Ethnographies of Schooling in Contemporary India 9781322031125, 1322031126, 9788132113850, 8132113853, 9789351500872, 935150087X, 2014001969

Table of contents :
Cover
Contents
Acknowledgements
Introduction
1 - Negotiating Schooland Gender: Peer Performatives
2 - Schooling and the Production of Student Culture: Principles and Practice
3 - Kiranjyoti Vidyalaya: A Sociological Narrative of a Government School
4 - Schooling, Identity and Citizenship Education
5 - In Quest of Identity: Student Culture in a Religious Minority Institution
6 - Being Muslims, Becoming Citizens: A Muslim Girls’ School in Post-riot Ahmedabad
7 - Living in the Bubble: Rishi Valley School and the Sense of Community
8 - School Experience: An Autobiographical Approach
About the Editor and Contributors
Index

Citation preview

Ethnographies of Schooling in Contemporary India

Ethnographies of Schooling in Contemporary India

Edited by Meenakshi Thapan

Copyright © Meenakshi Thapan, 2014 All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or utilised in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording or by any information storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher. First published in 2014 by SAGE Publications India Pvt Ltd B1/I-1 Mohan Cooperative Industrial Area Mathura Road, New Delhi 110 044, India www.sagepub.in SAGE Publications Inc 2455 Teller Road Thousand Oaks, California 91320, USA SAGE Publications Ltd 1 Oliver’s Yard, 55 City Road London EC1Y 1SP, United Kingdom SAGE Publications Asia-Pacific Pte Ltd 3 Church Street #10-04 Samsung Hub Singapore 049483

Published by Vivek Mehra for SAGE Publications India Pvt Ltd, typeset in 10/12 Berkeley by RECTO Graphics, Delhi, and printed at Saurabh Printers Pvt Ltd, New Delhi. Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Thapan, Meenakshi. Ethnographies of schooling in contemporary India / Meenakshi Thapan. pages cm Includes bibliographical references and index. 1. Education—Social aspects—India. 2. Educational anthropology—India. 3. Education—Aims and objectives—India. I. Title. LC191.8.I4.T53 306.430954—dc23 2014 2014001969

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Contents Acknowledgements

ix

Introduction: Understanding School Experience Meenakshi Thapan

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1. Negotiating School and Gender: Peer Performatives Anuradha Sharma 2. Schooling and the Production of Student Culture: Principles and Practice Maitrayee Deka 3. Kiranjyoti Vidyalaya: A Sociological Narrative of a Government School Anannya Gogoi 4. Schooling, Identity and Citizenship Education Meenakshi Thapan

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104 154

5. In Quest of Identity: Student Culture in a Religious Minority Institution Parul Bhandari

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6. Being Muslims, Becoming Citizens: A Muslim Girls’ School in Post-riot Ahmedabad Tanya Matthan, Chandana Anusha and Meenakshi Thapan

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7. Living in the Bubble: Rishi Valley School and the Sense of Community Bhavya Dore

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8. School Experience: An Autobiographical Approach Meenakshi Thapan

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About the Editor and Contributors Index

358 361

Acknowledgements

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his collection of chapters is born out of an enormous need for good quality sociological studies of schooling in India. As a teacher of sociology in the Delhi School of Economics, where I teach courses such as the sociology of education and the sociology of schooling to MA and MPhil sociology students every year, I am dismayed by the absence of this work in a field that is rich with the promise of diverse material based on the experience of the participants in the process of schooling. To put it in a nutshell: the field of the sociology of education in India lacks ethnographies of the large array of schools that exist in the country and of the experience of children in these schools. A project was undertaken at the Department of Sociology with research funding by the University of Delhi from 2007 onwards to study different kinds of schools in Delhi, Ahmedabad and southern India with a twin focus on student culture and the values of citizenship education as they are promoted through schools and negotiated by students. Graduate students of the Department of Sociology were engaged in these projects on a part-time basis and conducted fieldwork in different secondary schools in Delhi. This was done under my guidance and supervision at the Department of Sociology. Professor Murray Milner, University of Virginia, was a visiting fellow at the Department of Sociology for a few months and provided guidance and feedback to the students. I remain indebted to him for the initial idea to begin this project and for his comments on students’ work. Subsequently, the authors presented their work at in-house workshops in Delhi University and have been working on their papers which they have now finalised on the basis of detailed commentary and suggestions provided by the editor. These chapters form an important part of this volume. In addition to the chapters, all the authors have written brief accounts of their own school experience which have been included in Chapter 8. This collection of essays (except the editor’s contribution) is an effort by next generation

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scholars who have spent research time on fieldwork in schools and writing even though it is not necessarily their main research interest. I am thankful to them for their contribution and for their continuing friendship and intellectual support. Students at the sociology department in the Delhi School of Economics have helped me to think things through better by their earnest quest for understanding and persistent questioning. I thank all of them for enriching my understanding of schools and schooling. I am forever indebted to that doyen of sociology in India, who supervised my own PhD dissertation on the study of a school as a socio-cultural system, Professor T.N. Madan, to whom this book is dedicated. He allowed me to follow my dreams and research questions with complete immersion in a field that was relatively unknown to him. His unobtrusive presence and friendship have been a continuous support in my intellectual life, and I am grateful to him for his comments on a chapter in this volume. I must also thank the anonymous reviewers at SAGE Publications for their thoughtful feedback and Professor Amman Madan and Dr Anuradha Sharma for their insightful comments on some chapters. I spent nine months on a Robert Schuman fellowship at the European University Institute at Florence (2012–2013) where I completed the writing and finalisation of my contributions and this volume as a whole. I thank Professor Philippe Fargues of the Migration Policy Centre for hosting me and providing an excellent environment for intellectual engagement and some quiet time for writing. This situation was sustained by the affectionate care and tender environs for our mother Aruna Thapan provided by Arjun Thapan and Mai Flor in the Philippines. Many thanks to them and to George for being there at all times, ever supportive, providing comfort, warmth and endless sustenance. The schools I have inhabited as a researcher are my other ‘life-worlds’ that give me food for thought and life as a sociologist. I thank them all for allowing me entry and tolerating my presence as an ethnographer in their midst. Above all, it is my interaction with students at these schools that has helped me the most to understand what schooling is all about and I am ever grateful to them for allowing me to engage with them and share their lives at school. Meenakshi Thapan University of Delhi, August 2013

Introduction: Understanding School Experience Meenakshi Thapan

Studying Schools: An Agenda for Research

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n India, sociologists have paid scant attention to what goes on inside schools and classrooms in everyday life contexts. In their effort, rightly stated, to establish the failure of the state in providing equal education for all and the presence of prevalent inequalities that constrain the spread of, and equal access to, good quality education, sociologists have tended to neglect the processes of schooling, in their minutiae, where children and youth engage with one another and their teachers and other school personnel to live out their young lives as participants in a process called education. Understanding this world of everyday life in particular contexts brings into focus what is known as ‘ethnography’ as a ‘deliberate inquiry process guided by a point of view, rather than a reporting process guided by a standard technique or set of techniques, or a totally intuitive process that does not involve reflection’ (Erickson 1984: 51). Ethnography or the ethnographic method is therefore a finely nuanced method of inquiry and of writing about the social in ways that

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remain uncaptured by the recording and analysis of mere empirical information. Essential to the sociology of education in India is an understanding of what constitutes ‘the field’ in contemporary studies of education, especially educational institutions. In a recent survey of the field, Karuna Chanana (2011) emphasises the lack of interest in the sociology of education among Indian sociologists. She reflects on an essay by Professor Damle who lamented that even in the 1960s, research in sociology had ‘still not accepted education as a legitimate concern’ (1967, as cited by Chanana 2011). Although sociology no longer rejects education as a significant research agenda, its practitioners remain few and far between. All departments of sociology in the country still do not have sociology of education as a taught course at either the Masters’ or the MPhil level. This would surely prevent or discourage research in the subject at the doctoral level, and if students do express a research interest in the field of the sociology of education, it is an outcome of their own experience and inclinations.1 Conventionally, there has been a research interest in understanding the factors that disable students to equitably access education, or drop out of school, the gender dynamics in this context, the social backgrounds of teachers, teacher education, the quality of education per se, inequalities of different kinds, the textbooks that are in use and other indicators of the educational process.2 These are all essential aspects of education and need to be understood in the context of schooling in India in order to establish a profile of educational processes in multiple settings.3 Schooling in India is set in vastly different contexts that are dependent on a particular school’s history and setting, institutional goals, location, available infrastructure, linguistic medium of instruction, the relevant school board to which the school is affiliated, the social class of students and the teachers, caste identities and a host of other influencing factors. There are three types of schools in India: government, aided and private (recognised and unrecognised). Those that are run by 1 At the Department of Sociology, University of Delhi, it has been my experience in recent years that students who are enrolled for MA from the B.El.Ed. stream are the most likely to develop a research interest in the sociology of education. 2 See, e.g., Chanana (1988), Karlekar (1988), Wazir (2000), Kumar (2001), VaugierChatterjee (2004), Vittachi and Raghavan (2007), Deshkal Society (2010), Miles and Singal (2010), Velaskar (2010), Nambissan (2011) and Majumdar and Mooij (2011). 3 For a recent understanding of the different approaches to study the school as an organisation, see Chanana (2011).

Introduction

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central, state or local government are referred to as government schools; aided schools are those that are run by private managements but funded by government grant-in-aid; and private schools that receive no aid are referred to as private schools although there is an important subdivision among those that are recognised by the government (i.e., they fulfil certain criteria) or are unrecognised (Kingdon 2005). The most significant distinction between schools is that between the government and private schools. There has been a substantial increase in private schools in recent years as well as a massive growth in the government school system (Desai et al. 2008). This has resulted in a huge heterogeneity in the schooling system in the country as there are vast differences amongst private schools and government schools depending on location, fees charged, availability of resources and infrastructure, teacher qualifications and several other factors. A recent study has found that in rural India, enrolment into school is at high levels, but this is in no way indicative of the fact that learning levels, are equally high. There are over 96 per cent of children in the age group 6–14 years now enrolled in school with largest numbers taking place in private schools. In fact, the study asserts, ‘Since 2009, private school enrolment in rural areas has been rising at an annual rate of about 10 per cent. If this trend continues, by 2018 India will have 50 per cent children in rural areas enrolled in private schools’ (ASER 2013: 47). This does not necessarily mean that as a result of being enrolled in private schools, children have access to improved infrastructure, more committed and conscientious teachers, a more creatively designed curriculum with innovative content and teaching methods, and as a result enhanced learning levels. In fact, according to ASER (2013), learning levels are abysmal in rural India: for example, 67.7 per cent of children enrolled in class III in government schools cannot read class I textbooks and arithmetic learning levels have dropped across schools except in some states in southern India. The survey points out that students who have access to private tuition outside schools show superior learning levels than those who do not have such access (ibid.: 48). These facts point us to the alarming state of primary school education in rural India. With an overt emphasis in government policy to get more and more children into school, increasingly higher figures are reported for enrolment across India, but this does in itself prove that more and more children are receiving education as the dropout rate is still very high especially among girls between the age of 11–14 years (ASER 2013). This scenario is further complicated by the prevalence of a curricular framework that

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has over the years evolved from being a largely colonialist enterprise to one which, though embedded in a colonialist model, seeks to provide quality education for all.4 An important study (Govinda 2011) examines in some depth access to elementary education in India. One chapter in the volume probes the question: ‘Access to what?’ (Juneja 2011) and examines the diversity of schooling experience available at the primary level to children in this country. The author takes a look at the category of formal schools in which she includes government, private, including aided schools, and quasi-government schools. Within each category, there are undoubtedly hierarchies among schools as, for example, among government schools in Delhi. In addition to the existing schools of the Municipal Corporation of Delhi (MCD), the New Delhi Municipal Corporation (NDMC), the Delhi Cantonment Board and the state run government secondary schools, the Government of Delhi has initiated a new category of the Sarvodya Schools where admission is held through a lottery. Similarly, the Pratibha Vikas Vidyalayas have been added where admission to the schools takes place through admission tests. Both kinds of schools are considered much more prestigious than the MCD, NDMC and other schools mentioned above (ibid.: 223ff). Among government schools in Delhi, such schools would be considered elite institutions, relatively speaking, with access to greater resources, facilities and better teachers thus attracting students in larger numbers. Similarly, the popularity of a private school for parents is often judged by the medium of instruction in the school which is an important contributing factor in the life chances that are opened up for students (Juneja 2011: 227). In any case, the option of exercising choice in admission to private fee paying schooling is not open to all who must rely on government schools alone. There are variations in the quality of education provided in private and in government schools, and there has been considerable debate on whether private schools actually offer a 4 The colonial influence on the curricular framework rests in the organisation of the school day according to a British perspective prevalent at the time schooling became westernised in India. Missionary-run schools and other schools established a particular way of conducting the school day that continues to the present: by allocating time to different activities in the curriculum, privileging some subject disciplinary areas over others, an overt emphasis on the English language, the mode of evaluation, the examination and certification system. See Viswanathan (1989) for an understanding of how the English language became a tool for colonial domination. See also Advani (2009). Above all, it is in the impact on the framing of educational objectives for school education in India that a colonialist framework is most obvious; see Krishna Kumar (1991) for an analysis of the ‘homonymy’ between colonialist and nationalist objectives for education in India.

Introduction

5

better learning environment and opportunities for students.5 Although there has been a proliferation of private schools across India, in both rural and urban spaces, there is a need to exercise caution in the assessment of the long-term benefits of private schooling, as opposed to a government school education, as any excessive celebration or denigration of one or the other may result in harmful policy that will affect the educational outcomes of large numbers of students. Understanding access, quality and equity in school education is paramount in any study of schooling in India. However, an understanding of the experience of education in these settings is essential to a broader analysis of the processes in educational systems within which these and other factors work. Life at school, or what goes on within schools, is thus of overriding significance and it is important to understand schools with a focus on the participants in the schooling process: the students, teachers and other participants, and how they engage with the imposed structures in these processes or seek to negotiate, strategise or modify them. The aim is not only to provide thick description of how meaning is produced by a variety of actors in schools, but also to examine the social and political contexts of such meaning-making and the uses of culture by the actors who engage in schooling processes. It is in this sense that Giroux and Simon have argued for understanding ‘schools as sites of struggle and for pedagogy as a form of cultural politics’ (2000: 1541). They recognise that in schools, ‘meaning is produced through the constructions of forms of power, experiences and identities that need to be analyzed for their wider political and cultural significance’ (ibid.). As compared to earlier perspectives that approached meaning-making from a more person-centred symbolic interactionist approach that underplayed agency, such a view asserts that meaning-making is a far more fraught and complex process. We, therefore, need to pay particular attention to the social, political and cultural forces as they shape school experience in different social contexts while simultaneously enabling the agency of students and teachers to remain at the forefront of our analysis. There are diverse ways in which we may pay attention to agency and understand agency in schooling. At one level, agency appears as the obvious effort of students to assert themselves through forms of questioning and rebellion that seek to go against the norms set by the school, challenge school initiatives, school authorities, the curriculum and even 5 See, e.g., Jeffery, Jeffery and Jeffrey (2007), Desai, Dubey, Vanneman and Banerji (2008) and Nambissan (2012).

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their own interpersonal relationships. This is, however, only one level at which agency appears and indicates to us the non-conformity amongst students and their efforts to address their constraining circumstances in enclosed spaces in different ways. At another level, students seek to assert their independence in ways that undermine the efforts at ideological inculcation and indoctrination that appears to be a characteristic phenomenon of all schooling processes. Such forms of agency, that are not always directly expressed but are prevalent in the student culture, have far-reaching consequences as they seek to inform attitudes, perspectives, worldviews and forms of understanding among students. Although these may be influenced by the media, popular cinema and the increasing influence of social networking sites on the Internet, among other things, the influence of the student culture and the impact of peers cannot be undermined. This work, therefore, seeks to examine different kinds of agency as well as the efforts of diverse schools to discipline, regularise, constrain and shape students in particular ways. This volume argues that agency is always present as an aspect of human endeavour to be an engaged participant and that schools walk the tightrope between negotiation with students and downright domination.

Understanding Schools: Students as Engaged Participants in the Creation of School Cultures This book seeks to make a contribution to understand meaning and meaning-making in school processes in India as active aspects of a very vibrant school culture. It is essential to unpack and unravel the rich and engaged world of student culture as it is constructed in school life. The influence of popular culture, the media and aggressive marketing of consumer goods all enter the school arena to compete with the more formal aspects of being at school and contribute to the creation of a unique school culture. At the same time, there are schools where consumerism may not be a driving force due to the lack of economic and social capital among the student body, but the influence of popular culture is nonetheless prevalent. Or that students construct their own idea of what contributory factors create important elements of ‘life’ at school. Gender relations are constituted within the frame of peer relations and the often contradictory, contested and diverse aspects of these relations need to be

Introduction

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uncovered. Religion plays a dominant role especially in schools that are established within a religious framework such as the ubiquitous ‘convent’ schools, madrassas and other such institutions.6 We can see that political and social forces influence not just schools and their functioning but also the lives of teachers and students within schools.7 Thus, for example, the socio-political context of a school’s location in a city like Ahmedabad that experienced severe violence against the Muslim community in 2002 would undoubtedly shape the school’s constitution of itself as specifically focused on the education of Muslim girls. It would also shape the students’ constructions of themselves as young Muslim women and citizens in a changing India. Schools that seek to work with an ‘alternative’ frame do not cater to society as a whole but perhaps, only to particular sections of the society. Nonetheless, their significance as educational institutions where students are captive for even larger parts of the day and night need to be understood not only in terms of their contribution to the creation of a particular ‘person’ and an idea of modernity.8 We need to unravel the processes within such schools that make up the school culture embedded as they are in particular kinds of ethos and heterogeneity of experience.9 This work also asserts the primacy of students’ voices in the meaningmaking processes within schools. We, therefore, are unable to accept the view that children are passive or mute participants in schools that seek to crush their personalities, dreams and aspirations. Froerer (2007), for example, has examined the relationship between Hindu nationalist ideology and the disciplinary practices of the Saraswati Shishu Mandir Primary School in Chhattisgarh in central India. Her work emphasises the overriding aspirations of children who value educational success and a career over creating a Hindu rashtra. Students, even young children, are not silent or passive participants in the process of being moulded into good citizens. In the end, to be schooled is to be good and thereby capable of attracting the right kind of attention for educational accomplishment and upward mobility. It is therefore important to let students speak for themselves and ethnographers need to listen to these voices carefully in order to distinguish students’ aspirations and perspectives from what See the work of Winkelmann (2005), in this context. The works of Velaskar (2010) and Nambissan (2011) have provided an in-depth understanding of the social contexts of inequality that prevail in schools. 8 See the work of Srivastava (1998) for example. 9 See Thapan (1991/2006) and MacDougall (1997/2000, 2004/2005, 2005, 2005/2007, 2008). 6 7

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might appear to the observer to be the ‘right’ observation to make or the ‘obvious’ conclusion to arrive at. In other words, the ethnographer’s ability to listen, to observe and to faithfully record, without prejudice, is crucial to the process of school ethnographies. Studying schools is therefore not an easy task, where untrained ethnographers provide detailed summaries of activities and may conclude they are providing an ‘ethnography’. They are in fact providing reportage in some detail. Good ethnography requires more than mere qualitative descriptions; it ‘demands analyses that are methodic and self-conscious enough to reveal the hidden systematics of daily demands and desires’ (McDermott and Raley 2011). It is to be continually present as an ethnographer, even in your absence, to be aware of the nuances of each interaction, of the inflections that underlie all conversations, said and unsaid, between different stakeholders in schooling processes, of the embodied gestures, gaze and expressions of all participants, the multiplicity of opinions and undercurrents of unequal relations, of the stark poverty, both material and intellectual, that stare you in the face and also of your own role as an ethnographer in their midst.10 Schools are spaces where identities are fluid, made and unmade over innumerable times. The formal aspects of schooling no doubt influence these informal and fluid kind of relationships, but they are constituted essentially in the peer group which is one of the most significant aspects of all encounters in school. Students feel at home in school if they are accepted members of the peer group, comprehend the peer culture and are able to engage with one another on what appears to be equal terms. They quickly learn to master the art of inclusion and ‘fit in’ to appropriate an acceptable way of being. Being at the heart of the student culture is most effective way of knowing for a student that he/she is not out of place. At the same time, the focus of this book is not on student culture alone. There is an effort to understand the significant role of teachers and their perspectives in the construction of the school world, as it were. The extent to which teachers are constrained by the official curriculum, school rules and the ways in which they seek to liberate themselves from these constraints and arrive at a more liberal and less disciplinary attitude, is reflected in these studies of very different kinds of schools. Teachers’ somewhat dismissive and openly casteist and derogatory 10 The fascinating and delicately nuanced work of David MacDougall (1997/2000, 2004/2005, 2005, 2005/2007, 2008) immediately comes to mind for its creativity, attention to detail and complete immersion in the field as an ethnographer.

