Religion, nationalism, and gender: Perspective from South Asia
| Author | Nandini Deo |
| DOI | http://doi.org/10.1177/2057891119898523 |
| Published date | 01 December 2022 |
| Date | 01 December 2022 |
| Subject Matter | South Asian Politics |
Religion, nationalism, and
gender: Perspective from
South Asia
Nandini Deo
Department of Political Science, Lehigh University, USA
Abstract
Religious mobilization often takes the form of engagement with “the woman question”: how
should women as carriers of culture comport themselves? This article shows that many of the
debates over the role of women and religion in South Asia are misunderstood when they are seen
as instances of religious fundamentalism. Rather, the theoretical framework to make sense of
public religion and gender debates should be through the lens of postcolonial nationalism. The
creation and consolidation of the nation is what is at stake—not the creation of the religious
community as such. In order to make this argument, the article offers both a review of the lit-
erature on secularism and gender as well as short case studies from India, Pakistan, and Sri Lanka.
These three former British colonies have each struggled to arrive at a secular settlement and often
the contestation over the place of religion has centered on the rules and roles of women in these
societies.
Keywords
fundamentalism, gender, India, nationalism, Pakistan, religion, Sri Lanka
Introduction
Religious fundamentalism and women’s rights are usually seen as mutually hostile forces (Varma
et al., 2016). Examining religion and women’s rights in South Asia shows that their relationship
needs to be understood in the context of postcolonial nationalism rather than in terms of the politics
of fundamentalism. That is, the assertion of public religion with its preoccupation with gender
matters is not an anti-modern force. It is actually a process of modernizing and adapting traditional
societies to the nation-state system. By examining what may appear to be the politics of religious
fundamentalism from a historically informed South Asian perspective, I show that a series of
Corresponding author:
Nandini Deo, Department of Political Science, Lehigh University, 9 W Packer Ave, Bethlehem, PA 18015, USA.
Email: ndd208@lehigh.edu
Asian Journal of Comparative Politics
ªThe Author(s) 2020
Article reuse guidelines:
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DOI: 10.1177/2057891119898523
journals.sagepub.com/home/acp
2022, Vol. 7(4) 873–887
South Asian Politics
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