of gender and Naila Kabeer's perspective on women's power to examine how a normative gender order involving heterosexual marital partners tends to be sustained during 'normal' times but can often be destabilised in the context of an unprecedented crisis. Based on an analysis of data collected through an online survey and in-depth interviews, our findings show that the COVID-19 crisis has generated an opportunity for challenging gender inequalities by diminishing the public-private divide and expanding the horizon of responsibility sharing between women and men. Facing this 'new normal' reality, some women have been able to consider life choices and revise unequal relationships with spouses. In contrast, others have reproduced pre-existing inequalities and ...
Asian Journal of Women's Studies, 2019
Riverbank erosion is one of the major natural hazards that have long-term consequences for human ... more Riverbank erosion is one of the major natural hazards that have long-term consequences for human life. Bangladesh, a riverine country, regularly suffers from serious riverbank erosion. As a result, thousands of people, living near or along riverbanks, are displaced every year. Based on a field investigation undertaken in a village of Southern Bangladesh, this study examines how rural women cope with riverbank erosion. It reveals that women remain highly dependent on their surrounding environment to perform a wide range of activities. As a result, displacement due to riverbank erosion severely affects them. This article also shows that despite the socioeconomic , cultural and gender barriers, women build diverse strategies to carry on with their lives in a new environment. Our findings identify women's capacity to face adversities due to natural hazards and how they use their own agency to influence social transformation.
Asian Journal of Women's Studies, 2021
ABSTRACT Livelihood management is a severe challenge in the coastal area near the Sundarbans mang... more ABSTRACT Livelihood management is a severe challenge in the coastal area near the Sundarbans mangrove forests of Bangladesh. Human-tiger conflict in the area further complicates the situation and generates a group of women known as tiger widows who have lost their husbands because of attacks by tigers. They are therefore socially stigmatized as cursed and harbingers of bad luck. As a result, the lives of these widows in rural and geographically remote locations are full of suffering and hardships, especially with respect to their being able to manage livelihoods. This article discusses their vulnerabilities and difficult lives in this antagonistic eco-social setting. It also reveals their adoption of different livelihood strategies backed by some NGOs’ development assistance, whereby they become able to secure the survival and well-being of their families. Furthermore, our findings show how the widows have developed capacities to transform their own lives from utter misery to gain socioeconomic stability by fighting patriarchal constraints and also influencing other women to become self-reliant.
The practice of Mothering is largely persuaded by some specific expectations whether the woman is... more The practice of Mothering is largely persuaded by some specific expectations whether the woman is employed or not. Such assertions are more provident in case of care work and particularly for Child care work. Present study explores the dynamics of child care options for service holder urban mothers in Bangladesh. Available formal and non-formal options to raise pre-school children are brought in to focus. Government policy interventions are also examined in this regard. The large-scale entry of women into the work force in last two decades has vitally changed the fabric of work and family life in Bangladesh. Present study investigates the other side of economic empowerment; the space of mothers in between family and work. In fact it is an attempt to unlash, how care works pave the way from a successful, long aspired career to non-employment and downward occupational mobility; how an employed mother pays to perform politically induced set of social roles centered on care work? Finall...
Gender, Technology and Development, 2012
This edited volume addresses the population debates that characterized the United Nations (UN) In... more This edited volume addresses the population debates that characterized the United Nations (UN) International Conference on Population and Development (ICPD) held in Cairo in 1994, and the trajectories of those debates since that landmark event. The chapters are wide ranging in their geographical coverage, with an eminently insightful introduction to population, health, and gender in neoliberal times. Although most contributors are from the Western world and much emphasis is laid on India, case studies are also drawn from China, Tanzania, Uganda, Argentina, and Peru to provide the readers with an Asian, African, and Latin American context. The ICPD’s Program of Action (POA) called for providing women with adequate resources so as to enable them to take into their own hands decisions regarding their reproductive health, a charter of action that signaled a distinct break from the neo-Malthusian argument for population control. Prominent political economist Malthus attributed the high fertility rate among “Third World” women to poverty, environmental degradation, and their ignorance of methods of birth control. Needless to say, he hypothesized that they could not be trusted to be in charge of birth control. Since the 1994 ICPD, it has become rare to hear women or health groups complain or protest against a country’s population policy. But does this silence signify the success of the Cairo Program of Action (POA)? Gender, Technology and Development 16(2) 247–252 © 2012 Asian Institute of Technology SAGE Publications Los Angeles, London, New Delhi, Singapore, Washington DC DOI: 10.1177/097185241201600206 http://gtd.sagepub.com
Focusing on women’s significant roles as dairy farmers and managers of nutrition for their famili... more Focusing on women’s significant roles as dairy farmers and managers of nutrition for their families,this research analyses the real needs of women dairy farmers of Shahjadpur, Bangladesh by collecting individual-level information about their constraints to securing sustainable income and managing family nutrition. Through this study, it is revealed that scarcity of feed and fodder, inadequate veterinary services, lack of extension services, lack of access to improved breeds and artificial insemination, lack of suitable marketing facilities, and complex terms and condition for institutional credit are significant constraints the dairy cow-rearing community faces. Although cow rearing can enable rural women to be involved in income generating activities, they have little control over how their household uses that income. Also, socio-cultural practices are such that those in the farming community do not recognize women as earners or breadwinners, so most women are still not able to visit local markets; overall, the local community members and dairy firms see this value chain as men's domain.