Introduction

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attitude towards students from underprivileged backgrounds is also considered. The aspect of schooling that develops young students into ‘good’ citizens of India is another aspect examined in several chapters in this collection. Schools have always played a significant role in this process of socialisation and it is important to understand how schools contribute to, and develop, a sense of citizenship through ritual ways of inculcating belonging and patriotism among students. Benei’s study (2009) focuses on the relationship between ‘ideas’ and schooling in the context of developing an emotional and visceral bonding to ‘the nation’ and thereby building a form of ‘banal nationalism’ among young children. Focussing on schools in western Maharashtra, Benei locates her argument in a framework that celebrates the ‘emotional and embodied production of the political’ (ibid.: 5, emphasis in original). Through finely nuanced ethnography, and a focus on the multitude of practices that constitute everyday experience of school life, whether it is drawing, singing, play and school work, Benei constructs an engaging and engrossing world of how students are transformed into citizens through school life, teacher utterances and familial beliefs and values. In Benei’s work, replete with students’ voices, and detailed description of school activities, in the historical context of Maratha imagination about self and the Muslim other, there is a sense in which the student emerges as a citizen who is constructed by others.11 At the same time, students are not passive actors and engage with, and construct, the world as much as they are constrained by it through ‘discipline’ and ‘rules’. Some of this ground in the vast field of schools and schooling in contemporary India is covered in the chapters in this collection. The focus is on schools that represent different perspectives on schooling as well as on the processes within them. There is a particular emphasis in understanding schooling experience as it impacts students through their engagement with teachers and peers, and with various activities and events as they unfold in their daily life in the institution. The role of the media and popular culture in influencing their attitude towards their identities as young citizens and representatives of a particular kind of youth culture is described and analysed. The roles of religion, gender and prevailing social and political forces, as categories that shape student activity, are examined in some depth. Although students are privileged 11 Cf. with Maira’s ethnography among Muslim youth in the U.S. post-9/11 and her development of the concept of ‘dissenting citizenship’ as it emerges through the voices of students. See Maira (2009).

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in these chapters, the institutional processes of citizen making that are central to life at school are also examined. It is apparent that the institutional status of government schools lends a certain edge to the experience of student life as compared to students in the private schools. This is necessarily a result of the capital they have access to and the uses they can make of it and are evident in their expectations and perspectives. Similarly, more privileged children have access to a world of consumer culture including the media, which undoubtedly influences their schooling experience. It is crucial to point out immediately that there is no homogeneity in forms of interaction in school as these do not take place on an even or equal plane. They exist at the intersections of caste, class, religion and gender; linguistic and regional variations add to the complexity of school exchanges. Age and discipline (subject) centred hierarchies are other existing forms of the pecking order prevalent among teachers and are in turn reflected onto the students. Among students, and prevalent in the peer culture, are relationships embedded in a host of variables that emerge from memory and social conditioning, caste and linguistic affiliations, gender stereotypes, among other things. How are these expressed in the everyday settings of schools? What forms of negotiation and contestation prevail in different settings? How do students seek to maximise their gains and attain their goals? Do teachers merely transact the curriculum or do they also contribute to the complex experience of being a student in multiple, undocumented and invisible ways? What forms of identities take shape in different contexts? How do young people take on identities much as they simultaneously make them? Although the chapters in this volume do not answer all the questions we may pose, they seek to uncover the veils of the multifaceted, unique and fascinating world of life at school, in its movement of relationships, identities and ways of being. At the same time, this work does not seek to focus on any one social or cultural factor to the exclusion of others. We, therefore, do not examine how gender alone is significant to schooling processes inasmuch as we do not emphasise the role of the media alone in shaping student cultures. The effort is to understand the diversity of schooling on the basis of the studies conducted in some selected schools in Delhi, Ahmedabad and rural Andhra Pradesh. A final contribution to this volume seeks to emphasise the significance of autobiographical experience in both the writing of school ethnographies and in understanding school life. Autobiographical experiences of schooling are important as a genre as they bring out the relationship

Introduction

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between childhood and institutions in a far more intimate manner than formal sociological studies ever can. Andre Beteille’s experience of being a student in a boarding school is replete with anecdotes, poignant, witty and full of invaluable detail, about being away from home in an alien setting, a school run by Christian brothers for Anglo-Indian children in Patna (Beteille 2005).12 The personal account of life at school emphasises in sharp detail what sociological studies often fail to capture: the voice of the experiencing, feeling, often bewildered and somewhat fearful human subject. Such narratives provide rich descriptive accounts of what children think and feel while at school which is not necessarily always how sociologists ‘think’ they do in their explanations of schools and the people in them. Through the voices of children in school, and their memory, as adults, of that experience as well as the visual ethnography of MacDougall, for example, we are reminded that students, in any kind of school, are engaged participants in schooling processes. They construct their school worlds as much as they are constituted by them. They shape their identities and destinies as much as schooling seeks to harness their potential and project their trajectories for them. Some may gain from such participation, some may lose, some lives may be transformed, others may remain unchanged but they remain central to our understanding of the experience of schooling.

Writing Schools: Ethnographies of Schooling In a little remembered book (Kumar 1993), Marjorie Sykes makes a remarkably simple point: that education through the ages has been varied to meet the needs of different kinds of social existence but three elements have remained constant. These are, ‘a teacher, a learner, and some thing, some object, skill in dealing with which is the focus of their common interest’ (Sykes 1993: xxv). This ‘triangle of learning’ has passed on from one generation to the next over the centuries in vastly different contexts. This volume of chapters seeks to document some social aspects of what goes on in this basic triangle of learning within the institutional settings of schools. The emphasis in this book is on the people who inhabit 12 See Krishna Kumar (1999) for a short review of Jan and Rumer Godden’s autobiographical piece on schooling. See also Karlekar and Mukherjee (2010) for essays on childhood in India that contain excellent and varied accounts of school experience.

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these institutions, the structures that seek to contain or mould them, the complex and hugely engaging responses of students and teachers and the overall ambience within which school worlds are created and exist as worlds. There is a careful distance from the textbooks that prevail in such institutions as unlike other scholars who stress the sacredness of textbooks in schools, I seek to emphasise, like Marjorie Sykes, that ‘books have played only a minor part in the nurture of the young’ (Sykes 1993: xxv). Textbooks are not sacrosanct to the young in school; students understand that they have to be mastered for purposes of evaluation and discarded soon after, as only one aspect of a life at school that encompasses more than mere written or oral knowledge. It is the exciting world of exchanges and interactions, of challenges and defeat, of submission and rebellion, of discipline and freedom, and much more, that the chapters in this volume seek to capture. It is the world of the everyday, in the vast terrain of the variety of educational institutions in India, that these studies provide vignettes of some selected schools. It has not been possible to cover all kinds of schools and limitations of access and availability have restricted our focus to a few schools only: five in Delhi (three private, two government) and one each in Ahmedabad (a few aided Muslim Trust schools) and in Chittoor District in Andhra Pradesh (a private school run by the Krishnamurti Foundation, India).13 The first chapter by Anuradha Sharma is based on fieldwork in a co-educational, private school for underprivileged children in East Delhi. The chapter begins with a succinct consideration of the ethnographic method in the context of schooling and provides a framework that may well apply to all the chapters that follow. Drawing on extant literature and examples from school studies, Sharma points to the significance of the peer group in the student culture. Her chapter examines some aspects of peer relations among the students, in the course of schooling, and reveals not only the negotiations that the students undertake in relation to school rules and authority but also reflect the gender conceptualisations that the students adhere to in a significant manner through these relations. Peer relations constitute an informal but significant part of school experience, especially for the students. These are meaningful not just in their capacity to influence the formal aspects of schooling to some extent, but, in this case, these emerge as a site of gender-based social performatives in their multitude. Peer relations have links with the 13 The school in southern India is a residential school, earlier studied by Thapan (1991/2006).

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various formal and non-formal elements of schooling such as teacher– student relationships, discipline, negotiation of school rules, gender conceptualisations, friendships, normative behaviour, significance of play, the extra-curricular and so on. From the more immediate, local concerns to larger social conceptualisations, peer relations address a range of issues and Sharma’s analysis of schools is enriched by looking into this aspect of school experience. The ethnographic method facilitates this kind of nuanced study of events by focussing on everyday events and interactions. The gestures, intonations, the casual hints and gestures, as well as the settings, lend meaning to a situation and bring to the fore the not so readily apparent meanings of the situation. The second chapter by Maitrayee Deka seeks to understand a private school run by an educational society in Delhi that tries to establish a particular idea of being Indian through its emphasis on ‘Indian’ culture and heritage and forms of discipline and control. The student culture, however, deals with this effort in its own way, submitting, creating and constructing its own reality within a well-defined and articulated school ethos. Deka’s chapter, therefore, attempts to examine the processes through which a particular school tends to define itself through its principles and the extent to which these principles are contested or adhered to by the students through various practices. The multiple ways in which the principles of the school are interpreted and negotiated by the students create a gap in the way in which the school is imagined by the authorities and by the students. The lacuna between ideals and actual practices in the school cannot be seen as the feature of an anomaly as a distinct product of the school nonetheless emerges through the multiplicity. The school is deeply influenced at the official level by the Founding Society which has established the school with a distinct idea in mind: that of disciplining the body and the soul of the student through the process of formal education. In addition, the idea of an ‘Indian’ citizen in the school is associated with a person who is aware about, and respectful towards, Indian culture and tradition. This ideational figure is aimed for by the formal structures and processes in the school. Frugality, humility, spiritual knowledge and cultural symbols of ‘Indian-ness’ like classical dance and songs are some of the idioms through which Indian heritage is expected to be reproduced by the students. At a given point in time any school is also part of the larger society. The diversity that the student population brings into school has a lot to do with the influences coming in from their socio-economic backgrounds and the media. At the individual and collective levels, the students negotiate with the principles

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of the school. This is due to their immediate reality and the value system that they have been a part of which interprets citizenship and consumption practices not in an absolute sense but as a way of becoming. There is either a complete acceptance or rejection of the norms of the school by particular groups of students, while others might adapt principles in a modified way. The frame of principles even though contested at different levels does not disappear as the students are seen to rationalise various issues of Indian tradition, citizenship and consumption through the larger ideals upheld by the school. The chapter tries to draw the linkages between school principles, the larger social environment and the perceptions of the students. It strives to capture the phenomena of ordered multiplicity through certain anchoring points such as the ideals of the school, the backgrounds of the students, gender norms and a pervasive global media-scape. The communicable axes create a definable product particular to the specific school. Anannya Gogoi focuses on a Sarvodya school in Delhi and provides an understanding of this particular genre of schools with an emphasis on practices in the school that seek to develop citizenship ideals among students in a particular setting. Gogoi argues that India is a vibrant cosmos of institutions which coexist and function together in spite of their heterogeneous nature. The educational institutions depict this heterogeneity right from the level of play schools and kindergartens. Each school caters to a different section of the population although not in an exclusive way. Gogoi’s chapter is a sociological narrative of a government school wherein an attempt has been made to analyse the unique nature of the school and locate it within the larger rhetoric of the state initiative to provide a nationalist character to the school as well as its students. The school is seen as a part of a larger chain of Sarvodaya schools spread all over India with a similar ideology behind their birth and continuance. Gogoi views the school as not only a repository of teachers who impart knowledge according to designated syllabi, but also an arena for the creation and recreation of a holistic process of socialisation for everyone in the institution. Both the formal teaching–learning process and the informal culture of teachers and students are observed and presented. The chapter emphasises citizenship education as well as the consumer culture of the students along with peer relations and the practice of formal and informal rituals in the process of learning. These are framed in light of the socio-economic backgrounds of the students and teachers in the school. The continuity of the school’s ideology and its effort to cope with the competition provided by private schools and other government

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schools in the vicinity is represented through the practice of rituals, disciplinary measures as well as the perceptions of teachers and students. The significance of these perceptions lies in the construction of individual and group identities and in the interactive processes among these groups. The next chapter by Meenakshi Thapan examines the relationship between schooling, identity and citizenship in a government school in North Delhi and in schools run by Muslim trusts in Ahmedabad. My chapter draws out the significant difference between schools’ efforts to instil specific ideals of citizenship and the students’ constructions of the same. This difference is an outcome of an active student culture in, for example, the government school that offers a dissenting view of citizenship in no uncertain terms. Moreover, pedagogic encounters in the school contribute to the experience of difference and emphasise a marked sense of what it means to be an Indian in contemporary India. Through thick description of classroom activities and the teacher’s role in inculcating particular ideas about identity, we may understand how the peer culture uses or rejects the school’s ideas based on stereotypes prevalent in the student body. I am also concerned with the ways in which minority institutions, such as schools run by Muslim trusts, articulate and conduct citizenship education in a city like Ahmedabad that has witnessed communal riots periodically and horrific violence against the Muslim community in 2002. The chapter, therefore, examines the relationship between schooling, citizenship and identity in the complex, multi-layered and pluri-vocal processes and settings that characterise schooling in contemporary, urban India. It seeks to understand the ‘idea’ of citizenship that is sought to be inculcated through citizenship education in our schools, the manner in which classroom encounters take place and processes of communication within them. I view citizenship not as a legal status but as a social process that leads to the production of values concerning freedom and autonomy, as well as those that construct students’ perceptions of their relationship to society. In addition, preparing students to frame and understand questions of justice and morality is central to my understanding of citizenship education. It is not enough, I argue, for students to be concerned about their rights and duties in an environment that emphasises loyalty, obedience and sacrifice as central to ‘good’ citizenship. It is quite clear, however, that the school environment is not constructed by the official discourse alone but is simultaneously constructed and subverted by students who seek to bring their meanings to the situation. Based on fieldwork, I am concerned with how

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citizenship ideals are formulated, evolved, negotiated and expressed in the everyday lives of schools. Parul Bhandari’s contribution focuses on the religious identity that a ‘convent’ school in Delhi seeks to instil in its students and that forms the frame within which not only school goals are articulated but also the basis on which teacher differentiation among student rests. This creates a particular ethos within which the student culture is experienced and expressed. Bhandari provides a detailed analysis, based on rich data, on the workings of the school in these contexts. This chapter is an ethnography of an all girls’ Christian school and explores the topics of education, citizenship, religion, identity and peer culture. The three most important themes are, first, the inextricable link between religious identity and education and ways in which a religious minority school imparts citizenship education to its students who belong to various religious groups. An attempt is then made to understand the issues that the organisation relegates to the background and those that it emphasises as its responsibility and the intended or unintended ways in which the students receive this. Second, the chapter examines the concomitant existence of formal and informal structures, that is, ways in which the students as well as the academic staff negotiate with the goals and functioning of the school and its subsequent effect on notions of identity and citizenship. Third, the chapter foregrounds student culture within the school, that is, ways in which students are influenced by the school’s religious identity, the social class and religious backgrounds of other students, media and other factors in managing their group dynamics and developing their own identity as opposed to the ‘other’. This chapter by undertaking an analysis of these themes raises important research questions in the field of sociology of education, more specifically, in the realm of the interplay of religion and citizenship and the influence of class, status and media on young minds. The chapter by Tanya Matthan, Chandana Anusha and Meenakshi Thapan is based on a study of an aided secondary school for Muslim girls run by a trust for the education of Muslim girls in Ahmedabad. Being Muslim bestows a marked identity on the students who experience themselves in this duality of being Muslim (in Gujarat) and ‘other’ (and thereby excluded and/or marginalised) but nonetheless a part of the larger identity of being Indian. Becoming a citizen in this sense is therefore a fraught process, mediated by religious identity, shaped by a troubled relationship between citizen and state, and is based on a uneasy past and an uncertain future. The chapter explores the processes and

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activities in the school that frame the experience of growing up as a Muslim girl in Ahmedabad. Bhavya Dore’s chapter provides a detailed account of the processes and activities based on observation and interviews with students in the school that is well known as an alternative school with a difference. Her chapter is based on a study of the Rishi Valley School (RV) in rural Andhra Pradesh that upends perceived norms of the Indian education system while simultaneously submitting to it. Similarly, students at the school follow ‘careers’ of both discipline and resistance. Student culture is a function of several intersecting factors where ‘city’ values and ‘RV values’ alternate in the resistance/discipline paradigm. In the final analysis, fissures within the student community and between the student and teacher communities are resolved through the celebration of a self-fashioned RV community posited against a perceived mainstream. This is largely achieved through the ‘bubble effect’: an idea of selfcontainment created through distinctive rituals, language, shared histories and realised in the very real spatial distance from the outside world that creates and reinforces the uniqueness of the culture. Several strains make up a distinctive student culture where resistance/subsumption varies depending on the context. Clothes, brand consciousness, gender relations, attitudes to the environment—each of these and others, become points around which to rally for students—both to resist official school policy and to use it against each other. Simultaneously, ‘coolness’ is both redefined and upended, especially in the movement towards the idea of a redemptive, all-encompassing RV culture. Such an idealistic notion is created through different parameters: a shared argot, shared spaces and a unique geography, the school’s history/philosophy and sets of rituals and practices. The last chapter attempts to focus on school experience through autobiographical writing taking up some issues raised by the authors of the chapters in this volume. The emphasis in this chapter is on drawing out the perceptions, images and experience of schooling as these are articulated through memory. There is no doubt an awareness of the written medium, as much as that of remembered pasts, in the several examples that prevail in this chapter. At the same time, there is an effort to keep one’s remembered experience at bay in case it influences our ‘objective’ understanding of reality. This chapter seeks to unpack the meaning of schooling through personal experience, memory and the ethnographer’s voice.

