Tracing the Growth of Ecofeminism in Modern Indian Literature through the Selected Works of Kamala Markandaya, Amrita Pritam, Manjula Padmanabhan and Anuradha Roy
Author : Pranjal Tripathi and Dr. Mohd Farhan Saiel
Abstract :
This research paper contains a scrupulous disquisition of the special connection women have to the environment through their diurnal interactions as this relatedness has been scorned in the society predominantly, examining different Modern Indian Writings as a work of Ecofeminism. Women in affluence economies, who generate “wealth in cooperation with nature, have been experts in their own right of holistic and ecological knowledge of nature’s processes.” The novels considered range from early ecofeminism to civic ecofeminism: A Silence of Desire (1960) by Kamala Markandaya, Aak ke Patte (1972) by Amrita Pritam, The Harvest (1997) by Manjula Padmanabhan and An Atlas of Impossible Longing (2008) by Anuradha Roy. The paper will project the quintessence of Ecofeminism in the works of the above-mentioned famed authors. This paper quests to adumbrate the lineage of Ecofeminism in India in terms of both activism and stories that unequivocally focus on women and nature. Drawing upon ecofeminist theory and literary criticism, this paper explores how these novels depict the interconnectedness between gender, ecology, and social structures, and how they contribute to the discourse on ecofeminism in the Indian context. By examining the representation of women, nature, and their relationships in these texts, this paper aims to highlight the evolution and complexities of ecofeminist thought in modern Indian literature. It manifests a case to be invigorated for the women writers, and why they are salient for the discipline of literature and environment in the period of expeditious and globalized technological advancement. While outlining Ecofeminism as a field and the forms it has taken in India in both activism and jottings, the paper presents the fact that women’s association to the terrain is inconclusive, therefore disputing the biofortify of nature/culture and yet bestriding the slate sector in the middle of these two binaries. This is peculiarly stressed by women writing Indian Fiction in English. A brief elucidation of the nature/culture dualism will be provided to scrutinize this study and to decipher how this ambiguity affects upon the conceptions of an engendered (ecological) allegiance.
Keywords :
Ecofeminism, ecofeminism in the Indian context, women and nature, interconnectedness between gender, ecology, and social structures