Gender, Technology and Development
Asian Journal of Women's Studies
International Journal of Green Economics, 2015
International Journal of Green Economics, 2007
The level of destruction of the natural sal (shorea robusta) forest of Modhupur Garh in Banglades... more The level of destruction of the natural sal (shorea robusta) forest of Modhupur Garh in Bangladesh has pushed the forest-dwelling indigenous Garo community into cash crop production, forcing them to move away from their traditional subsistence economy. Cash crop production started in Modhupur region with pineapple cultivation which, in recent years, has been superceded by Banana monoculture. Environmentalists have identified
International Journal of Green Economics, 2009
184 Int. J. Green Economics, Vol. 3, No. 2, 2009 ... The socio-cultural impacts of economic chang... more 184 Int. J. Green Economics, Vol. 3, No. 2, 2009 ... The socio-cultural impacts of economic changes to matrilineal Garo society in Bangladesh ... School of Environment, Resources and Development, Asian Institute of Technology, PO Box 4, Klong Luang, Pathumthani 12120, ...
Social Science Review, 2019
This article analyses the lived experience of first-generation Bangladeshi immigrants to Australi... more This article analyses the lived experience of first-generation Bangladeshi immigrants to Australia to show the role of gender in the migration process and the gendered impacts of migration. The findings demonstrate that until the present, highly educated young Bangladeshi men tend to migrate alone to chase a valued life in a developed country like Australia; they are later followed by their wives. The article, however, marks a notable change to the typical scenario showing the evidence of independent female migration to Australia in the era of globalisation. It also reveals the impacts of migration with reference to the reconstructed gender roles, division of labour and power relations among the married couples in their new place of residence, which mark both continuation and rejection of the life they left behind in Bangladesh.
Export oriented readymade garment (RMG) industry of Bangladesh has flourished at a rapid pace uti... more Export oriented readymade garment (RMG) industry of Bangladesh has flourished at a rapid pace utilising elastic supply of cheap female labour. Despite its grand success and world recognition, this industry encounters criticism for not maintaining minimum safety standard within factories. Industrial hazards are frequent in this sector, often ending the lives of workers and making the survivors and dependent family members vulnerable. Taking Rana Plaza disaster as a case study, this article illustrates how the RMG workers are compensated for the loss of their lives and livelihoods and how much progress has been made until April 2016 to ensure workplace safety in the RMG sector.
Export oriented readymade garment (RMG) industry of Bangladesh has flourished at a rapid pace uti... more Export oriented readymade garment (RMG) industry of Bangladesh has flourished at a rapid pace utilising elastic supply of cheap female labour. Despite its grand success and world recognition, this industry encounters criticism for not maintaining minimum safety standard within factories. Industrial hazards are frequent in this sector, often ending the lives of workers and making the survivors and dependent family members vulnerable. Taking Rana Plaza disaster as a case study, this article illustrates how the RMG workers are compensated for the loss of their lives and livelihoods and how much progress has been made until April 2016 to ensure workplace safety in the RMG sector.
Drawing upon a field investigation conducted over the matrilineal Garo community of Modhupur sal ... more Drawing upon a field investigation conducted over the matrilineal Garo community of Modhupur sal forest, this article analyses the gendered consequences of transforming traditional agriculture. Referring to the role of state forest department, Christian missionaries and neighboring Bengali community, it illustrates how structural constraints and institutional discourses render 'new agriculture' a gendered project targeting men as the recipient of knowledge and prescribing normative gender role in agricultural activities. Ultimately, it is revealed that men are directed towards the center and women are pushed either to the margin or outside the domain of agriculture.