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References Advani, Shalini. 2009. Schooling the National Imagination. Education, English and the Indian Modern. Oxford, California, Delhi: Oxford University Press. ASER. 2013. Annual Status of Education Report (Rural) for 2012. New Delhi: Pratham. Benei, Veronique. 2009. Schooling India. Hindus, Muslims and the Forging of Citizens. New Delhi: Permanent Black. Beteille, Andre. 2005. ‘Boarding School’, in First Proof. The Penguin Book of New Writing from India I, pp. 169–200. New Delhi: Penguin Books. Chanana, Karuna. 1988. Socialisation, Education and Women. Explorations in Gender Identity. New Delhi: Orient Longman Ltd. ———. 2011. ‘The Sociologies of Education’, in Yogendra Singh (ed.), Schooling Stratification and Inclusion. Some Reflections on the Sociology of Education in India, pp. 34–80. Delhi: NCERT. Desai, Sonalde, Amaresh Dubey, Reeve Vanneman and Rukmini Banerji. 2008. Private Schooling in India: A New Educational Landscape. India Human Development Survey. Working Paper Number 11. NCAER, University of Maryland: 1–58. Deshkal Society. 2010. National Report on Inclusive Classrooms, Social Inclusion/ Exclusion and Diversity. Delhi: Deshkal Publications with support from UNICEF. Erickson, Frederik. 1984. ‘What Makes School Ethnography “Ethnographic”?’ Anthropology and Education Quarterly, 15: 51–66. Froerer, Peggy. 2007. ‘Disciplining the Saffron Way: Moral Education and the Hindu Rashtra’. Modern Asian Studies, 41 (5): 1033–1071. Giroux, H.A. and R.I. Simon. 2000. ‘Schooling, Popular Culture, and a Pedagogy of Possibility’, in Stephen Ball (ed.), Sociology of Education. Major Themes. Volume III. Institutions and Processes, pp. 1540–1557. London, New York: Routledge, Falmer. Govinda, R. (ed.). 2011. Who goes to School? Exploring Exclusion in Indian Education. Delhi: Oxford University Press. Jeffery, Roger, Patricia Jeffery and Craig Jeffrey. 2007. ‘The Privatization of Secondary Schooling in Bijnor: A Crumbling Welfare State?’, in K. Kumar and J. Oesterheld (eds), Education and Social Change in South Asia, pp. 442–474. New Delhi: Orient Longman. Juneja, Nalini. 2011. ‘Access to What? Diversity and Participation’, in R. Govinda (ed.), Who Goes to School? Exploring Exclusion in Indian Education, pp. 205–237. Delhi: Oxford University Press. Karlekar, Malavika. 1988. ‘Women’s Nature and the Access to Education’, in K. Chanana (ed.), Socialisation, Education and Women: Explorations in Gender Identity, pp. 129–165. New Delhi: Orient Longman Ltd.

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Karlekar, Malavika and R. Mukherjee (eds). 2010. Remembered Childhood. Essays in Honour of Andre Beteille. Delhi: Oxford University Press. Kingdon, Geeta Gandhi. 2005. ‘Private and Public Schooling: The Indian Experience’. Available online at http://www.hks.harvard.edu/pepg/PDF/events/ MPSPE/PEPG-05-15geeta.pdf (accessed on 23 December 2013). Kumar, Krishna. (ed.). 1993. Democracy and Education in India. New Delhi: Radiant Publishers (under the auspices of the Nehru Memorial Museum and Library). ———. 1991. Political Agenda of Education. A Study of Colonialist and Nationalist Ideas. New Delhi, Newbury Park, London: SAGE. ———. 1999. ‘Children and Adults. Reading an Autobiography’, in T.S. Saraswati (ed.), Culture, Socialization and Human Development, pp. 45–61. New Delhi, Thousand Oaks, London: SAGE. ———. 2001. Prejudice and Pride: School Histories of the Freedom Struggle in India and Pakistan. New Delhi: Penguin Books. MacDougall, David. 1997/2000. Doon School Chronicles, Centre for CrossCultural Research, Australian National University, 143 minutes. ———. 2004/2005. Some Alien Creatures. Rishi Valley Education Centre & Centre for Cross-Cultural Research, Australian National University, 74 minutes. ———. 2005. ‘Doon School Aesthetics’, in R. Chopra and P. Jeffery (eds), Educational Regimes in Contemporary India, pp. 121–140. New Delhi, Thousand Oaks, London: SAGE. ———. 2005/2007. Schoolscapes. Fieldwork Films & Centre for Cross-Cultural Research, Australian National University, 77 minutes. ———. 2008. Gandhi’s Children. Australian National University, 185 minutes. Maira, Sunaira. 2009. Missing Youth, Citizenship, and Empire after 9/11. Durham, North Carolina: Duke University Press. Majumdar, Manabi and J. Mooij. 2011. Education and Inequality in India. A Classroom View. Abingdon, New York: Routledge. McDermott, Ray and J. D. Raley. 2011. ‘The Ethnography of Schooling Writ Large 1955–2010’, in Bradley A. Levinson and M. Pollock (eds), A Companion to the Anthropology of Education, pp. 34–49. Chichester: Wiley-Blackwell. Miles, Susie and N. Singhal. 2010. ‘The Education for All and Inclusive Education Debate: Conflict, Contradiction or Opportunity?’, International Journal of Inclusive Education, 14 (1): 1–15. Nambissan, Geetha. 2011. ‘Education of Tribal Children in India: Sociological Perspectives’, in Yogendra Singh (ed.), Schooling Stratification and Inclusion, Some Reflections on the Sociology of Education in India. Delhi: NCERT. ———. 2012. ‘Private Schools for the Poor: Business as Usual?’, Economic and Political Weekly, XLVII (41), 13 October: 47–58. Srivastava, Sanjay. 1998. Constructing ‘Post-Colonial’ India: National Character and the Doon School. New York, NY: Routledge, Taylor and Francis.

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Sykes, Marjorie. 1993. ‘Keynote Address’, in Krishna Kumar (ed.), Democracy and Education in India, pp. xxiv–xxvii. New Delhi: Nehru Memorial Museum and Library. Thapan, Meenakshi. 1991/2006. Life at School: An Ethnographic Study, 2nd edition. Delhi: Oxford University Press. Vaugier-Chatterjee, Anne (ed.). 2004. Education and Democracy in India. New Delhi: Manohar and Centre for Human Sciences. Velaskar, Padma. 2010. ‘Quality and Inequality in Indian Education: Some Critical Policy Concerns’, Contemporary Education Dialogue, 7 (1): 58–93. Viswanathan, Gauri. 1989. Masks of Conquest: Literary Study and British Rule in India. London: Faber and Faber. Vittachi, Sarojini and Neerja Raghavan (eds). 2007. Alternative Schooling in India. New Delhi, London, Thousand Oaks, CA: SAGE. Wazir, Rekha (ed.). 2000. The Gender Gap in Basic Education. NGOs as Change Agents. New Delhi, Thousand Oaks, London: SAGE. Winkelmann, Mareike Jule. 2005. ‘From Behind the Curtain’: A Study of a Girls’ Madrasa in India. Leiden: Amsterdam University Press.

1

Negotiating School and Gender: Peer Performatives Anuradha Sharma

S

chools have been associated with learning and tutoring in a primarily pedagogical sense. The nature of what is learnt, however, goes beyond formal schooling and its plan. Within schools, the informal aspects of school life play a very significant role in defining the meaning of school to its students. This chapter examines some dimensions of school experience with a special focus on peer cultures in a school.1 Peer relations and peer contexts not only mediate schooling but also emerge as a site 1 This fieldwork was primarily conducted as part of the doctoral dissertation that I was enrolled for at the Department of Sociology, Delhi School of Economics. I conducted the fieldwork in 2009–2010. The co-educational day school selected for the fieldwork is an afternoon shift free school for economically weaker children that is being run by the trust that runs a public school in its morning shift. During school visits, I mostly relied on classroom observations and informal interactions and observation of students’ activities, behaviour, expressions in non-classroom settings as well. Informal interactions with the teachers and the students worked well in this setting while getting access to more formal records was less easy, though not impossible. The other sources that proved very helpful were the open-ended questionnaires. The students were much more articulate when they filled responses (open-ended; one word response; multiple ways of asking about the same query) than when they were interviewed formally.

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of gender conceptualisations. An ethnographic study of the school not just brings out the nuanced working of school in its various settings, but actualises the often scripted strengths of this particular method.

The Ethnographic Method Basically, ethnographic studies of social phenomena address a methodological concern that involves the issue of objectivity/subjectivity. It redefines both and offers a repositioning of the same. The assumption that a reality exists out there and needs to be observed carefully has been questioned. The ethnographic endeavours guided by this approach believe that reality is not available outside a certain subject position; that it is in interactions that reality is known and expressed (to some extent); reality can be mapped through certain themes and it is futile to look for a ‘complete’ reality. One can aspire to observe a ‘whole’ reality, i.e., a social site can be observed and understood in its network of relationships of contexts, but the picture is never complete for the observer because of the limitations of interest and concern. Paul Willis (2000) in The Ethnographic Imagination has outlined some of the most central concerns that the ethnographic method addresses. The ‘lived dynamics’ of ‘everyday culture’ (Willis 2000: 2) are organised in different time frames and with different agendas or motives; their nature changes with contingent contexts and situations. This lived culture expresses itself not just in language but also through other forms of embodiment like gestures, self-presentations and various meaning-making techniques. There are personal assumptions, materials, institutional elements through which human subjects constitute realities; the ethnographer through his/her presence gets access to the cultural practices that are mobilised while the subjects live their lives. Primacy is given to their views, their meanings and their stories, however the questions are the ethnographer’s; at the same time, physical presence in the field should not encourage the ethnographer to feel that now they can know it ‘all’. The idea is that one goes to the field with certain assumptions which may get strengthened, reversed, shifted in a novel way or something else. ‘Knowing’ as a prerogative of the ethnographer is put in a perspective through this unexpected content that the field may bring up. ‘Knowing’, in another way, founded on a theoretical perspective, which constantly guides the findings of the fieldwork, is so

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important. The search should not be for ‘the meaning’ of things, but for a scope of their possible meanings for the subjects as they express it and also as they act in it. It is a complex exercise, but essential. The socio-symbolic perspective presented by Willis (2000) has a poststructural orientation as well. Bronwyn Davies’ study of discursive practices in school settings (Davies 2004: 128) gives a distinct format to the emergence of subjectivity in relation to the contexts. The post-structuralist paradigm has been identified as proclaiming that individuals are not fixed products of a socially constructive exercise but is again and again constituted in the discursive practices that they participate in.2 Davies has used this paradigm to focus on the processes or discursive practices through which identity emerges and re-emerges in school settings. It involves learning the meanings of various categories available for creating an identity, through ‘storylines’. ‘Persons as speakers acquire beliefs about themselves which do not necessarily form a uniform coherent whole. They shift from one to another way of thinking about themselves as the discourse shifts and as their positions within varying storylines are taken up’ (Davies and Harre 2001). Taking up or not taking up a discursive practice shapes our identity. ‘Images, metaphors, narrative structures, terms of address, teaching practices’ all have a strong role to play in creating various discourses which when appropriated by the pupils, shape their identity (Davies 2004: 137). They are not passive recipients of what the school has to offer them, they already have ‘a personal baggage of images and metaphors based on their own experience of being positioned within many and contradictory discursive practices that they have encountered’ (ibid.: 138). Willis has also drawn attention to the significance of the non-literal, figurative meanings present in language practices in the form of metaphors, stories, jokes; he also puts a premium on the symbolic meaning and symbolic usage of objects and artefacts and body expressions in a social set-up. So what the subjects say is important but the form that expression takes and the expressive value of the non-verbal language are sometimes more important. Sometimes these are the opportunities where the agent/subject has possibilities for the transgression of the structural order. G.E. Marcus (1995) understood ethnography to be an exercise that is about cultural translation where a complete interpretation is never 2

See Weedon (1987) for an exposition of the post-structuralist perspective.

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accomplished. And ethnographies need to be ‘multi-sited’ (Marcus 1995: 83), i.e., they need to study their subjects through several modes. Marcus recommends respecting the boundaries recognising the specific sitedness of the field but calls for a multi-site imaginary. The ‘spatiality’, ‘temporality’ and the ‘perspective’ that used to be fixed in their references and were believed to be having a reality in them that needs to be observed unobtrusively by the ethnographer in the field have been reworked through the more radical ethnographic orientations. These radical ethnographic practices do not restrict the spatial to the locale of the social phenomena or to the local frame but extend it to include other connected locales, including spatial intervention through the electronic media. Temporally, the shift is from the focus on historical to historical narrative, i.e., that part which is created in memory and is considered a source of identity formation. Here also the impact of the electronic invasion is significant. Everyday life is characterised by linguistic accounts of all kinds where people talk about that happened, they analyse each other’s intentions, attitudes, responses, abilities, etc., more so when ‘some kind of misalignment is perceived between values, rules or normal expectations and the actual course of events’ (Hewitt and Strokes as quoted in Hammersley and Atkinson 1995: 126). Categorisation of people or actions happens during such discourses; this can prove to be a useful source of evidence about ‘the perspectives, concerns and discursive practices of the people who produce them’ (ibid.: 127). The nature and the form of discursive practices can also help in drawing attention towards certain cultural codes present in a situation, and often these have links with larger contexts. The school processes themselves are repositories of various kinds of cultural codes at their most basic level, i.e., why certain practices exist in schools, those intentions have a certain basic assumption built in them, for instance classroom teaching is meant to expose the students to a formal procedure of knowledge transmission and a certain social etiquette of listening, sitting quietly, paying attention, responding appropriately and so on; punishment regimes are meant to correct the discipline benders; uniforms, seating arrangements, punctuality, tidiness are meant to instil discipline; extra-curricular activities are meant to be the arenas for creativity, cooperation and competition (Jeffrey 2005). These are the patterns through which the intended cultural impacts materialise, so these are some routes that are significant for research in schools. The unstructured practices

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that move along these routes are also important to observe as these carry significant constitutive energies. For instance, the spatial praxis of classrooms, corridors, playgrounds and stage can be significant to observe who ‘fools around’ more in the classroom; who answers the teacher’s questions; who sits dazed; who engages in what sorts of stage performances; the students’ activities and behaviour in the non-formal spaces of the school; all these may have clues in them that could point towards forms of identity formations. The school selected for this study is a private, co-educational school situated in an urban neighbourhood in East Delhi. It is a separate wing for underprivileged children, henceforth called the Pratyantar School, run in the after hours of the main school. It is a charitable endeavour on the part of the main school that is run by a private trust. The main School, as it would be addressed from now on, was established in the late 1980s and is managed by a private trust owned by a private sector company. It is an established, well-known school in that part of the city. The special wing, i.e., the Pratyantar School was started a decade later. It is a philanthropic endeavour as far as the official rationale goes. It caters to children from the economically underprivileged section, residing in the nearby areas and aims at providing them with presumably better education. It is a novel attempt in a way although the school does not proclaim to be providing an ‘alternative schooling’ in a radical manner. It goes a little beyond the recent drive to grant admissions to a small percentage of students from the EWS category, i.e., the economically weaker section, in the private schools. It is also a precursor to the RTE (Right to Education) (ACT)3 which has made it mandatory for all private schools to reserve 25 per cent of its seats for EWS category students. It dedicates a complete wing, named the Pratyantar School, to such students till the VIII standard and then on promises to admit them to the main school. The school charges no fees from these students, provides free textbooks, stationery, uniforms and lunch to its students in this wing. Education is imparted in the English language, primarily, to about 250 students. How these distinctions of home and school, in this case, interact with each other with implications for students’ identities on the one hand and processes of schooling on another, would need to be observed in the everyday life of the school.

3

See http://righttoeducation.in/ (accessed on 8 November 2013).

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Peer Culture in School A very significant aspect of schooling as a social experience and practice is the relationships students have with their peers in the school. At the most palpable level for the students themselves ‘having one friend, a circle of friends, groups to talk to … makes life more manageable ... For students, having or finding a friend reduces the chaos of the school’ (Gordon et al. 2000: 111). Considering that students spend much of their significant social time in schools, friendships or peer connections there ‘provide children with a means of entertainment, a source of feedback, a feeling of belonging, and a foundation of identity’ (Underwood 2008: 115). Unlike other school processes, this aspect of schooling is mostly informal, i.e., the school’s agenda of educating and training its students in a certain medium (language), a fixed curriculum, the routine practices, the timetable and calendar of school activities are all laid out formally. The space of peer relations, though not totally out of the control of the school authorities, is nevertheless a largely informal space where students apply their criteria and rules of interaction and membership. William A. Corsaro (2005) situates peer relations within this space of the personal and the public. ‘[Peers are a] … group of children who spend time together on an everyday basis…. [I]t is through collective production of and participation in routines that children’s evolving membership in both their peer cultures and the adult world are situated’ (Corsaro 2005: 110). In an earlier work, Corsaro and Eder (1990) define peer culture as a ‘set of activities or routines, artefacts, values and concerns that children produce and share in interaction with peers’ and thereby signal it to be a very in-group sort of interaction where children ‘produce’ and children ‘share’. In a later text Corsaro (2005) understands the peer culture as a dialogue with the adult culture where the children’s peer culture ‘adopt(s), reproduce(s) and transform(s) adult culture’. It is in both these meanings that the importance of peer cultures is situated. In the context of schooling, ‘Pupil culture is thus not some kind of an entity in itself but exists only in relation to the many components of school life: in fact it is an ensemble of relationships’ (Thapan 1991: 117). Even outside school contexts, peer groups continue to have the characteristics that are displayed by in-school peer groups, as has been shown in the study of young women in an urban slum in Delhi by Thapan (2005: 209) where ‘peer group represents that collectivity …

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within which identities are expressed, constituted and affirmed. This group provides a crucial forum for discussion and communication for the display and performance of identities through an expression of feelings and experience …’. In the school context, peer groups retain this element of constitution and expression of identities except that, here, in the space of the school, the peer culture is constituted in dialogue with school processes such as classroom interactions among peers, teachers’ interventions in their routine, school rules and regulations and codes of propriety, interactive zones facilitated by school, e.g., outings, cultural events, play time, etc., and the recognition that one is primarily a student here. In the study of Pratyantar School, peer relations among students are constituted along several of these axes, but what keeps emerging is the gendered nature of peer relations. Gendered selves find frequent expressions in the space of peer relations and the extra-curricular in this school. ‘The informal views and comments of the teachers are also very crucial in gender division of school activities and in directing boys and girls to gender typed subject choices, and extra-curricular activities’ (Chanana 2003: 212). Curriculum-based interaction between teachers and students did not display significant signs of gender categorisations.4 There was no obvious discrimination or privileging of a particular gender in the classroom culture of the school,5 however, conventional gender imagery is displayed by the teachers sometimes, in extra-curricular interactions.6 These gender and peer discourses, among the students, are articulated most frequently in the zone of the extra-curricular. It is in interaction among the peers that gender identities are crafted and expressed most openly, though not exclusively.

Significance and Identification of Peers Students in Pratyantar School value peer relations and consider them to be an important segment of their school experience. During an informal

See Chanana (1988), Wazir (2000) and Rajagopal (2009). Study of some Chinese schools by Liu (2006) shows clear segregation of genders, by teachers, in the seating arrangements, codes of conduct and play areas. 6 The extra-curricular are the activities held and promoted in and by the school and are largely non-academic in nature. 4 5

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discussion, class VI students7 were jumping eagerly to reply to the query about the importance of peers. The significance of the issue is expressed through the students’ eagerness to respond to questions about peers: one boy, wringing his hands and with a grave display of sadness said, ‘Oh it feels I should return home … nothing feels good when friends are not around.’ Another boy added, ‘It gets very lonely’; a girl said, ‘That day I do not like anything’. Many echoed similar sentiments. A boy thoughtfully replied a little later, ‘When your friends do not come to the school on a particular day, that day you realize how important they are for you.’ Another boy immediately seconded this opinion, ‘Yes ma’am that’s true.’ Across the age-groups, similar views were expressed by the students in this school on being asked the question: why are peers important? While classes IV and V students considered ‘help’ to be the strongest reason behind having friends, students from classes VI and VII were more expressive about the reasons for having peers. ‘Help’ is a constant, recurring theme for most of the students when it comes to the identification of peers. ‘They should help us when we are in some trouble’; ‘friends are for mutual help’; ‘only friends help’. ‘Help’ is delineated by some students as helping in resolving some difficulty related to school work, informing about the instructions teachers gave the day the particular student was absent from school, sharing things like pen, pencil, scale, etc., the day one of them forgets to bring it to the school. The next common reason given for having peers was ‘fun’. ‘We make friends to stay happy’; ‘I will be alone in school without them’; ‘no one to talk and play with’; ‘alone is sad, with friends its fun ...’ Fun assured by having peers around is recognised by the opposites of fun, i.e., sadness, loneliness. The experience of not having peers around accentuates the significance of having them around. It is through experience that students talk about the importance of having peers in school. ‘Help’ as the prominent, recurring reason for peer group relationships in school indicates the urgency of having such relationships in an ever looming threat of being helpless, in trouble, in school. When classes IV and V students say, if I forget to bring something to school, it’s my peers who bail me out because school work gets halted if some ‘tool’ is forgotten at home and it could lead to displeasure of the teacher, probably 7 I use the terms ‘class’ and ‘grade’ interchangeably throughout the chapter, referring to a particular age cohort of students, moving between classes one and eight in the school.

