#InTheirWords: About Being A Woman

By Asmaani Kumar June 2, 2020June 6, 2020 In Features, Intheirwords 0 Being A Woman, FEMINISM 0

Often I wonder about being a woman, even though I’ve been one all my life. There is a poem by Kim Addonizio called “What Do Women Want?” She wants a red dress, flimsy and cheap and too tight and wants to wear it until someone tears it off her. What a powerful and bold expression.

I have more questions than answers to give but the importance of queries — even those without black and white responses — are important. I want to ask you “What does it mean to be a strong woman?”

For Addonizio, it has been an expression of a raw, female sexuality and for my friends at large, it has been confined to the term independence. But what does this independence encompass? In the most ideal terms, it calls for liberation, for a womanhood that is free to do as it pleases and to chase all that it wants out of this life that they have been given, to create a space for themselves with conviction and determination to overcome every obstacle in their path.

It’s what Naomi Replansky says in “Housing Shortage”:

“Excuse me for living,

But, since I am living,

Given inches, I take yards,

Taking yards, dream of miles,

And a landscape, unbounded

And vast in abandon.”

ABOUT BEING A WOMAN: GENERATION Z

I believe that creation of womanhood is an important part of the rhetoric of this generation, this fearless generation that I belong to, it presses upon us the need to speak up and this has been reflected in the #metoomovement but it is not just about speaking up but also about embracing the different kinds of womanhood that exists, the different kinds of women out there in terms of not only the body but also the mind. I remember the #LikeAGirl trend where the very meaning of being a girl, a girl on the verge of being a woman was left open for imagination. It blew me away.

The Indian imagination, I must add, has not been left behind in the creation of womanhood and it has had its beginnings very early on in the sexually explicit prose and poetry of Ismat Chughtai or even Kamala Das. I wish I could be that daringly honest. It has surfaced in movies like Queen which talks of the strength it takes to be on your own and to grow through that process. I mean, after watching this movie, I am convinced that we are all seeking an adventure and we are so unafraid. Who cares if a man leaves us? Who cares if we find ourselves all alone? We will still go out there and do what we want to do.

We are courageous, imaginative, open and growing and celebrating diversities. But isn’t it funny how when we talk with so much conviction about the strong, independent woman in India who is not held back by the tradition of marriage and family and is open to finding herself in an urban milieu, we don’t see how we have completely forgotten certain types of women?

ABOUT BEING A WOMAN: THRIVING UNDER PATRIARCHY

In the urge to embrace the modern woman (often funded on the western conceptions), we have forgotten to talk about women who have thrived under patriarchy. We forget at times to talk about our mothers, although married and a housewife (a fate we can’t dare even imagine for ourselves) but symbolising a kind of endurance that the modern, urban woman is always celebrated for. We need to talk about the strength and conviction that takes to give up one’s own ambitions to raise a child and to take care of the family and to immerse in the daily household chores. We need to talk about our grandmothers who too have faced the brunt of patriarchy but still sacrifice so much for the family.

We need to recognise women who are both a housewife and a modern working woman. We need to recognise the women in the villages whom we seek to liberate but who also express an innate strength, toiling night and day in the fields. They comprise 43% of the world’s agricultural labour force, which rises to 70% in some countries.

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ABOUT BEING A WOMAN BEYOND LABELS

Womanhood is not about the urban, upper class woman but also about the rural, poor woman; about the women who choose to live their life in tradition; and those who learn to balance tradition and modernity. It is a diverse sense of identities that cannot be ignored, that cannot be side lined in favour of one. If we have the completely Western Sex and the City escapades on one hand, we also have the Ariel detergent ad in India where a father learns through the struggles of his daughter about how a man must also take part in daily household chores. It is as grand as that, as simple as that.

Who cares if a man leaves us? Who cares if we find ourselves all alone? We will still go out there and do what we want to do.

The heart of womanhood lies in something very simple and that is strength and endurance. It exists both in the modern world and in the world embraced by tradition, it is made of choices but also circumstances. We are sexually explicit, we are encompassing space, we are speaking up for what we want, we come from different classes and different backgrounds, we are modern, and we can also be traditional. But we are not limited because we can grow and we will not grow according to a standard that has been decided for us, we will grow according to the decisions we take to fully become who we are.

We are seen in the voices of Tanushree Dutta and Dr. Christine Blasey Ford who years later spoke about their sexual assault experiences. We are seen in participating in a larger movement that believes survivors wholeheartedly. We are seen in embracing each and every kind of women into our fold and multiply our strengths. We are seen in standing up for ourselves and for others, for believing in a sense of invincibility that we possess.

Also read: Book Excerpt: No Regrets by Kaveree Bamzai

Now, the space is up for you to decide who you are but to also understand that you are not limited by your circumstances, that you still possess a great deal of strength in spite of everything. You need to believe it and if I am really honest, it is time I start believing in it too. And together, we move ahead.