Description
Book SynopsisMany people still envision India as rigidly caste-bound, locked in traditions that inhibit social mobility. In reality, class mobility has long been an ideal, and today globalization is radically transforming how India's citizens perceive class. This title examines a nation in flux, bombarded with media images of middle-class consumers, while navigating the currents of late capitalism.
Trade Review"This raw, evocative, and beautifully written book is for anyone interested in class, India, socioeconomic inequality, or ethnography … Highly recommended." * Choice *
"This innovative analysis builds on captivating stories of everyday life, connecting the capitalist forces we categorize as 'global' with the spaces, practices, and organizations that ground daily experience. It marks an important achievement." -- Mary Hancock * University of California at Santa Barbara *
"Dickey has an exceptionally rich longitudinal perspective on how patterns and logics of social organization change and how class shapes lives. She lays out the complex cultural context in and through which material class dynamics operate." -- Mark Liechty * University of Illinois at Chicago *
Table of ContentsAcknowledgmentsNotes on Transliteration and Pronunciation1. Introduction: The Everyday Life of Class2. What Is Class in Madurai?3. Four Residents, as I Know Them4. Consumption and Apprehension: Class in the Everyday5. Debt: The Material Consequences of Moral Constructs6. Performing the Middle7. Marriage: Drama, Display, and the Reproduction of Class8. Food, Hunger, and the Binding of Class Relations9. Conclusions: Nuancing Class BoundariesNotesReferencesIndex