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punishment and a loss of prestige and a consequent sense of well-being. Many students mention mutuality in the context of help, i.e., I may need it and I may need to extend it to others. It is a corresponding sense of responsibility along with dependence on others. It is a simultaneous constitution of oneself as an enabler and a helpless being, in the act of being a peer. Selfishness and pride are two qualities that are detested in peers, i.e., those who are selfish or proud will not qualify as one’s peers. These two qualities are the exact opposite of thinking about the others’ well-being. Being studious and being obedient are the virtues that the school as an institution desires in its students and when students too reiterate this, they reflect the impact of the school’s ideology over and above the individual’s meaning of schooling. At the same time, they value ‘help’ in the event of a face-off before the school authorities, i.e., the teachers. Peers, in this instance, are being defined in consonance with the school’s stand on students and peer relations appear to confirm the school values of studiousness and obedience. The students want to therefore project a school habitus—a continuity in their relationship to the school. At least this is what they want to project. In the previous instance, i.e., class V, having peers stands as a guard against the potential threats that school practices can pose for individual students. Here the vice is, being selfish, i.e., thinking of one’s own well-being with no consideration for others’ discomfort or fears. Qualification to being a peer in this instance expects a collective acknowledgement of the power of the school and an assurance to each other of all help needed in the event of an ‘unpleasant situation’. As the responses of the next grade i.e., class VI come out, the pattern of helpfulness being the most significant denominator of good peer relations emerges again, but two years later when the class VI students are asked to spell the most desirable quality in peers, they are no more talking of ‘help’ as the top priority; it is ‘sharing thoughts and having personal, heart to heart talks’ which is put on premium this time. And the current class VII students also respond in the same manner; suddenly, the pointer indicates aspects of ‘sharing’ to be the key component of peers as against ‘helping’. Sharing one’s thoughts, feelings, at times possessions (but the focus was on feelings much more than on material things) has a connotation of interacting as individualities open to each other; and sharing implies trust. Very often the students mention that with close peers one can freely share one’s secrets without the fear of being made fun of or sounding bizarre. A boy responds, ‘I can share my thoughts with my

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friends but anyone else would respond with unkindness towards such expressions, might dismiss those as silly.’ All classes respond in this manner: sharing one’s thoughts is an expression of distinctive individualities and when someone listens, you too have to be available to listen to others. The collectivity of peers thus enables an expression and constitution of individualities and distinct identities. Sharing in the space of school does not directly place the school as the opposing, threatening power but as a facilitator that enables such groupings. The sharing is also, as some students mention, of the sorrows, fears, that are not always related to school life but to the life outside it as well. As grown-ups there are issues that concern them apart from the school work and hence the significance of peers takes on a different meaning as does the school in this context; from being a threat, it becomes a facilitator, a ground for conversing with friends. The sixth and seventh graders are asked what causes rifts between peers. The old sixth and the current sixth show a pattern, while the old sixth blames ‘fights’ for rift, the new sixth are, much more expressive in their responses and consider ‘rudeness’, ‘deceit’ and ‘fight’, in this order, to be the causes behind rifts between peers. Giving away one’s friend’s secrets, gossiping about them to others, leaving them for others, not paying attention, death, misunderstandings and, one even mentioned, ‘eating my head with all sorts of complaints and too much talking’ are the varied and expressive responses that emerge from the relatively older current batches of students, that cause rifts or break a relationship. The cause of rift is mostly a damaged trust between friends and is logically apt because the foundation of friendship for them is trust in each other. Sharing secrets and innermost thoughts and feelings is something that is crucial to students’ lives because these are often issues related to identities, what is wrong and right—morality, subservience and dominance, traditional values and modern lives, how to carry on despite the follies and hurts associated with growing up. These may be ridiculed or subdued in the adult world that is based on a sorted out, fixed way of knowing oneself and defining others. For adolescents, these are issues not yet settled, and school with all its curricular paraphernalia may not be adequate to resolve these issues; it is an adult’s version of what education should be about and it aspires to prepare them for the world out there. Schools teach languages to that end, provide information about history, geography, sciences, etc., but dealing with life requires some other skills which come from learning at schools but some of those skills come from dealing with peers, learning with them and learning to be

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with them. Peer group relations are the first lessons in friendship based on notions of help and trust. These are also the first lessons in an agential acting out of one’s identity away from adult supervision. Schools become significant for their peer cultures to many students; the nature of peer relationships may vary from one school to another, from one grade to another but largely, peer cultures have come to constitute an important aspect of school experience. What the students share with peers is something which they would not be very comfortable sharing with their families. While the old sixth graders, i.e., the sixth grade batch two years earlier, stated that peers in school are primarily significant for help in school work and the family is significant for other ‘important’ issues, the new sixth graders and the seventh graders consider peer groups in school as a source of ‘guidance’, ‘identifying human nature’, ‘personal matters’, ‘handling troubles’, ‘being together’; and the family is significant for ‘major decisions’, ‘financial issues’ and sometimes help in studies. There is a reversal of roles of family and peer group in the lives of school-going adolescents in the comparative outcomes of the responses by the sixth graders placed two years apart from each other. The old sixth graders respond in a manner similar to the current fourth and fifth graders (i.e., the recent batches of students are much more expressive than their predecessors). As compared to the older senior classes, the new senior classes are much more expressive, forthright and show a pattern that values peers, as being equally significant as one’s family.

Gendered Peer Contexts At one level, peer groups in schools are situated vis-à-vis the school’s authority and the adult-world’s authority, but within these school peer groups, gendered contexts have been of interest to many scholars as potential sites for the emergence and construction of gendered identities. Recent scholarship in this field has moved away from a conception of gender as a clear binary and a consequent essentiality that comes with such binary assumptions about gender. Judith Butler (1990) and Bronwyn Davies (2004) have been two significant post-structural theorists on issues of gender identity who basically believe that gender emerges in the discourse, in the performativity of self and is not predetermined. Consequently there are multiplicities of gendered identities that emerge through and in such performatives of everyday experiences.

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Gender relations in peer group contexts in schools also show a similar trend. While in some contexts and instances, the stereotyped gender differences are visible, in many other situations these are absent and displace the usual associations between gender and behavioural patterns and social attitudes. While individuals constitute their identities, they engage with a certain storyline available to them; peer communities provide a storyline which influences its members, though not necessarily in a predictable manner, but it is the one available to them and does have a possibility of generating a pattern. Our old class VI students display a lopsided preference for same gender peers in their responses to the gender break-up of their peers. The girls show only girls as peers and no boys at all while it is the same with the boys of this class. The pattern that emerges here supports the stereotypical segregation of genders and strict same-gender peer relationships. The new sixth graders show a different pattern in this. The girls have peer relations with boys also but the boys from classes VI and VII are divided into two segments, one that has girls as friends, another which denies having friendships with girls. While girls are not inhibited in their peer preferences and associated with peers across the gender divide, some of the boys from the same grade underline the gender divide by resorting to saying that they have zero number of girls as friends. Zero was the response of old sixth graders when asked about peer relations across gender. It is a dramatic and excessive response and says a lot by itself. There are instances of boys being made fun of in new sixth and seventh grades when the number of girls as peers was more than a meagre two or three. The boys would use whitener to erase the number and over-write a zero. In addition, the ridicule that was the trigger takes these incidents to be linked to the typical constructions of a stereotypical aggressive masculinity. ‘Those male students who are less successful in gaining recognized spaces in the official school do so by claiming other sources of power, resorting to aggression … and (hetero) sexism’ (Connell as cited in Gordon et al. 2000: 121). The girls were not under such pressure to deny their friendships with boys denoting an acceptance of across gender peer relations and, since the number of girls was less in these sections as compared to the number of boys, girls had a choice to have friends from among boys whom they found temperamentally compatible. Boys, however, outnumber girls and it is the more aggressive, naughtier, talkative ones who deny having peer relations with girls. They anyway are not likely to be chosen as friends by the girls. The boys in senior classes make fun of the girls while the girls have a

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tendency to shout back and snap at the boys whom they find irritating. This is not too prominent in the junior classes and took place in the absence of the teachers. When the senior boys say they have ‘zero’ girl peers they may be referring to an imposed state rather than a choice, because girls would not want to have them as friends. At the same time their own dispositions are choices they make about their identity which further reinforces their distancing themselves from girls and in turn gives them a privileged position in peer groups which are all-boys’ groups. While there are sections of students, primarily boys, who believe in keeping a line drawn between girls and boys, their responses in terms of the most valued quality in peers are largely similar. Boys and girls of new sixth and seventh grades value sharing of feelings with friends; here, boys show a preference for friends with whom they can have fun, who are witty and ensure moments of repartee and jest. Boys value trust but also value a carefree, fun-filled time with friends. Another similarity visible across the gender divide in these classes is an expressive, articulate, specific, descriptive style of communicating their choice. The older sixth grade is monosyllabic across the gender divide; the girls there value ‘life long trust’ primarily while boys value ‘helpfulness’ and ‘goodness’. What emerges through this brief exposition is a communication culture in each grade which is shared by most of the students of that grade. The old sixth grade is terse and clipped; the new sixth and seventh grades are expressive and specific; the new fourth and fifth grades are conventional and school-oriented in their commentary on peers. Within the shared communicative style of each grade emerges a thin line that separates the way girls and boys express their peer preferences. The old sixth grade girls and boys have a conventional preference for goodness, honesty and helpfulness but girls differ a bit when they value ‘lifelong support’ from peers. There is a ‘forever friend’ promise that they expect from close peers; boys do not refer to this. Carol Gilligan (1982/1993) has commented upon this gender pattern of dependent femininity and independent masculinity as distinct moralities for the two genders. The new sixth and seventh grades share a commitment for trust and sharing of feelings but boys move away from only ‘sharing’ to fun, jest and other qualities as well. The across the grades study of peer preferences among students at this school shows that there is a diversity within one school’s culture, as one moves from one grade to the other. ‘In this sense, pupil culture is not monolithic: that is, it is not all of one hue and its liveliness is generated by the individual perspectives and activities that constitute it’ (Thapan 1991: 144).

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Peer Performatives: Different Stories Peer performatives can be understood as ways of behaving, believing that the peer discourse the school culture provides its students with. They are not generated by the school setting alone, but are partially created outside the school and partially recreated in the school setting. Peer performatives include close one-to-one peer relations, within small groups of like-minded students and a large community of acquaintances who share classroom experiences. The various discourses available to the individual create the possibilities of identities for him/her. By participating in the different themes one experiences and expresses a different identity. Peer discourse in the school culture and gender discourse present in the school culture are two broad zones of possibilities for the constitution of selves for the students at the school. These two discourses involve students’ participation in multiple ways. Sometimes, for some students, the peer discourse matters more, for others, it’s gendered peer relations which makes their identities meaningful, for some others it could be a peer identification along with a gendered identification without being too taken up by either, or rather by being taken up by both, simultaneously either way. In this way, peer identities and gender identities act upon each other in various ways and a multiplicity of patterns may emerge in a given cultural setting leaving space for both stereotypical and some idiosyncratic ones. Peer discourse will be taken to be the source point of understanding the gender discourse as the experiences of the two unfold in this particular form in this setting of the school. It is in peer associated performatives that gendered performatives keep showing up. These two are, however, not present without any mediating sites: these are acted out in classrooms when the teacher is interacting with them (the students); when the teacher is present but not directly engaging with all the students; when the students are on their own in the classrooms; on an educational trip, etc. Playground activities and dramatics/cultural activities are two other significant zones where the two discourses come across. In this section, educational activities and classroom settings will be in focus. When the students are asked to number the people in their peer circle, the responses ranged from five to fifty. It is in this range of reference that the concept of peers works, not just in this case but otherwise also. Peers include very close friends, yet they also include those whom one meets or spends time with due to some regular, routine activity, here it

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is attending to the same school or class five days a week. Peers are the others, mostly one’s contemporaries, with whom one shares the space of the school on a regular basis.

Privileging Peer Bonding Ruckus One of the favourite transition time past-times of the students in school (i.e., when left free between two structured activities like two lessons) when out of teachers’ surveillance, is creating a ruckus, a jolly banter, a chaotic merriment involving running helter-skelter, talking all at the same time, hitting each other, laughing and crafting an utter nonsensical moment for the time being. This is not a ‘must-happen’ activity but is a mostly happening activity. There are times when students would maintain a quiet, workable atmosphere even in the absence of a teacher, but when this sort of melee would start, then everyone joined in sooner or later; they engage in such activities when they are happy about something or are worry free. It is not a boys’ activity, girls were equal participants; a few students would not take part once in a while but that included girls and boys. On being asked why you do this many could not answer, some plainly replied ‘it is so much fun.’ On their school sports day, the students are disciplined and well behaved till the time the teachers are around but the moment the teachers have to leave to participate in the musical-chair event for teachers, the students find a reason to cheer in their favourite style. Corsaro (2006) has tried to understand the meaning of these dramatic fights among school children and finds a cultural situatedness of such peer behaviour. Corsaro states that such a dramatisation of opposing forces is in fact a cultural affirmation of community among the AfricanAmerican/Afro-American students who come from a culture that sees constant contrarieties and antagonisms as uneliminatable. Its acceptance is expressed through these dramatised mock fights. The way students behave in this collective revelry is characteristically similar to what McLaren (1986) describes as the street corner state. He noticed in such acts ‘dynamics of peer relations … usually cathartic; indulgently physical; unbound, ungoverned behaviour … overtones

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of merriment … irregular speech …’. The moment the teachers return to the room or the space where such behaviour is taking place, there would be an instant shift to the ‘student state’—‘generally quiet, well mannered, predictable and obedient … very little physical movement ... communitas is rare …’ (1986: 98). McLaren states that the street corner state is valued a lot by the students largely for the spontaneous communitas experience that it offers. The fact that such revelry is enacted basically when the teacher is away, and stops the moment the teacher steps in, signifies it as an act of resistance to the discipline the persona of the teacher represents. The good natured friendliness among the classmates tutored by the teachers when they say, ‘Make sure your desk mate has also got his/her lunch,’ ‘don’t push each other in the line,’ ‘do not talk to your friend while the class is on, you are disturbing everyone’ is being internalised but then once in a while this unfettered friendly banter is lived out. Students must do it whenever situations are conducive for it, though not necessarily always, which means they can regulate it if they want to, it is not compulsive in that sense. However, once it starts then only a teacher can stop it; class monitors fail and often join in; the presence of an adult (the ethnographer) does not act as a deterrent, even pleas of taking caution lest they hurt themselves falls on deaf ears. They stop the moment a teacher arrives. So, it is not really against each other that they are acting but together they act against a certain imposed reality, in a sorted out understanding of peer group discourse.

Imitation Imitating the tone of voice, tempo of voice, answers to the questions asked and repetition of what someone does by many others unblinkingly is observed in the very junior sections of the school, until class III. Not that imitation stops after that, as sociologists believe that people inculcate social-cultural norms and values through some form of learning the behaviour of the others, only that grown-ups do it artfully. Peer culture leaving its impact on the members of the group is observed in imitative behaviour of the younger students. They indulge in such behaviour the most when they are clueless which takes two forms. One, when students are clueless about something they are expected to know/learn. Two, when they are clueless about who they are at the moment. Once in a while there is a third kind of imitation, which is to surpass the other, to

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compete; students imitate someone’s behaviour if that ensures success of some sort. This imitation, in all its forms, is meaningful among peers; a commonality is acknowledged before and in the act of imitation. ‘I am what you are.’ Imitating fellow students acts as a guard against teacher’s unpleasantness or sticking out as an ignoramus. Class I students had gathered in the music and dance room for the music lesson. The teacher asked them to sing the song about the rainbow, it had been practised earlier. The teacher asks them, after one session, whether they have learnt the lyrics. One girl says she knows the song’s lyrics, all say one after the other they know the song; then one student said he does not know the lyrics yet and everyone repeated this. Many of them did not learn the lyrics but in order to save face, joined the voice of the one who knew, but when another student confessed to not knowing and there was no repercussion to that, all those who were in a similar state confessed too. In the same teacher’s class, the students one grade younger than the first (which is called prep/preparatory) happened to call the teacher ‘uncle’, i.e., one student called him ‘uncle’ instead of ‘sir’; for a moment, there was a pause and then one after the other students started echoing the same: ‘uncle’ ‘uncle’—at this the teacher politely asked them to revert back to ‘sir’ from ‘uncle’ explaining that ‘uncle’ is an elder at home while the teacher in the school is ‘sir’. It was a mild digression from protocol and when other students saw that no serious harm will come on committing this mistake, they too joined in to enjoy the thrill of breaking the norm. It is through the assurance that others are also doing the same that each student gets the courage to handle the new situation in which they find themselves. Class III students acted in this manner in their civics class to save themselves. The social science teacher asks them to name the major airport in Delhi. No one knows the name. She repeats the question, ‘The major airport?’; to this the class repeats back in chorus, ‘the major airport’; she asks, ‘So what is the name?’—they repeat ‘major’. She gives up and tells them the name of the airport. This question’s answer was something beyond their everyday knowledge, no one in the class knew the answer, all looked at her for the answer and the first utterance was assumed to be the answer. The whole class imitated what the teacher uttered after posing the question once and they all imitated each other hoping that saying it in unison would make it the right answer. It is one of the ways young learners (in this instance, seven to eight years old) venture into lesser known realms and keep themselves safe as well.

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There is another sort of imitation happening in peer groups at a very young age. It is an act of sheer imitation, with no intention and no particular aim. The text reading sessions are common display fields of this form of pure imitation. One incident is peculiarly dramatic in nature. Class I students had understood their lesson for the day and in the rest of the time their teacher asked students to read the chapter from the beginning. One student is supposed to lead the reading; others are to repeat after that student. After around five sentences, the ‘lead reader’ would be changed, the change is ordered according to the seating plan in the classroom. The voices of the students would modulate according to the voice of the key speaker. One is smooth and reads almost like the teacher—the students copied that to perfection; the next girl’s voice is shrill and loud—the class repeats after her in the similar tone; a boy who is next is very, very slow—students try to be that slow as well—some try to correct his speed but the teacher stops them by saying ‘let him read’; one boy is even slower than this one—the class almost goes on a holiday—only one tenth of the class is reading with the boy, the others wait for him to finish reading. Only a few students would react to a tone that is too strange but otherwise the class easily shifts from one intonation to the other. The slow ones are not made fun of. The teacher’s initiative is intentional, teachers ask students to read aloud the text to improve their reading skills and instil confidence in them; each child’s turn is his/her moment of elocution, the teachers discourage interruptions in this process. The students in their imitation are getting used to the differences around them though not consciously. These are not conscious imitative acts but more out of a force of habit, but in that moment, students move along thereby giving space to their peers to express themselves idiosyncratically. Going along with the key speaker, copying his tone, pace and pitch of voice is an act of reassurance by the peers to that individual speaker. Once in a while, someone may break this norm by asking the speaker to speed up or slow down but such instances were rare. The students do not repeat in this manner when the key speaker is the teacher; then one can hear multiple tones and pitches; so this uniformity for the classmate, though not consciously planned, places the peer in a different space than that of the teacher. The repetition of the key speaker’s intonation by the classmates is the recognition and affirmation of the speaker’s identity in the peer society and also an assurance that it is accepted by the others. Students like to do these reading aloud exercises and often remember whose turn is it now, if the exercise is continuing from the previous lesson.

