Exploring the Complex Gendering of Cookbooks in Colonial India by Srishti Snehal

ABSTRACT:

The paper seeks to analyse the aspect of gender consciousness present in the culinary history of India. The author will briefly examine the ancient and medieval culinary spaces before delving into the numerous cookbooks that were published in colonial India to trace women’s history. While the central audience of these cookbooks were the emerging middle class Indian women, yet, in the public and professional spheres it was, in fact, the men who dominated these spaces. In a growing nation, cookbooks (such as those of Yashoda Devi) also revealed the innate connection that existed between food and nutrition. Moreover, factors such as caste and class discrimination have pervaded the discourse of culinary practices in India.

The work of the women was tied to the kitchen and inevitably, to the traditional domestic spaces. The cookbooks were part of a larger phenomenon that seeked to restrict women’s roles to those of wife, mother and homemaker. To go further was neither encouraged nor entertained. Such statements can be corroborated through famous cookbooks such as Pak Chandrika written by a male author which contains chapters like “the most important task of the housewife”. Alternatively, there were also instances of cookbooks being published by certain women’s groups and it is these sources that help in reconstructing a more nuanced history of gender roles. The paper will further examine the difference in expectations held for the British “memsahibs” as opposed to the Indian women. By questioning the foundation that these cookbooks were built on, the paper attempts to examine the role of women in the private and public spheres.

Author: Srishti Snehal

Full Paper: Exploring the Complex Gendering of Cookbooks in Colonial India