Gender, Place & Culture, 2013
ABSTRACT Based on an ethnographic field investigation conducted on the matrilineal–matrilocal Gar... more ABSTRACT Based on an ethnographic field investigation conducted on the matrilineal–matrilocal Garo community of Bangladesh, this article provides a historical account of local environmental struggles to draw attention to the interconnections between gender, environment and sustainable resource management. From a feminist political ecology perspective, the article argues that interacting with traditional culture, forest ecology and changing processes of centric resource governance, gender remains a salient variable in environmental issues. Local contexts of gender dynamics help configuring local people's mode of participation in environmental struggles as well as being the consequence of those struggles. Findings suggest that Garo women and men have sustained gender specific roles and interests through their struggles to ensure control over forest lands and tree resources. Furthermore, they have developed a class-based relationship with forest ecology which must be acknowledged in forest policies.
In the early 1950s, the forest department imposed sudden restriction upon local access to the sal... more In the early 1950s, the forest department imposed sudden restriction upon local access to the sal forests of Modhupur. To cope, the forest-dwelling indigenous Garo community started encroaching on forest land for habitation and agriculture, contributing to deforestation and biodiversity loss. In the long run, the migratory Garo adopted permanent cultivation system and ownership of land became critical to them. Over generations, competition for private land has aggravated and Garo women, who are traditionally considered owners of household property, are losing land rights to men. At the other end, the state continues to deny Garo people's customary land rights. Based on the case study of a Garo village, this article overviews the community's changing land tenure system and traces out the difficulties the Garo, especially landless women, face in sustaining livelihoods in a degraded forest area.
International Journal of Green Economics, 2009
The construction industry in Bangladesh exhibits gender biases in many respects and for many reas... more The construction industry in Bangladesh exhibits gender biases in many respects and for many reasons. Construction work requires physically strong labourers and that is why it is referred to as masculine work. Women construction workers are considered'weak labour' ...
Agriculture was once the basis of the socio-economic structure of Bangladesh, but in the last fo... more Agriculture was once the basis of the socio-economic structure of Bangladesh, but in the last forty years the rain-fed agricultural subsystem has undergone transformation. In recent decades, irrigation and the introduction of High Yielding Variety (HYV) rice has worked to make Boro the highest-producing rice season – transforming Bangladesh from the “basket case” of the seventies into an economy that is self-sufficient in food.
Although the Bangladeshi economy continues to be agriculture-based, this formerly firm foundation is undergoing immense changes and shifts. The reasons for this could be demographic pressures and the division and fragmentation of farmland, which is causing landlessness and a higher rate of migration to the cities. Migration has not been limited to the cities within Bangladesh, but also extended to other global cities. Currently Bangladesh is one of the main origin countries for migrant workers in the world.
This book dwells upon gendered lives and livelihoods, exploring the dynamics of this transformation from a subsistence economy into a capitalist one, with an eye on those areas that have been under-researched thus far. The focus on multiple dimensions of the everyday lives of women explored here has revealed the different facets of social transformation and helped us to better understand these processes of change. The essays in this anthology are microcosmic studies deliberately chosen to demonstrate the understated realities of peripheral economies. The subjects vary from indigenous women engaged in jhum cultivation, Dalit women embedded in caste-specific work structures and relations, female-headed households in rural areas, and elderly women from city slums. All of the studies are a product of original fieldwork that has produced rich qualitative data and a limited amount of quantitative data. It is expected that the analysis of such data will be a precursor to theory-building efforts in this vital area as well as assisting in future policymaking discourses.
Focusing on women’s significant roles as dairy farmers and managers of nutrition for their famili... more Focusing on women’s significant roles as dairy farmers and managers of nutrition for their families,this research analyses the real needs of women dairy farmers of Shahjadpur, Bangladesh by collecting individual-level information about their constraints to securing sustainable income and managing family nutrition. Through this study, it is revealed that scarcity of feed and fodder, inadequate veterinary services, lack of extension services, lack of access to improved breeds and artificial
insemination, lack of suitable marketing facilities, and complex terms and condition for institutional credit are significant constraints the dairy cow-rearing community faces. Although cow rearing can enable rural women to be involved in income generating activities, they have little control over how their household uses that income. Also, socio-cultural practices are such that those in the farming community do not recognize women as earners or breadwinners, so most women are still not able to visit local markets; overall, the local community members and dairy firms see this value chain as men's domain.