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There is a third understanding of this imitation of the others, where ‘getting ahead’ of the others is the intention. The idea is to do exactly as the other is doing but show how you are no less or even better than the other/s. The oft repeated act in this segment is when evaluation is involved. Evaluation by the teacher or any other adult: the moment one student’s exercise book is being peeped into by an adult, all the students rush there with their notebooks. This tendency is more evident in younger students and becomes less and less prominent as students move towards the senior classes. Here, peer group becomes the parameter along which one gets accessed by the others. This imitation is for aggressively seeking one’s legitimate space in the various peer hierarchies. The competition is enjoyable because of the co-competitors; excellence in itself would hold no meaning if there are no others around doing the same thing but not doing it the way you do it. What makes it an act of imitation and not outright competition is that it happens suddenly; the students are eager to show their work but do not demean others. Once in a while a student will come up to show how poor his handwriting is or how he needs to improve his drawing/sketching skills. The idea is to show that they too are part of the learner’s community although they are not one of the best. Ostracisation from the peer community is avoided as then, school would become a difficult place to be in, especially when ‘help’ remains the key sustaining element of peer-relations.

Monitoring Culture patterns prevalent in a society tend to have an impact on the peer interaction patterns in school in that society. Monitoring is one peer act that is found prevalent among the students in Pratyantar School. Monitoring in this context basically revolves around keeping a tab on the others in the group. It involves taking care or showing concern for the others; checking out for some social misdemeanours and either resolving them by themselves or complaining to the teacher; assessing the others and commenting on that. School inculcates these ways of being when teachers say in the class, ‘Make sure all your classmates have got their lunch’; or when they ask some students to actually monitor the class as in keep an eye to maintain discipline in the absence of the teacher; or when students are encouraged to help their desk mates with small difficulties. It is through this culture of competition, comparison and

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acknowledgement of differences, for good or for bad, that monitoring becomes a part of the fabric of the peer culture. However, peer culture monitoring is also about getting to know the others and even assisting them in crisis. While the school culture of monitoring, tutoring and disciplining plays a role in its prevalence in school peer culture, some of it could be inspired from the culture back home. During the parent– teacher meeting (PTM) a boy’s mother complained about the behaviour (non-studiousness and talkativeness) of her son’s fellow student who is also their neighbour. This sort of involvement (and some would call it meddling) in the other’s issues is a very culture-specific behaviour. Similarly, for that PTM the teacher asks two boys to inform their classmates, who stay near them but were absent that day from the school, to definitely attend the meeting. This informality and involvement with neighbours is a cultural trait not common across all neighbourhoods in Delhi. The well-being and reputation of the peers is guarded on several occasions, and the senior sections too display such gestures. Class II was practising music with their teacher and some students were not clear about the lyrics. One girl, who was good at the song, sang the lyrics for them and without any instruction from the teacher, changed the tutoring from musical expression to clearly stated lyrics. This concerned mediation is often visible in several instances in the school’s everyday practices. Brief warnings such as ‘Ma’am is coming’; ‘keep quiet or you’ll be taken to principal madam’s room’; ‘don’t dance like this, you’ll tear your legs apart’; ‘last warning before I put your name in the monitor’s notebook’, etc. are some other ways in which the peer structure tries to prevent harm coming to its members. Class VI is discussing their results for the first term when a girl reports that one girl is crying. It seems she is the one who stood third in the class last time and this time she was pushed to a lower rank as two boys stood third in the class. Everybody comes around her for a while and consoles her; the teacher too speaks indulgently to her. The boy next to her, whom she is angry with, also tries to calm her by playing down the issue through jesting comments. Eventually she is fine. The girl who stood first in the class is sitting quietly at her desk at the end of a row. Two girls walk up to her, hug her, pull her cheeks and say, ‘Look at this one, she takes the best position always.’ She smiles back. The acknowledgement of success by others is also important for the success to be meaningful.

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Later in the day when the parents are to visit the school for the PTM, the students try to diffuse the tension created by the results of the tests by being funny and excessive about the treatment that awaits them at home on that day. Girls as well as boys contribute to this pool of wisdom. The usual chatter and rowdiness is missing and they are joking about how there will be ‘a rainfall of blows at home’; ‘unpunctuated thrashing’; ‘I’ll be killed’; ‘Oh, other people’s moms will also beat me up.’ In the mock dramatised articulations of trouble that awaits them after their poor performance in school was a sign of support to one another. For some it would be real and thus those, for whom this would not be real, were nevertheless participating in the collective acceptance of insults that come with poor performance. In this excessive jocular articulation, members of the peer group are reassuring each other that they all are in it and thus making the insults bearable. On one occasion a class VII student is scolded by the teacher. Once the teacher left, the students gather around that boy and crack jokes about how the ‘clouds that make a lot of noise often go away without doing much.’ They were pointing towards the uselessness of such scolding; and in this way, the peer group took away the pain of the punishment. There is another aspect to this monitoring of others’ actions and feelings among the peers. The junior classes are more monitoring prone in some senses. Their sense of being fellow students to each other is very strong in some ways. They react more quickly, more animatedly, to what the others around them are doing and especially so, if it out of the norm. The older students behave in a different manner. The younger groups are much more particular about normative behaviour, she replied first, he spoke later (while answering in class); your belt is going towards the left; he came running to the class; he is chewing the food with his mouth open, etc. Small incidents became matters of transgressions of stated and unstated rules and complaints are fired against those found indulging in ‘trespassing’ norms. A class I student dropped her halwa (a sweetmeat made with clarified butter and flour) on the floor and her desk mate Jaya, who is very vocal and perceptive, announced aloud in the direction of the teacher, ‘Ma’am she dropped the halwa on the floor, she was trying to cut it like a cake, I started this style of cutting halwa as cake’ and went back to her meal. This is the other aspect of monitoring which culminates in complaining to the teacher primarily or to the others. When a class monitor is on duty, younger sections’ students take it upon themselves to report trespasses of

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others. They believe in rules and in their effectiveness in ensuring justice for all so they very eagerly appeal to the authority (teacher, monitor or the group) and they are also at a stage where they are learning the ropes; so, in complaining about the others, they also observe what sort of punishment this trespass results in. They are also more worried about their own well-being in the face of the rules and authorities that implement those; they are yet not very confident about the devices they can employ to be safe and thus pointing out the follies of others assures them that at least for now they are on the right side of the rules. The norm about ‘finishing your lunch properly’ was one such issue that led to complaints to the teacher or comments from peers. The teacher of class I is informed about a boy putting the banana that he got for the lunch (apart from other things) in his bag, the teacher asks him to eat it now and then was busy with her work. The students take it up on themselves to deride the act. One boy said, ‘it will smash in your bag and spoil all your books’; there was a glee on his face at the prospect of the mess that would be created. A girl comments ‘why are you stealing the banana?’ as though eating it then and there, with or without any pleasure is a dutiful act and preserving it for a better, opportune time and enjoying it later is theft. The singling out of the norm breakers is instant and intense but episodes do not linger on, and within next few hours or days, the peers are incorporated into the group again until the next time. The older students also complain against the unruly behaviour of their peers, but it is not as frequent as it is among the younger lot. The older ones see through some of the façade of rules and authority. Ridicule amongst them constitutes a control device that students use if they find their peers crossing a boundary. Class VI is being shown their test sheets. One boy came up and said, ‘Look ma’am, that boy has failed and yet he is saying “oh wow! I got such good marks”.’ The boy who complained meant that despite failing, instead of feeling sorry or ashamed, he has inverted the norm by expressing happiness and pride in what he got. In this act of ‘rejoicing’ over failure, that boy was deriding the norm related to the prestige associated with passing the exams. It caused the other boy to complain, as he had to study and pass the exam to feel this, but the other was also ‘feeling’ thus without the effort. Incidentally, the school sometimes asks the naughtiest students to be the class-monitors. The grown ups, the older students, are much more

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on the side of their peers than the authorities, as the monitors would also give several warnings before they actually wrote somebody’s name in the ‘black book’ of mischief makers. The ones warned would argue their case, would explain their situation and would just take a minute more to continue with whatever that they are doing. The last form of monitoring that remains is a neutral, largely objective assessment of the peers and their performances. These acts of evaluative monitoring do not aim at complaining or assisting as was the intention in the earlier two forms of monitoring. This is much less subjective and is somewhat collective in nature, i.e., these assessments are made by a group or the whole class and are not limited to one or two individual peers. These are prestige-inducing when positive and the other side of it signifies an ordinary existence. Class II is having a poem recitation session. It is a poem about Ibnbattuta, a Persian traveller known for his penchant for journeys around the world. This is a poem written by an Indian poet, adding a comical element to it. It says how he starts his journey amidst great storms and how it is tough to carry on and he eventually loses one of his shoes and is left stranded at the cobbler’s shop. The students are to recite the poem, standing before the class, one by one, and they have to appropriately enact the events. The response of the students to each presenter is different. One girl is too inaudible; the students remark ‘louder-louder’, they keep saying ‘we can’t hear you,’ etc. It is important, what they were doing, because all of them knew the poem already so, when they say that she should speak louder, they are not worried about them missing the story but know that this moment they are the audience and this girl is a presenter and are playing their role to the hilt. She is being told about her shortcomings. Next is a little girl who tries to add some action to the recitation but is abrupt and inconsistent; the class laughs a little at these attempts but she herself is smiling shyly so the class too felt free to laugh along. After her, a boy comes up and somebody shouts from the back ‘he will take off his shoe’ and the whole class watches attentively, anticipating the fun that this presentation promised. This boy starts the act with great gusto, actions and modulation of voice; all eyes are on him, a few sing along with him with a smile. Finally, the moment comes, he takes off his shoe and the whole class roars with laughter, and then he throws the shoe a little away to show that the shoe has fallen in Japan (that’s what the poem

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states). He finally gives a very sullen expression to express the angst of Ibn-battuta. The class loves his performance; they knew he would perform in this way, so he already has earned recognition for himself and this was an encore of that recognition and appreciation. Another boy comes forth, he too wants to repeat the same antics but at the moment of taking off the shoe, his shoe would not come off, he tries hard but it would not move, the class laughs at this; he completes the poem and goes back to his seat. The class sings along with the students who perform well; laughs at small faux pas but are not dismissive of someone who does not perform well. The appreciation by peers enhances the confidence of the good performers and silence from peers makes the not-so-good ones realise that they have not made it to the select few ranks. Assessment of peculiar traits also happens among the peers and students appreciate these though sometimes assessment comes out in the forms of nicknames that the group accords them. However, because of their uniqueness the students, mostly, love their nicknames and almost never reject these. One girl in class VI who had a temper and was a little dark complexioned was nicknamed kaala toofan, i.e., ‘black thunder’; another girl in class V was nicknamed chuhiya, i.e., ‘a she-mouse’ for her small built, rapid movements and a mild resemblance to the species; one boy came up to announce his nickname and with great pleasure informed me that he is called kalajamun, i.e., ‘a round black sweetmeat’ by his friends; his face was round, sweet looking and he is dark complexioned. Nicknames are assessments made by one’s peer of one’s unique traits and are half jocular and half endearing. On the whole, the dramatised, unruly, collective display of ‘mucking around’, various versions of imitations and differently intended monitoring among the peers are some of those aspects of peer culture of Pratyantar School which privilege peer group membership over anything else. These performatives are not gender-restricted or gender-specific and are displayed by both the girls and the boys. There are contexts therefore, as elaborated upon in this chapter, where peer group membership, or studentship, or other human vulnerabilities and aspirations, take centre-stage in the everyday performatives.

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Gendered Relations in Peer Groups Peer culture in school is not completely dissociated from gender stereotyping though in the present contexts it is not normatively binary and is not absolute in its impact. There are significant performatives of peer relations that are not structured around or governed by gender differences as they were prevalent several years ago. Studies in different part of the world that have focused on gendered peer relations primarily in classroom interactions found that girls are marginalised in these contexts through various ways.8 Teachers’ blatant privileging of the boys over the girls through praise, encouragement, presumptions and differential behaviour contributes to a gender conceptualisation that influences peer relations as well. These obvious discriminations may have been checked in schools in some cases but what remain, despite conscious efforts to bring in gender parity, are unconscious perpetuations of these discriminatory binary codes by the educators and by the students themselves.

Attempting to Overcome the Bias Girls in class I of the school are not at all shy or inhibited in their interactions with the teacher during the classes. They are alert, sharp and well organised. They are quite clear about what are correct answers to the questions the teacher poses and are competitively aware of providing the answer before their peers. Class III students too show a similar pattern. Girls participate in discussions, give their comments and observations and are treated by their teacher as equal. The only students who are scolded are those who are not paying attention. Students in both these classes sit in mixed pairs and in gender-specific pairs as well. Class IV is managed by a girl monitor and everyone recognises her authority. There are other sections that have girl monitors as well and are as effective or ineffective as boy monitors. Classroom behaviour of the teachers is not discriminatory in overt gendered terms. The school-imposed gender-segregation practices are not evident; they are not asked to sit separately, no girls versus boys 8

See Chanana (1988), Wazir (2000) and Rajagopal (2009).

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competitions are held in classrooms and girls are paid as much attention by teachers and others. These are the attempts that the school makes in keeping the opportunities open for girl students. The teachers are conscious of the overt perpetration of gender bias. However, covertly sometimes teachers display gender-centric behaviour in non-academic associations with the students. On one occasion, class VII boys are asked by their teacher to open the windows of the basement so that their class could get some fresh air. On the face of it there was nothing in it that would be called discriminatory but the assumption that girls are not suitable for this work that needed some physical labour is indicative of an underlying remnant of bias, despite the overt efforts to erase those. Similarly, the class VI teacher asks a boy of the class to call some tall boys from the senior section as they are needed for putting some files and folders in the upper segments of a cupboard. The assumption that boys are tall was working in the subconscious of the teacher though otherwise she is one of the most supportive of the teachers and is appreciated a lot for her sincere efforts for the students. There were tall girls too in the senior section but the preference was for the tall boys. These assumptions are considered harmless on the face of it but are discriminative. Children themselves sometimes carry deeply embedded notions of gender segregation from homes or other contexts like popular culture, peer talk, etc. One day, the dance teacher was supervising the preparatory section as their teacher for that period was on leave. A boy found a small shiny sticker shaped like a dot, the teacher, in jest, put it on his forehead like a bindi (an ornamental dot that Hindu women and girls apply on their foreheads). The boy jumped back in shock, he removed it instantly from his forehead, ‘girls put bindi, I am a boy’ while the other students watched him. A similar incident reported from a preschool in Ohio showed a four year old boy who had playfully applied red nail paint on his nails and the next day was sent by his father to the school with an angry note about this. The boy explained to the teachers that boys do not wear nail paint and insisted quite strongly that he should be recognised as a boy (Davies 2004: 136). The children in this instance and the one at our school are both displaying a serious concern over the ‘confusion’ being created by the teachers about gender-specific behaviour; both students vehemently

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resisted such attempts. They are already familiar with a certain gender coding prevalent around them and though not overtly engaged with the masculine–feminine issues, are nonetheless, drawing from this discourse of binary opposites. For the sports day of the school, the preparatory section was to participate in an event where four girls would stand at one end of the small race track and four boy partners of theirs would have to race down to them where they (the girls) were to put dots and other stickers on the boys’ faces and make them up as clowns. Here, the boys had no problem with coloured dots put on their faces because the role was of a clown. Being perceived as a clown was acceptable to the students but appearing to cross the gender boundary was unbearable. Much of the sport events were gender-segregated since boys and girls are not considered as equals in terms of body strength and stamina, and it is considered fair play to keep them in different competitive zones. However, the girls and the boys participated in all the events without discrimination.

Gender Stereotyping in Peer Contexts A gender construction ‘silly/sensible dichotomy’ is prevalent in many classrooms across the world and constructs the two genders as oppositional. Of the feminine construction, maturity, obedience and neatness are valued ‘sensible’ qualities, (while) ... the masculine construction involves ‘silly’ qualities of immaturity, messiness and naughtiness. The gender stereotyping often moves through seemingly innocuous binaries. There is a ‘construction of femininity as sensible/mature and self effacing; and the contrasting construction of masculinity as demanding and assertive. (Francis and Skelton 2005: 99)

Rituals of pollution, teasing, chasing are some of the other forms of interactions that take place with members of the other gender as students enter preadolescence (Thorne and Luria as cited in Underwood 2008: 21). Thorne and Luria identify borderwork as these intense, brief interactions between genders as the girls and boys get ‘interested in exploring the world of the other gender’ (ibid.). In class VIII, three pairs were seated as mixed pairs and the rest of the class sat in gender-specific pairs.

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Those sitting next to each other constantly fought with one another, ‘He is so bad,’ ‘she is unbearable.’ Another pair was jostling about the space boundary—the invisible line drawn on the desk that separates their ‘areas’. The boy had kept his bag between them and would push it in her ‘area’; at this the girl would scream and push it back. Another pair—the boy would make a wisecrack, the girl totally unimpressed, would say loudly, ‘You better not talk to me, ok?’ These are rituals of pollution which are believed in and followed among preadolescents sometimes. Discrimination is sustained by talk of ‘boy germs’ or ‘girl germs’ polluting one another. A boy in class VI responded during one informal discussion on peer relations, ‘It is bad if your friend does not come to school but it is such a relief if your desk partner does not come ...’, he added, looking at his partner, a girl slightly bigger than him; ‘... as that day you are saved from all the falling-downon-you acts.’ The class laughed and the girl made a mocking face.9 During an educational outing, some girls from different grades complained of boys pulling their ponytails. The younger ones complained to the teachers while the older ones shouted back at the boys trying to tease them. One class VII boy complained to the teacher about his classmate, a girl, who was running after him to see his exam sheet. He said, ‘I have got very poor marks but she insists on looking at my answer sheet and does not budge.’ These acts of teasing, fighting, ‘keeping the other away’, running after one another, etc., are gender conscious acts where gendered differences are played out much more than gender parity or peer relations. Here, gender distinctions are highlighted but in the context of a discourse which segregates and forbids camaraderie. While the younger peer groups are very particular about personified gender codes and their material representations; about dress, hair, name, accessories; the older peer groups are more conscious of the behavioural, communicative codes of gender like physical distance between genders, patterns of communication, physical comportment, attention/nonattention and so on. The pre-adolescents are somewhat overt in their attempts to segregate 9 David MacDougall’s film Some Alien Creatures is about gender relations in Rishi Valley School where girls and boys treat each other as some alien species. See MacDougall (2004/2005).

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the gender groups while the adolescents carry some of that sense of segregation along with a deliberation towards being with the other.

Jesting Masculinities Jesting, playing pranks, repartee, puns are performatives appropriated by the boys’ peer culture. This was one zone where girls did not compete or figured very infrequently. Laughter as a subversive tool has been associated with masculine subcultures of schools in the works of Willis (1977), Kehily and Nayak (1997) and Willis (2011). They have described ‘laff’ as a multifaceted counter school act that is taken to be a panacea for the problems schooling creates for working class boys and laughing, ‘having fun’ are very macho acts. In the study of Pratyantar School, however, what seemed to emerge was a culture of witticism, leg pulling and dramatic one-liners that were appropriated largely by the boys and that too, boys from the VI standard onwards but laughter was not always a device used by macho, anti-school boys; it was often used by some of the more studious boys who simultaneously wanted to look smart and sharp. So, laughter inducing phrases or acts were used by three sorts of boys—studious and well placed in the school’s academic culture; not too studious but aspiring for a status in the peers nevertheless; and studious but sharp witted ones who do not want to be known only for their book knowledge or as ‘nerds’. The nature of humour was such that they tried to display their worldly-wise attitude; a ‘know-all’ sort of attitude; a pattern that showed a refusal to be treated like imbeciles or easy to fool. Basically, it was an expression of being prepared for the world out there and represented a masculinity which must know how to deal with several levels of existence. One very common query that boys across classes had asked was if they could write girl and boy both, when they were asked to mention on the questionnaires whether the respondent was a boy or a girl. Someone or the other, among the boys, would ask this question and were very pleased at this existential dilemma brought up by them. No girl ever asked this question. This question was asked mostly by boys in older sections and usually by those boys who tried to act flamboyantly at other times. Not all of them were academically marginalised, but had a tendency to act in a manner that would make them visible and noticed.

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Class VII boys were asked to open the basement windows high up on the walls. At this, several boys asked one of the shortest boys to open the windows from inside the room ‘why don’t you try opening the windows, from inside the room, you can do it easily’ (actually an impossibly high distance). The boy who was being targeted replied ‘yes of course, why not’. This sort of leg-pulling was common among the peers, more among the boys. In class VIII, a short boy is one of the most studious and sharp students of the class. When he was replying to a teacher’s question in a science lesson, one boy from the last bench murmured, ‘At least stand up before you reply to the teacher, have some sense’; at this another one added, ‘He is standing, what do you expect,’ meanwhile the small built boy looked back with a smile and said, ‘I am standing.’ Such witty teasing among the friends is a sort of a daring that only friends are allowed. Enduring these and recognising these as ‘fun’ is part of peer culture. During an outing to the Nehru Planetarium,10 the older students were last in the long queue of the school. The boys were together and the girls were within their small groups. The planetarium is called taramandal in Hindi and this was written outside the main hall. The boys were teasing one of their friends, who is a Bengali and name, Gaurav Mandal; the teasing centred on the pun situated in the intonations of ‘mandal’. The boys said to one of the younger teachers, ‘Ma’am this looks like mandal’s house as it says tara-mandal’; another small, thin boy added, ‘We are going to learn a lot about the future of Gaurav Mandal in this hall.’ The boy who was being this teased was smiling and trying to shut them up simultaneously. This sort of teasing, repartee, poking fun is not so prevalent among the girl peers. Although the girls are at times funny and witty as well, the boys are more often so. It can be seen as indicative of a less strict cultural distinction between the expected behaviour of girls and boys now in some contexts but a significantly apparent distinction persists, despite the attempts to bring in gender parity. During the tour of the museum, some of the boys from the older sections kept commenting on what they saw. They commented with jest Nehru Planetarium is situated in Delhi at Teen Murti and is part of the Jawaharlal Nehru Memorial Museum and Library. It has a sky-theatre with a huge dome shaped screen that simulates travel into the universe and provides knowledge related to astronomy. It is a popular place for schools for an educational visit with their students. 10

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and some bit of mockery. The younger lot was awestruck and kept commenting on how huge, beautiful everything was, the older ones, especially the boys (some of them), took great delight in having a different perspective on it all. In the guest room, they comment, ‘So this is where the tea was had’; in the inner lawns, ‘This is where the IPLs, i.e., Indian Premier League (a recently established, novel pattern of holding cricket matches and have no association whatsoever with Nehru or his times) must have been conducted’; to the rose beds, ‘This is the source of his rosebuds, all right;’11 when they reached the room where Nehru spent the last moments before leaving forever—most of the students kept quiet, younger one’s bowed reverentially and an older boy commented ‘move along, the soul could still be here.’

Peer Acts in the Playground Playground is another site in the school’s space which is distinct from the rest of the school in some ways. Playgrounds are used during recesses and during games periods. There are legitimate spaces for playing, an activity that is orchestrated by the children and not so much by the teachers and adults; playgrounds in school are spaces where peers interact with each other largely free of adult supervision; playing as an activity is an act that involves role playing, rules, fantasy, creativity. Given these aspects, playgrounds in schools are significant spaces that may present peer interaction in a different light.

Meaning and Significance of Play The playground defines an educational site beyond the margins of the prescribed, enacted and assessed school curriculum … Here children create their own subject matter through the kinds of activity they play, define their own ways of learning through their associations with other children, and display learned competence through demonstrable physical movements. (Smith 1997: 142)

This distinction between subject matter activity and play activity is not a distinction made by adults or the ethnographer, but is a distinction that 11

Nehru used to adorn a rose bud in his jacket lapel as a regular practice.

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children recognise though they may not articulate it in a detailed complex form. As noted by Romero (1991: 126), ‘... [T]he same activity was labelled as play if children had chosen it for themselves, whereas it was classified as work if teachers had assigned it.’ Playing games in the playground during the games period or occasionally in a free period is a much cherished act among the students of all sections in the school. Students do not sacrifice their games period for anything. Beresin (2010) notes in her account of recess studies in schools, ‘[T]he children chose to play rather than eat ...’ (2010: 9). The older students are as playful as the younger ones during their visits to the playground. It is not a very enormous space but is not small either. It has grass on the surface and there is a tiny basketball court in one corner. The other corner has a few swings and some other structures made of steel, iron and plastic for younger students to climb upon and manoeuvre. With the shift in context, the performatives of peer relations also change. Playgrounds are places of knowing what the children would want to do when allowed to be with their peers, but they also know that this is a window space and they have to return to the discipline again. In this context playground activities are significant for understanding peer relations of school goers. This section will focus on the games, playing; other activities that students indulge in during their stay in the playground will also explore the gender axis in these activities and how it emerges.

Camaraderie during Play Class VI was enjoying their games period. It was noon of early summer time but their enthusiasm was at its highest. Not even a single minute was wasted doing nothing and this was so across the genders. The students improvised their games constantly, if they were bored of playing one game, they would generate another. What was collectively decided, though it was an unstated agreement, was a complete ‘freaking out’ or collective hanging out together without any restrictions or inhibitions. The constant concern was how to not let the action stop. They did not have much in the name of play gadgets but it was a time out with their peers with a shared understanding of what it means to be here, now. As soon as they were informed about the time up in the field, the mood shifted; they would line up, so much quieter but happy.

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In the playground the ‘children’s game playing has its own momentum’ (Tucker 2008: 109). The transition in their movement from the playground to the classroom captures the significance of play for them. While at play, they are using their cultural skills of which they are largely sure and over which they have certain mastery but in the movement towards the classroom, they are again going to be positioned as learners; it is something they are not confident and sure about. As peers too, a lot of learning and proving oneself has to be accomplished but the rules can be negotiated then and there and very easily. In the classroom, peers do not decide the rules of the game; teachers do and are not so easily malleable. The playground is a different place in this sense, the games are played according to certain rules but the rules of the games are charted out in the field and are changed midway, but with a consensus among the peers. Often, rules would not be adhered to, changed abruptly by one person who was placed in a disadvantageous position because of a certain rule and sometimes rules would be forgotten totally. What was significant was that during such times, when the game was being enjoyed by all, playing around with rules did not create any sourness. Somebody who had a complaint about this rule-bending would go to the accused and very rarely to the unspoken leader of the moment, discuss the matter in phrases and then continue with the game. The need to give the rule a back-seat, for the sake of having fun in the game, is possible and recognised by one’s peers. The call to go back to the classroom is a reminder of the shift to the space where rules are not changed for comfort that easily. In fact getting back to the classroom because the time is up is one such rule which is not negotiable so easily. This camaraderie is valued because it is not so readily available in other spaces. Not to say that peers do not have disputes, quarrels, but what is more significant is that these still belong to the realm of play. As Romero (1991) has remarked, children identify all those activities which they control as play, the rest is work, so the disputes, differences during play are counted as play nevertheless. All the students of the school, from preparatory section to class VIII, are fond of their games break. The younger sections, including the VI standard, particularly tax their bodies in the play area. Till younger sections, the girls and the boys indulge in an almost euphoric manner with the running around, jumping; falling acts, but the older sections VII and VIII were not so frenetic, although they too are very actively involved. As many students from older sections reported, peer relations are significant

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for the sharing that happens, the heart to heart talk that is possible most easily with one’s peers; so the playground does not mean a space where self-expression finds its outlet, for them. They are not restricted to the explorations of the body in its most active possibilities; they have narratives that are to be explored to their active possibilities. They, as grown ups, have other ways of negotiating the rules, by humour, by habit, by a cultivated irreverence for some rules and so the playground is valued but not as much as by the younger peer groups who are coming to terms with the restrictions schools pose on bodily movements. These distinctions between the older and the younger peer groups in terms of their interest in playtime are not absolute; there are younger students who sometimes play quietly, calmly and sometimes older ones indulge in hyperactive behaviour. Most of the time, it is the younger groups who are more adventurous. Even if somebody gets hurt during the play (not serious injury), through a ball hitting them, someone pulling or shoving, falling, getting breathless due to constant running, etc., nobody complains. They do not even sneer at the other, except sometimes when the hitting is deliberate and understood to be ill intended that instant revenge is taken. Otherwise, the bodies are extended to their endurance limits and all participate in this act, according to their individual potential. Carmichael notes in her study of peer cultural explorations, ‘[T]he students’ creativity in entertaining themselves during recess was admirable, some of their play on the equipment seemed dangerous … some children didn’t appear to know “their bodys” capabilities and got hurt doing things that weren’t safe for them physically’ (2008: 177). The students in schools are trained to keep their bodies in discipline because the curriculum is primarily transmitted through listening, seeing and thinking, the body must stay in control and these senses have to be supported through that disciplined body. In play, these senses are also at work but this time the body is also allowed to be a part of the whole exercise and allowed much greater freedom than it gets anywhere else in its everyday existence.

Gender as an Axis Playtime is a favoured form of activity among the students; they maintain a shared understanding of its utmost utilisation. However, within this shared discourse of playtime, there are gendered peer performatives

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coexisting with the classroom performatives in some significant ways. In the classroom, students sit together in mixed pairs of boys and girls, though largely they show a preference for same gender pairs. But the moment the students enter the play area, a clear segregation according to gender was visible. Boys play basketball while girls are into jump-rope. Only three girls from their class dribbled a basketball a little away from the boy’s group. At one point, the smaller group from the boys’ teams tried to take away the new, better ball from the girls by mixing up the two during the play. The girls soon noticed this and threatened the boys to return it or else they will report the matter to the games teacher. At this he promptly returned it. While most girls were engaged in conventional girl games, one of which is jump-rope, and some were busy racing, three girls were sharing the space with the boys on the small basketball court but played at their own pace. The girls needed the assistance of the teacher to make sure that they retain their status-quo in the face of being cheated. Two boys who were bored of the basketball game were watching the girls playing jump-rope and were impressed by the dexterity of the girl players and showed interest in joining in. The girls taught them the procedure, but the boys could not do it for long, they moved aside laughing at their own failure. Meanwhile, the girls continued with a relative ease. The ease with a game shows a longer association with it. Girls’ slow pace in basketball and the boys’ failure at trying jump-rope shows the divide; however, the distance is not insurmountable because neither the girls were ridiculed for trying out basketball nor were the boys who tried their luck at jump-rope. That they do not play these games as mixed groups points towards the gendered nature of playground performatives. The other favourite games of the girls were kikli (where girls clasp their hands in a criss-cross manner and turn around in circles in a fast encircling motion); ‘catch-chain’ where one girl runs after the others and whomsoever she touches will have to join hands with her to touch the others, gradually the chain gets larger and it becomes difficult to continue; ‘cuckoo game’ where the girls stand in a circle and one in the centre, all the girls prompt her to touch them but if they start flapping their hands, making a clucking sound and stand on one leg, that girl cannot touch them. The boys play different sorts of games; an all time favourite was some game that drew inspiration from a crime-detective serial on television,

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C.I.D.12; another was ‘snake-water gun’; ‘hide and seek’; ‘catch the ball’; ‘run and catch’. C.I.D. is played with great involvement. The roles are distributed and great debates ensue over who takes which role. During one such enactment a leader of the group decided, ‘I will be the doctor and you (pointed to one boy) be the one who gets killed,’ and then continued, ‘I will drive the car, all of you sit behind me.’ The group ‘adjusted’ itself behind the driver’s ‘seat’ as though they were travelling in a car ‘applying brakes’ at appropriate intervals; suddenly a shoot-out was enacted by them—the one who was to be the murdered man was falling over other children playing their games; the details of who will get shot, where and how many shots will be directed was being meticulously discussed while the ‘dead’ one lay still. In another such enactment game, the murdered one was writhing in pain when others called the special investigators though a ‘mobile phone’. In the course of this, the ‘murdered’ boy tried to suggest some move related to the game when his friends shouted ‘Oh you are dead, don’t talk!’ It is played by boys largely for it involves a confrontation with murders and mystery. Fiske (1989: 129) notices that ‘… violence is an element of masculine popular cultures’. It is associated with the difficult situations out there in the real world that they will soon need to confront and hence an involvement with this game. While the girls’ games are about dexterity, keeping the chain of people together while running around, hopping on one leg, doing several things at one go, the boys’ games are about chasing each other, guns, fights, killings, a display of courage. Many of these are stereotypical images that the students come across at their homes, in the everyday consumption of the popular soaps on television and films, and constitute the discourse through which these typifications get coded for them. The school’s attempts to bring in a gender parity fall weak in the face of more persuasive and prevalent gender stereotypes available in everyday life, but the school’s efforts towards promoting it have created a counter discourse that is generating possibilities of not just gender parity but also multiple performatives of gender. There are therefore confident girls who are leaders of their groups during the games, there are girls confident of themselves as they reclaim their space in the playground, there are boys who show interest in ‘girls’ games and there are girls who act 12 C.I.D. is a crime detective series aired on Sony channel. It is one of the longest running television series on Indian television (from 1998 till date).

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as bullies! These are minor shifts, though significant, but the dividing discourse is more prevalent and often permeates through apparently harmless mediums. As Thorne (2002: 291) notes, ‘[T]he gendered worlds children inhabit are far more complex, shifting and fluid than the separate cultures thesis would indicate’, and ‘... Girls and not just boys sometimes play in larger groups and negotiate and argue about rules’ (ibid.: 296). While girls in the playground sometimes appear to adhere to the dominant model of femininity, by playing in encircled groups and playing nonaggressive games, there are instances of girls taking over the playground through their ‘chain-chase’. In this game, a group of girls line up and move aggressively, without concern for others in the ground. This poses a non-conformist feminine image. In the emergence of leaders among the girls whom girls turn to for decisions about the rules and players, emerges another expression of a femininity that can ‘read’ power and is learning to lead. The presence of the ‘bully’ girl shows that bullying is not masculine only; and that feminine is not always about being ‘nice’. Gender is reframed differently by different individuals using their particular experiences and their interpretations and this has significant and myriad implications.

The Extra-curricular and the Television A segment of the cultural life of a school is invariably linked with the popular culture that the students experience outside their school. The school’s location in the larger social space determines the form of popular culture that its students engage with. In this context, i.e., in the case of this school, the popular culture is present in the television programmes that the students watch by choice or by circumstances. The choices the students make in the consumption of televised tales are, to some extent, significant in relation to their peer relations as these stories, imageries, issues are discussed by the students among themselves and thus peer relations are also about knowing these stories and events. The gender stereotyping or sometimes, attempts at undoing such binaries (that emerge through some of the more gender-centric stories and representations) constitute the repertoire from which children draw meanings.

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There emerged a certain pattern of preferences regarding the television programmes among the peer groups from different age groups but it was not a stable, uniform sort of pattern. There are considerable variations and some similarities. There is a consensus on the kind of programmes a peer group watches as patterns vary from class to class. These engagements with visual culture may remain as memory in the minds of the children/students and may influence their thoughts, expressions in ways which even they would not always be able to identify. As John Fiske (1989: 3) states, ‘[The] activation of the meaning potential of a text can occur only in the social and cultural relationships into which it enters.’ Patterned choice of television programmes by students of a given class brings out the impact of peer communication.

Are Gendered Patterns Present? The engagement with the make believe, drama, myth does not take place in television watching alone, it happens, in this case, during play as well. As Carmichael (2008: 177) notes, ‘[Children] get into play, and as they play sometimes they get into the role so deeply that they forget … who they are … they become something else.’ The impact of the make believe entertainment is not insignificant although the audience may be well aware of the fictional nature of it. ‘Despite their working knowledge of television’s unreality, people continue to turn to it to derive something more than merely entertainment’ (Lembo 2000: 170). These are two associations that point towards how people engage with the not real with great meaningfulness. In the case of television, when students collectively say that television programmes are mostly imaginary, and the next moment they claim to have learnt something from watching those programmes, brings the issue of ‘plausibility’ (Lembo 2000) to the fore. It is also related to what they choose to watch on television because they choose it when they find something to be plausible, it usually means that one or another aspect rings true with what they take to be their own experience and because of that, such programming usually merits their sustained attention …. In distinguishing plausible from implausible, people relate (it) … to one or another aspect of their own lives …. [I]n doing so, they supply a referent or referents to the television discourse … they actively transform what television provides for them … (ibid.: 168)

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This perspective on the significance of television as a cultural medium is being used here. When class III students opt for Chota Bheem13 they are therefore going for the experiences that a nine-year-old boy, who is brave, strong and intelligent, goes through. Bheem has a rival in Kalia Pehelwan, a jealous 11-year-old bully who is envious of Bheem’s popularity. Bheem moves in a group of friends that includes a monkey, a very young boy and an older girl; while the rival moves around with two boys who are not very wise. Bheem is helpful by nature. However, the serial draws inspiration from an epic character from the Mahabharata. (Bheem is one of the five Pandava brothers and is the strongest of all the brothers.) While the association with the mythical figure of Bheem is not deep, the serial does remind one of him. In its improvised version it refers to an imagined childhood of Bheem and it keeps bringing in very ‘modern’ elements and issues like cricket, birthdays, friend visiting from Mumbai, aliens, the Mask (the Jim Carrey starrer Hollywood movie as inspiration), fashion show, a day at the beach, Shaolin (a form of Kung-fu), circus, etc. It often has highly implausible plots, but young students of class III are very fond of it, girls as well as boys. In showing their appreciation, they are pointing to their concerns about friendships, difficulties, small time rivals and modern day interests; it is of significance to a girl as much as to a boy. However, there are gendered preferences too, the girls are drawn more towards Doremon: The Gadget Cat from the Future, a science fiction, comedy drama about an earless robotic cat who travels back in time from the 22nd century to aid a schoolboy. It is of Japanese origin. It caters to values such as honesty, courage, perseverance, family and respect for elders. The boys prefer Power-rangers—a series about the policing of earth by a group of power rangers who have an alien as their leader and the group values teamwork apart from skilled commando actions and weaponry. The class VII students collectively dislike melodramatic representations in tele-serials and vote mostly either for ‘real-life stories’ or for 13 The animated series is produced in India and is set in an Indian village. It revolves around the everyday life of young children and the concerns it caters to are of friends, rivals, insults, cleverness, victory, ‘giving it back’ and is interestingly modern in its intertextuality, i.e., though it is set in a village background and this Bheem is the childhood portrayal of the legendary Bheem, one of the five Pandava brothers (and here too he is assisted by Krishna the Hindu god who assists Pandavas in the Mahabharata).

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cartoons. In rejecting the melodrama in these televised stories, they are rejecting the over-reactive, unreal parodies of women and men and call these implausible; but are open to ‘real’ stories whose plausibility is undoubted or for cartoons which are licensed to be fantasies, imagined as a genre. The boys of class VII totally reject tele-soaps of all kinds and show a preference for sports, Discovery channel, cartoons and reality shows related to dance, music or comedy. The girls too reject melodramas where girls are tortured or they whimper and weep; they prefer narratives that are dramatic but are about the empowerment of women, within the limitations of being ‘popular’. Class VIII boys, as a peer group phenomenon, deviate towards dance reality shows. Chakravorty (2011: 137) states that ‘... dance reality shows are opening up new public spaces for contestations and reaffirmations of identities in contemporary India’. Despite a shift in the way television choices emerge that reject domestic melodramas that exaggerate gender oppositions, certain stereotypes nonetheless emerge. Class VIII girls describe gender traits as follows: girls are responsible, caring sweet while boys are the opposite, irresponsible, careless. The boys describe boys to be talented and naughty while the girls are described as helpful, nice, hyper and angry. Interestingly, the adjectives the boys and especially girls used to describe themselves were much more idiosyncratic where girls called themselves, happy, caring and cool. The television programmes the students dislike are actually pointing towards a departure from certain fixed categories in the portrayal of genders. Not that a revolution of sorts has occurred but a certain shift is visible. When extremes are rejected, their plausibility is being rejected which then suggests that a multiple portrayal, closer to what is perceived as ‘real’, is being given credibility and hence some approval.

Dance, Drama as Gendered Expressions The cultural events in schools, especially the dramatic and dance events, in which students participate during competitions and the significant days in the school or public events, have implications for the portrayal of gendered identities. Schools, through these events, become contributors

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to the repertoire of gender conceptions available to their students. These events also become the sites of gendered expressions apart from impressions. Some very young students, girls and boys, were trained to participate in a musical presentation of yoga postures. In the green room, two girls (dressed in pink leotards and tee shirt with pink roses in their hair) were making fun of a boy participant dressed similarly except for the roses. They said, ‘You are dressed like a girl, in pink’ and laughed mischievously. He was offended and complained to the teacher, ‘Look ma’am she is saying that I am dressed like a girl.’ The girls were hushed up. The girls take part in much larger numbers in the dance-drama, on River Ganga. It depicts the journey of the river and the nurturing and giving nature of the river who is believed to be a goddess, a deity. Girls represent Ganga in its various stages viz., the beginning, the mid-course and its flow in the cities; girls represented all that was good in the dancedrama. Boys either had a brief entry as fishermen, or as Lord Shiva,14 but their most prominent role was that of ‘pollution’ that harms the river Ganga.15 The song’s lyrics say, ‘Why do you still keep flowing o mighty, graceful, powerful, grand Ganga … why don’t you just retaliate?’ It was meant to portray several cultural codes—the various classical dance forms; girls in their finest get ups; Ganga as a river, a lifeline; Ganga as a religious figure; Ganga as an enduring feminine power who can but does not unleash its wrath; and boys as the dark, the negative influences (they actually wore black dresses, wore black war paint and masked their eyes). There can be several readings of this but gendered readings hover between a fairly liberatory concept of women as powerful and women as benevolent despite the tortures they experience. The girls portrayed as the finer forms and the boys as rouges is another axis of interpretation. In the dramatic event, it was the opposite in terms of numerical division of actors; here the boys were in a majority while there were hardly four or five girls. The drama was a witty portrayal of the well-known Ali Baba and the 40 thieves from The Arabian Nights. What was significant in terms of gendered expressions was a multitude of gendered

14 He is one of the prime deities from the Hindu pantheon, who is believed to be carrying Ganga in his mane. 15 Over the years, the river Ganga has been polluted enormously by industrial effluents and city waste.

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persons—the boys as thugs, dacoits, honest, funny, romantic, wise and the girls as intelligent, cunning, greedy, quick witted and romantic.

Concluding Remarks This chapter has assessed the significance of peer contexts in their multiple hues especially for the students at the Pratyantar School. The peer relations mediate the schooling sometimes by socialising the students in the culture of the school and also by helping them overcome the anxieties that the school tends to induce in its students, intentionally or unintentionally. Peer cultures of a school are an informal aspect of school experience but are an integral part of the process of schooling. In this study a very significant link emerges between peer performatives and gender identities. Peer contexts seem to support gender stereotypes in some situations while simultaneously providing gender neutral spaces as well. In fact, the most prominent display of gender segregated activities is provided in and through peer interactions, at least, in this school. The formal school activities attempt to come through as gender sensitised, however preliminary these may seem. Gender constitution as the formal schooling facilitates, as the extra-curricular aspects of schooling lead to, as the peer stereotyping creates and as the peer relations tend to disregard (the gender difference)—all these discourses generate several pathways for gender identity to be constructed and reconstructed for its students. The informal aspects of schooling represented in peer relations and peer cultures of the school impart another kind of ‘education’ which leaves an impact on the students. Often this dimension reveals some of the most engaging concerns of students as social actors not just in school but beyond it as well. The pedagogic monitoring and mentoring of the students by teachers who share a different kind of relationship with them is assessed and measured in some form but this other learning which is through one’s peers is not usually considered a significant part of schooling. It remains, nevertheless, one of the meaningful aspects of school experience for the students. Its unmonitored and secondary status in school analysis makes it a site of complex and rich expressions and thus important to an understanding of school life.

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References Beresin, A.R. 2010. Recess Battles: Playing, Fighting and Storytelling. Oxford, MS: University Press of Mississippi. Butler, J. 1990. Gender Trouble: Feminism and the Subversion of Identity. New York, NY: Routledge. Carmichael, C.M. 2008. On the Playground: Discourse, Gender and Ideology in English Learner Peer Cultures. PhD Thesis. Department of Language Reading and Culture. Tucson, AZ: The University of Arizona. Chakravorty, Pallavi. 2011. ‘Global Dancing in Kolkata’, in C.D. Isabella (ed.), A Companion to the Anthropology of India, pp. 137–153. Oxford: Wiley-Blackwell. Chanana, Karuna. 1988. ‘Social Change or Social Reform: The Education of Women in Pre-independence India’, in K. Chanana (ed.), Socialization, Education and Women: Explorations in Gender Identity, pp. 96–128. New Delhi: Orient Longman Limited. ———. 2003. ‘Gender Inequality in Primary Schooling in India: The Human Rights Perspective’, in J. Tilak (ed.), Education, Society and Development: National and International Perspectives, pp. 197–218. New Delhi: NIEPA. Corsaro, W.A. 2005. The Sociology of Childhood. London, Thousand Oaks, CA; New Delhi: SAGE Publications. Corsaro, W.A. and D. Eder. 1990. ‘Children’s Peer Cultures’, Annual Review of Sociology, 16: 197–220. Corsaro, William A. 2006. ‘Qualitative Research on Children’s Peer Relations in Cultural Context’, in Xinyin Chen, Doran C. French, Barry Schneider (eds.), Peer Relationships in Cultural Context, pp. 96–122. New York, NY: Cambridge University Press. Davies, B. 2004. ‘The Discursive Production of the Male/Female Dualism in School Settings’, in S.J. Ball (ed.), The Routledge Falmer Reader in Sociology of Education, pp. 128–140. London: Routledge Falmer. Davies, B. and R. Harre. 2001. ‘Positioning the Discursive Production of Selves’, in Margaret Wetherell, Stephanie Taylor and Simeon J. Yates (eds), Discourse Theory and Practice: A Reader, pp. 261–283. London; Thousand Oaks, CA; New Delhi: SAGE Publications. Fiske, J. 1989. Understanding Popular Culture. London: Routledge. Francis, B. and C. Skelton. 2005. Reassessing Gender and Achievement. Questioning. Contemporary Debates, pp. 75–102. Great Britain: Routledge. Gilligan, C. 1982/1993. In a Different Voice: Psychological Theory and Women’s Development. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. Gordon, Tuula, Janet Holland and Elina Lahelma. 2000. Making Spaces. Basingstoke, London: Macmillan Press Ltd. Hammersley, M. and P. Atkinson. 1995. Ethnography. London: Routledge.

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Jeffery, Patricia. 2005. ‘Hearts, Minds and Pockets’, in P. Jeffery and R. Chopra (eds), Educational Regimes in Contemporary India, pp. 13–61. London, Thousand Oaks, New Delhi: SAGE Publications. Kehily, M.J. and A. Nayak. 1997. ‘Lads and Laughter: Humour and the Production of Heterosexual Hierarchies’, Gender and Education, 9 (1): 69–87. Lembo, R. 2000. Thinking through Television. New York, NY: Cambridge University Press. Liu, Fengshu. 2006. ‘School Culture and Gender’, in Christine Skelton, Becky Francis and Lisa Smulyan (eds), The SAGE Handbook of Gender and Education, pp. 425–438. London; Thousand Oaks, CA; New Delhi: SAGE Publications. MacDougall, D. 2004/2005. Some Alien Creatures. Rishi Valley Education Centre and Centre for Cross Cultural Research, Australian National University. 74 mins. Marcus, G.E. 1995. Ethnography through Thick and Thin. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press. McLaren, P. 1986. Schooling as a Ritual Performance. Boston, MA; London: Routledge and Kegan Paul. Rajagopal, A. 2009. The Indian Public Sphere. New Delhi: Oxford University Press. Romero, Maria Jose. 1991. ‘Work and Play in the Nursery School’, in Lois Weis, Philip G. Altbach, Gail P. Kelly and Hugh G. Petrie (eds), Critical Perspectives on Early Childhood Education, pp. 119–138. Albany, NY: State University of New York Press. Skelton, Christine. 2006. ‘Boys and Girls in the Elementary School’, in Christine Skelton, Becky Francis and Lisa Smulyan (eds), The SAGE Handbook of Gender and Education, pp. 139–151. London; Thousand Oaks, CA; New Delhi: SAGE Publications. Smith, Stephen J. 1997. ‘Observing Children on a School Playground: The Pedagogies of Child-watching’, in Ann Filer, Andrew Pollard and Dennis Thiessen (eds), Children and Their Curriculum: The Perspectives of Primary and Elementary School Children, pp. 143–161. London: The Falmer Press. Thapan, M. 1991. Life at School: An Ethnographic Study. Delhi: Oxford University Press. ———. 2005. ‘Cultures of Adolescence: Educationally Disadvantaged Young Women in an Urban Slum’, in R. Chopra and P. Jeffery (eds), Educational Regimes in Contemporary India, pp. 216–236. London, Thousand Oaks, CA; New Delhi: SAGE Publications. Thorne, Barrie. 2002. ‘Do Girls and Boys have Different Cultures?’, in S. Jackson and S. Scott (eds), Gender: A Sociological Reader, pp. 291–302. Abingdon; New York, NY: Routledge. Tucker, E. 2008. Children‘s Folklore: A Handbook. Westport, CT: Greenwood Publishing Group.

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Underwood, M.K. 2008. ‘Gender and Peer Relations: Are the Two Genders Really All that Different?’ Available online at http://www.cds.unc.edu/cchd/ s2008/02-25/underwood 1.pdf (accessed on 10 December 2013). Wazir, R. 2000. The Gender Gap in Basic Education. India: SAGE Publications. Weedon, C. 1987. Feminist Practice and Post-structuralist Theory. Oxford: Basil Blackwell. Willis, P. 1977. Learning to Labour: How Working Class Kids Get Working Class Jobs. New York, NY: Columbia University Press. ———. 2000. The Ethnographic Imagination. UK: Polity Press. Willis, Paul. 2011. ‘Elements of a Culture’, in Richard Arum, Irenee R. Beattie and Karly Ford (eds), The Structure of Schooling: Readings in the Sociology of Education, pp. 228–242. Thousand Oaks, CA: Pine Forge Press.

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Schooling and the Production of Student Culture: Principles and Practice Maitrayee Deka

Introduction

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thnography of a school is singular in illustrating the social worlds of the students, teachers, office bearers, rules and regulations of a particular school (Thapan 1991).1 It is simultaneously part of a general 1 The study of school as a social universe has extended the idea of school as a closed organisation or institution to look at it as a dynamic social space. Ethnographic details of a school analysing the lives, rituals and activities of the students, teachers and office bearers provide a thick description about the everyday life of the school. In this regard, it is worth mentioning the classic ethnographic work on an Indian school by Thapan (1991) and the way in which through her works the school emerges as a social world of negotiations. The school in which I conducted my fieldwork is Erudite Public School (EPS) in North West Delhi. I conducted my fieldwork in 2007 and in 2008. The initial days in the school were spent in figuring out how to gain access to the classroom, teachers and the students. With the permission of the school counsellor, I could finally gain entry to the classes. In 2007, I spent time in different classes in which the teacher was absent. In 2008, I spent more time in the class XII Humanities and Commerce sections. I interacted with the students

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framework of analysing the school as a pedagogic space of knowledge production, creating productive individuals and good ‘citizens’ (Durkheim 1973; Parsons 1951). Taking into account school as an institution of knowledge transmission and a particular conceptualisation of that, this chapter attempts to examine the extent to which secular and normative knowledge impact the students at Erudite Public School (EPS).2 EPS as a modern institution demarcates itself from other schools by defining its role as going beyond academics to the domain of the ordering of life. There are, however, different practices, rituals and cultural formations of the students’ community which resists it from becoming an absolute space. In reality, incorporating the school ideals within the everyday life of the students, we may argue learning is in the process of ‘becoming’ and not fixed (Deleuze 1995; Williams 2000; Žižek 2004).3 In the secular dimension of the school, which largely involves teaching according to a systematic curriculum, the students conform to the tenets during classes as well as in the lunch hours. The fieldwork comprised participant observation. I would sit through many of the classes, take notes and interact with the teacher as well as the students. A lot of times issues came out through discussions rather than a strict question–answer session. A questionnaire was also used to obtain broad opinions of students on particular subjects like their family backgrounds, religious affiliations, place of residence, opinions on consumption, preferences, etc. Interviews with the principal and teachers were conducted by taking prior permission from them and they were mostly unstructured. The responses of the students towards me varied from surprise to excitement. As the students became familiar with me, they were happy to be in a class with me so that they could chat about things apart from their books. At most times, it was difficult to stick to a structured interview schedule. Students at the beginning of the interaction preferred to talk about light topics like movies. My visits started becoming more welcoming to the students when they were accustomed to the idea that I was not part of the regular staff. They could discuss things with me without fearing the consequences. It was mostly during lunch break that I got to observe a whole range of students forming groups and cliques irrespective of their classes and courses. 2 In this chapter, the academic activities within the school like classroom teaching, assignments, sports and competitions are taken as the sphere of secular knowledge. The normative sphere, on the other hand, comprises the principles of the school with a strong emphasis on Indian tradition, minimalistic consumption behaviour and disciplining of the body and the mind. 3 The attempt is to capture an emergent field where objects are given at a point in time, but the ways in which each of them interacts with one another create a reality of their own and are not formulated prior to the act of interaction. This refers to the Deleuzian idea of creating the context and not historically having it as a precondition. Ontology of becoming according to Deleuze (1995) indicates the aspect of reality as being in a state of flux and the presence of differentiation behind all static things. Learning in this regard includes the processes of variations within it. At EPS, through the students’ negotiation with rules and obligations, learning is processual than fixed.

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laid down by the school. In other words, so far as the rules are about the content of the syllabus, quantity of tests and assignments and emphasis on procuring good grades, the students agree with the school. It is in the normative world of the school with an overall emphasis on classical Indian values where the students are observed to follow the rules mechanically. They find moralistic ideas of disciplining as a mode to build up an obedient personality implausible. Furthermore, the restrictions of the school against performing western musical instruments and songs in various celebrations are viewed by the student community as an archaic practice. At EPS, the process of education is all about creating productive individuals imbibed with definite sets of values (Apple 1995).4 The students who are from similar socio-economic backgrounds assist in imagining a common goal for the school. The authorities, the school principal and teaching staff try to implement the shared goals of education among other things to hone skill sets for the practical world.5 The professional and business ‘class’ that the students mostly belong to, can be analysed in the framework of social class illustrated by Bourdieu (1992) merging together economic and cultural capital. The students are closer to those idioms of the school which enable an economic reproduction of their class situation through the subjects laid out in the syllabus. Most of the subjects especially for the science students like mathematics, physics and biology lay the base for a future in engineering or medicine. The construction of a cultural universe, on the contrary, is in a nascent stage, weaving multiple stories in a globalised context. Generally, the students are Hindu ‘middle class’ with a strong moral universe of dharma, located earliest in the Vedic texts (Saavala 2010).6 Along with 4 At EPS there is an absence of a critical pedagogy revising the role of school as a ‘neutral’ organisation. In fact, there is a tendency to see the school as a noble institution as it is trying to inculcate particular sets of values. These values are conceptualised through the rationale of a certain section of society. The value of education is imagined from a privileged position of an urban Hindu ‘middle class’ in India. The need of schooling to reflect and build sensitivity towards larger inequalities in society and difference in opportunities is not emphasised. 5 Henceforth, I will be using the term ‘authorities’ to mean the principal and the teaching staff. Whenever there is an exclusion of anyone from the category it will be indicated in the passage. 6 Minna Saavala (2010) suggests using the idea of negation to speak about the middle class. In this way, one need not exactly define who constitutes the middle class but we can identify it by talking about who does not. The middle class in India likewise is not the elite and the decision making class. They are not manual workers and are educated. In this

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the cultural universe of Hindu values that the students inherit, they are experiencing another ‘life-world’ with peers in a globalised world of goods, ideas and lifestyles (Wagner 1983). The students want the economic advantages of their class to continue by getting into lucrative professions. However, in terms of their cultural universe, they are seen to move away from a traditional Hindu upbringing of right/wrong and are experimenting amongst other things a commodity-centric lifestyle. In this light, they are in an ‘embryonic’ class position keeping intact the professional desires of the class they were born into. They have an open mindset to the different cultural objects from brands to teen jargon to pop music that they can use to build an identity.7 They have multiple modes of self-expression vis-à-vis their parents. The students have flexible opinions on the normative ideas of the school, and a ‘glocal’ approach to the world around them.8 This chapter explores the ways in which principles of a particular school are arrived at and the areas in which it faces strong resistance from the students.9 The first part is a brief introduction to the teachings of the syllabus and other activities of the school. This section is followed by an exploration of the ideals of the school and the ways in which it is transmitted to the students. Next section is an examination of the lobby as a crucial area illustrating the priorities of the school. The final section

light, both the business and professional class to which the students broadly belong can be co-opted within the umbrella term ‘middle class’. 7 I use the word embryonic to show the changes that the students are bringing to their inherited class ideas which merges economic security with strong classical Hindu values like obedience, meekness and respect. The students want economic security but they also want loose ideas of a moral universe and do not mind it getting muddled with ‘conspicuous consumption’ and ideas of individualism/autonomy (Veblen 1899). Such a negotiation is embedded in a transforming society. Along with the development of students as earning members of society, class ideas will take a more pronounced shape in the coming years. 8 ‘Glocal’ is indicative of the local being the vantage point through which the students are gazing at the world and are filtering ideas which are attractive to them (Gobo 2011). It does not mean that the local is getting subsumed by the global. 9 School is a separate world as it restricts the movement of individuals within its premises. At the same time, it is rife with inter exchanges with the larger world primarily through the socially embedded student population and their guardians. The distinctiveness lies in the ability of the school to be a closed world for a few hours for the staff and the students. It is interesting to examine the extent to which this boundedness configures in the ideas of the students. There is therefore the possibility of looking at school both as a place which has an identity of its own and at the same time viewing that identity as contingent on the constant interaction with the larger world.

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opens the school as a complex space through the voices of the students commenting on the norms of the school.

Curricular Activities in the School EPS is a co-educational institution with classes from nursery to twelfth standard. It is spread across a wide area having a separate wing each for junior, middle and senior schools. For the XI and XII standards the school offers humanities, commerce and science subjects. Around 70 per cent of the students are from neighbouring areas of North West Delhi. During my fieldwork, the school had a strength of about 3,500 students. A single class has on an average five sections with each class having 25–40 students. Each class is for 35 minutes and there are about eight periods daily of different subjects with a 20 minutes lunch break in between. On most days, a free period is available to the students due to the absence of one teacher or another. A proxy teacher usually fills in and the students spend their time finishing incomplete homework. The school has a tight schedule of tests and assignments. Apart from the students having to do homework almost daily, there are weekly tests on different subjects. The students take the classroom teaching very seriously. They do not question the heavy school syllabus and imposition of a whole range of assignments and special classes on different subjects. In an increasingly competitive environment, they think rigour is necessary. In other words, the academic rigour that the school promotes is seen to be beneficial for the students. Any lapses are considered as negligence on the part of the student himself/herself. Grades which reflect on the prospective chances of faring at the boards and other competitive examinations affect the students immensely. Some days, I see the students sulking over their poor grades. It seems that the life of the senior school students hangs on a thin thread of performance. Good grades indicate that they will be in coveted courses that can guarantee them better job possibilities. The senior school students widely perceive the science stream smarter and more knowledgeable than the humanities. Science students put a greater emphasis to be either an engineer or a doctor. Apart from the school lessons, they take up coaching in various institutes to qualify in the entrance examinations for professional courses. The students mention

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that the pressure is high from their parents to study Science. Even those students who have chosen Humanities after their class X Board exams express the discouragement they face from their families regarding their decision. Interestingly, the opinions of the elder members of the family become an influential factor in the academic orientation of the school. Inadvertently, science stream gets maximum attention from the faculty. This is proven by the fact that in the senior classes there are at least four sections for Science and fewer sections for Commerce and Humanities students. The everyday lessons at school comprise teaching the chapters on different subjects, and sometimes discussing things outside of the textbooks. It is interesting to note how the linkages drawn during classes depend on the subject at hand. The English teacher in a particular class with a poem about the gap between the lived realities of the children living in slums and the lessons they learn at school makes the students aware of the problems faced by them. She points to the fact there is a world outside their classroom which is difficult and different. Another day in one of the classes of economics in the Commerce section, the lesson is on market and competition. The students are asked to prepare advertising jingles within ten minutes forming a group of five. After the time elapsed, the different groups try to sell products like matchboxes and washing powder with jingles that mostly resemble Bollywood movie tunes. The English teacher emphasises on developing humanitarian sentiments while the class on economics is about learning practical skills to succeed in the market. In many instances, the students participate in class half-heartedly but the topics are at times picked up from out-ofclass conversations. The selection of monitors is an important activity in the school. The school monitors are selected from a small group of students. These students have to participate in overnight camps and participate in various competitions before they are selected for the post. The outcome of the selection process is awaited apprehensively. Before the selection, the students are wondering about whose nominations will go in. After the selection they are either celebrating or gossiping about the impartial stance of the teachers in selecting a candidate over another (Hallett et al. 2009).10 10 Gossip and gossiping emerge as an interesting area to understand the ways in which the formulations of a student culture take place. In this chapter, gossip is used to understand the larger realm of discussing people, and events. The absence of an explicit utilitarian value attached to idle talks helps me to differentiate gossip from other conversation, say, about studies. At EPS, there is a clear separation of topics that are used to pull each

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There are usually discussions about the ways to deal with the new head boy or head girl. To be selected as a monitor is a status symbol as the incumbent is a notch higher than the rest in the power hierarchy, placed between the teachers and rest of the students. The school gives importance to sports-related events. Students are encouraged to take part in various games and sports. The school boasts of a good swimming and table tennis team. The students miss classes for tournaments and it is seen that even amongst bright students, the concept of a good sportsperson is welcoming. In the above section, a brief discussion about the academic routine of EPS is given with aspects of the students, and teaching culture. These activities broadly cover the secular sphere of the school which aims at transmitting skill sets to students to excel in the practical world. We notice that all the activities whether it is classroom assignments, sports or the selection of the monitors have an underlying achievement oriented approach. In other words, accolades and praises are showered on students who excel in academics and in sports. The students also take pride in their achievements. They treat these activities as forming the base of their future life. The students believe in a Darwinian logic of ‘survival of the fittest’, which they see as the disposition of the society at large. With the norms however, which is discussed in detail in the subsequent sections, they appear for the students at another level of importance, open for negotiation and subversion.

Perspectives Informing School Ideals The Founding Society EPS has been established by a trust called Inspiring Education Society (IES). IES was founded by eminent educationists and social workers in 1944. It started off as a social welfare organisation providing nurses’ training facility after Independence. Gradually, it grew into an expansive body financing and administering educational institutions. EPS was other’s leg and relax. These talks are usually about dating amongst the students, conversations about consumption, physical appearances and dissatisfaction with the school principles. Academic topics are seldom available to similar kind of negotiation and criticism. In a broad way therefore, most topics which are not to do with studies are gossip which are open to discussion, criticism and also caricature.

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established under IES in 1984. With the aid of the funds released by donors, the school has developed into a prominent educational institution in West Delhi. The main building of the school is built in a 3.84 acre complex acquired by the society from Delhi Development Authority (DDA) on lease basis in 1986. The parent body of EPS lists itself as a philanthropist organisation. The website of the Society spells out clearly that the IES was set up in the year 1944 during the pre-Independence era with a particular motive. ‘When the elders thought that Indian culture, heritage, tradition and ethos must be preserved and fostered and in order to achieve these objectives, it became obligatory for the Society to educate the young people.’ The Society emphasises the need to establish schools going beyond syllabus education to create individuals trained in Indian culture, tradition and heritage. Established at the time of Independence, it echoes the strong sentiments of nation-building and creation of individuals who are uninfluenced by colonial culture. The Society envisions the responsibility of students to become formidable citizens who will carry forward the traditional legacy of India. Furthermore, the brochure of the Society speaks about the aims of the schools established under it as: The establishment of IES in 1944 is owed to the vision and perspicacity of our elders who thought that whilst progressing and modernizing, Indian culture, heritage, tradition must be preserved and nurtured. They seek to instil in the children proper habits, positive attitudes and values such as truthfulness, unselfishness, self respect, and self control, sense of duty, striving for excellence, respect for authority, civic sense, good manners, fair play, team spirit, dignity of labour, punctuality, compassion, freedom of mind, and a rational and scientific approach.

The amalgamation of a whole set of ideals reflects the larger ideas of nation-building prevalent in the country during the time of Independence and in post-Independence India especially in the Nehruvian era. The importance given to ‘Indian culture, heritage, tradition’ and rational scientific knowledge echoes the larger project of the nation to develop and industrialise without losing sight of the unique heritage of the country. The school attempts to promote Indian culture and tradition in several contexts. The school organises functions, competitions and special celebrations like SPIC MACAY events which encourage Indian cultural programmes. English songs and dances are prohibited in school events. Different regional dances and indigenous musical instruments like tabla and sitar are promoted over guitar and drums. The school notice boards

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and collages have several quotes and posters of ancient monuments stating India to have the richest heritage in the world.

The Teaching Staff and the Ideals of the School The Principal of the school, Mr Bharadwaj sees it as an important responsibility to implement the ideals of the school laid out by the founding society. He envisions the goal of the school is to build a wholesome personality not viewing academics as the sole imperative of schooling. The principal highlights that the school consciously makes an effort to promote Indian culture over the west. The school accordingly offers courses in Hindi and Sanskrit. When I ask him about the apparent contradiction as to why English is used as the medium of instruction, he does not comment. Mr Bharadwaj lashes out against the adulteration of Indian culture by the west. Salsa training according to him is receiving celebrity status and the Indian dancing styles have in the process got marginalised. This trend for him is worth thinking through. He contemplates that the loss of rich Indian tradition with the invasion of western dance forms can take an irreversible turn in the near future. The attempts of the school to train the students in different art forms of classical dance, songs, shlokas (Sanskrit hymns) are for him direct measures to counter western influences. Mr Bharadwaj has an unequivocal understanding of the norms of the school inherited from the ideologies of the founding society. He introduces discipline as a tool to enforce the rules and the norms of the school. He believes that when behaviour is under observation, it is disciplined and when it is not, it takes the form of aggression. He puts it, ‘The school makes an attempt to discipline the students as much as possible. In this school we make sure that boys keep short hair. I feel good when students walk up to me after years and thank me for instilling in them this habit.’ There is a tone of discontentment when he speaks about the increasing difficulty in maintaining strict discipline on campus. Discipline is not what it used to be ten years ago. About a decade back when the visitors used to come during lunch time, they used to ask if the school was on a holiday as it was so quiet. But now it is the opposite, at lunch times my office is blasting with screams and noises of the students.

Mr Bharadwaj regrets incidents of senior students destroying laboratory equipment and toilet amenities. He claims the slackness is not

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on the part of the authority to enforce discipline. He blames the larger society in creating aggressiveness in the youth. The visual exposure to new consumer goods, a westernised media and liberalisation of the market, according to him, are some of the main causes for creating a sense of restlessness in the youth. He speaks how the neo-rich are nurturing a blasé attitude and children are increasingly reflecting the same. He draws a comparison between those who are traditionally rich and the nouveau riche; the latter for him is the category who believes in being silly and irresponsible. You won’t see the kids of Tata and Ambani’s reflecting this nonchalant attitude. When I was a student whenever the teacher punished anyone, then parents at home would again scold their kids for violating the rules of the school. Now if someone gets punished guardians come the next day and question the school about the action taken against their child. They sympathize with their own children saying how they had gone into depression post the incident and were refusing to have food.

Mr Bharadwaj asserts obeying an authority for the benefit of the society as a whole has become a less popular value. He ends the conversation by referring to entropy, a phenomenon in thermodynamics. It stands for a situation when after a slump in the activities of matter, there is a boom. He believes the downward trend of society is reaching its lowest point and after this phase, it is bound to change for the better. It is interesting to note the romantic tone in the principal’s concerns. In resisting tropes of western modernity, for him a certain timeless notion of India is sustained. There is an acritical understanding of an ‘authentic’ Indian culture (Chong 2011). This aspect is captured amongst other things by a popular notion of Sanskriti, a Hinduised idea of Indian tradition flowing from Vedic texts and myths11 (Sharma 1987). In his conversation, it becomes clear that the school is not merely in the business 11 Through the course of the interview with the Principal, the notion of Indian tradition and culture that came out strongly was close to the one produced by epics like Mahabharata and Ramayana. The emphasis on obeying rules and voluntarily exercising control on behaviour appear to flow from ancient Vedic role of Guru–Shishya (Teacher–Disciple) and corresponding sets of obligations. The moral universe of the Hindus is strongly based on the line of conduct which among other things is illustrated by the concept of Dharma, duty. The sense of obligation nurtures a notion of the right action which an individual is assigned within the whole. Unlike the western ideas of individualism particularly post-enlightenment ideas of autonomy, individuals in the Hindu moral universe are understood through their position in the overall system of order and merit.

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of transmitting scholastic education but is responsible for building character of students. A puritanical notion of order aimed by the school and the surrounding disorder is a binary which is accepted by other members of the teaching staff, particularly by Mr Lal. He is one of the teachers after the Principal who is constantly surveying the school for miscreants. Under the supervision of Mr Lal, disciplining is broken down into minute practices. He sees if the boys have their shirts hanging loose and if the pants are worn below the navel button. The shirt sleeves should be rolled up and the ties worn properly. These checks are repeated almost every day in different classes. The offender is sometimes poked with a stick in the belly button if he wears the pants low and beaten up occasionally. The prevalence of a strong sense of disciplining is part of the school culture. For the authority, it stands out as a means to meet the normative ends of the school and for the students it is a symbolic reminder that they are part of EPS. The gap between the importance that authorities attach to values and the students is wide. In EPS, there is a lack of dialogue in making the larger principles of the school understandable to the students. The students see the need to follow discipline only as an empty ritual and do not see such acts developing a sense of control of the temptations of the self. Modesty of dress and habits in portraying a superior personality is an ideal which is abstractly followed by the students. In fact, students display their annoyance with regard to the constant supervision imposed by the school. A few groups of students directly challenge the authority of the school. And most other students follow the rules in a rehearsed fashion. In the next section, there is a broader understanding of the ways in which the principles of the school and disciplining of the mind and the body get juxtaposed in the everyday life of the school.

Body That Can Be Disciplined Signs of disobedience to a great extent are mapped on the body, the way in which the body is conducted, groomed or made to appear. Both boys and girls undergo supervision. However, there is a difference in the way in which aberration in both genders is handled. For boys, the breaking of rules is sometimes met with physical punishment. They go through a drill of checking; girls do not undergo physical checking. Most of the time, they are reproved for sporting stylish haircuts. There have been instances when girls have been reprimanded for dying their hair. One of the Humanities teachers is known to pick on female students if they are

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found to thread their eye brows. Aachal, a student of class XII, narrates this particular incident when one of her friends had bleached her face. She claims that teachers are attentive to every detail of how girls carry themselves. They at once deciphered that her friend had bleached her face and she was given a warning to not repeat it in the future. Bodies at EPS not only have to act in a particular way in terms of the demeanour and appearance but there is also an image of an ideal typical body. The image of a noble student comes from the fact that the collar buttons are fastened, boys have short hair not falling on the forehead; tie in place and socks pulled up. Boys should not forget to wear their vests under their shirt and girls should not paint their nails. For both genders, it is important to wear their pants or skirts above the belly button. Changes in the personality of the students are achieved through practices of embodiment, the way in which the body is carried in the premises of the school and the way it appears.12 For the authorities regimenting the body is closely connected to an image and possibility to attain a desirable self (Deshpande 1993; Goffman 1959). Even the teachers have to follow the rules and discipline of the school. The forms of discipline are seen to be same for the teachers as those of the students. There is a rumour in the school that a lady teacher was given a warning as she had dyed her hair reddish brown, and she had to dye it back to black to continue teaching in the school. Female teachers dress mostly in Indian attires like salwar kameez and occasionally in sarees. The authorities act as the custodian of the body which is strongly associated with the notion of modesty and docility. As Foucault points out ‘A body is docile that may be subjected, used, transformed and improved’ (1979: 136). The school as an ‘Ideological State Apparatus’ attempts to reproduce a Hindu ‘middle class’ moral universe through moulding of bodily gestures and dispositions (Althusser 1971). The notions of purity and pollution, good and evil are translated through the regulated body which defines the normal. The school derives its legitimacy from disciplining as the authorities in the long run see this discipline building up an EPS product, a subject who has incorporated the values of Indian tradition and also knows the ways to look Indian. What becomes interesting is that apart from training of bodies to fit in a moralistic universe, an attempt is made by the school to internalise those values in 12 Satish Deshpande (1993) interestingly brings out the idea of dress and that of the Indian loom creating an idea of the native contesting the foreign in the Indian struggle for independence.

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the students. These two aspects in Hinduism, especially in the Yogic tradition, are correlated. The body needs to be disciplined to be able to discipline the mind which leads to the true realisation of the self, the Atman (Judith 2009).

Disciplining of the Mind In the ideals of the school, developments of the body and the mind are not seen separately but in an interdependent way (Lucas 2002; Seidler 1998). Both the body and the mind in the school are believed to go astray when they are not under supervision. This aspect resembles the Foucauldian idea of a social morality which acts on individual morality to ‘know the self’. The knowledge of the self as Foucault theorises in the Christian tradition becomes a public spectacle both in the practice of sinning and confessing it to the Church. At EPS, in a similar fashion there is an emphasis on knowing the self through renouncing it. Furthermore, it entails a sacrifice of free will for a purer authority (Foucault 1988). The school takes the form of an authoritative entity having the tools and methods to correct thoughts. There is an evocation of a corrective practice that limits the presence of a sensible consciousness prior to training. In this regard, the school is convinced that young minds need to be trained to control bad influences. The notion of a holistic personality development at EPS hinges on the ability to nurture a healthy body and mind. The role of both in a given point is seen not through their inherent characters but the future forms that it will take through training. Thought is viewed as an instinct that can be sharpened for better mental faculty. Links drawn with a higher energy and controlling of temptation are perceived as ways to build a healthy personality. Juxtaposed to the training of the minds are ideas of a spiritual being. It is laid out in a more abstract sense as something whose impact cannot be perceived directly or in an immediate fashion. It is projected as those virtues which will make the students better human beings. As IES brochure mentions, the motive is to create spiritual beings who engage in material pursuits for survival keeping intact their ‘relationship with God and ... develop spiritual life with a genuine spirit of freedom and commitment’. The spiritual register, therefore, builds another layer to the triad. Disciplining of the body entails a physical training of habits and demeanour. Disciplining of the mind is to do with thought, conduct and a general everyday philosophy of life. And the spiritual register has a more cosmic appeal of oneness vis-à-vis God.

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In the school training of the mind flows from different mediums like absorbing classical music, meditation and listening to the noble words of leaders of different religious/spiritual organisations.13 Chanting of Sanskrit shlokas and recitals of Indian classical dances are viewed as modes to attain peace. In a few conversations with the school counsellor who is constantly interacting with different students regarding their personal and study-related problems, she comments that there is a greater need to pacify the young minds. The school, according to her, through various activities has been realising the demand for students to have a healthy development curbing the wastage of mental and physical energy. The effective mode of training of the mind in the school is attained through the existing ‘Tuesday Assemblies’ when leaders of different spiritual institutions or other prominent semi-religious organisations come and speak to the students for about an hour. The different speakers from various organisations like the Art of Living, Brahma Kumari and Anu Sankalp Sanshtha, lecture on various aspects, principles amongst which are thoughts on how to build self-restraint and exercise control over the mind through meditation. For instance, the speaker from Anu Sankalp Sanshtha highlights the need to have the correct physical posture while eating, sleeping and sitting to have a healthy body and mind. The speaker alerts the students of the possibility of certain food creating heat in the body making people anxious and distracted. The speaker for Art of Living, a qualified engineer maintains that apart from a stable professional life, it is important to have a peaceful mental constitution. He elaborates on the importance of meditation for disciplining the mind. In the above section, we see the school developing as a normative site with fixed notions of what is wrong or right. Beginning with the school ideals which harps back to a pristine Indian tradition, the school principal and teachers meticulously follow them in the everyday practices of the school. We see through rigid notion of control over the body, the mind and a search for the universalising spirit, a Hindu moral universe at the structural level is created in the school. Most schools have an overarching framework of discipline. Leriche argues one of the ways in which discipline is viewed in schools is through the lens of order. He says, ‘One of the axioms in the process of schooling is that schools, in order to carry out their mission of educating students 13 The reason for the usage of the word ‘spiritual’ and ‘semi-religious’ is that many of these institutions have their own understanding of a spiritual being, while in some it takes the form of a divinity, in others it is a set of practices.

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well, must maintain order. This is an absolute necessity because if order is not maintained, chaos results’ (Leriche 1991: 77). He further argues the way in which discipline is enforced in schools impacts the learning of the students. If we focus on EPS, matters are complicated. Disciplining is not limited to classroom practices like maintaining silence in the class and not entering late in the class. Disciplining is an ideology and the chapter argues that it has a strong Hindu connotation. Beginning with the understanding of modesty of dress, pure mind and soul, the associations made by the school are largely limited to the Greater Indian Tradition (Nath 2001). For instance, immodesty in dress is examined as a corrupt influence of the west. And the traditional Indian/Hindu ways of civility are perceived through practices of tidiness, simplicity and restraint. Again if we focus on the routine followed to discipline the mind, many of the methods like chanting of Sanskrit hymns, meditation, etc., are part of the Hindu religious philosophies to be one with the self and in turn with God. The blurring of cultural and religious boundaries in the school does not happen with other religions like Christianity and Islam. We do not see symbols of these religions getting subsumed in the moral universe of the school. The fragility of disciplining comes out clearly through the noncommitted way in which the students surrender to it. Disciplinary practices for the authorities act as a reminder of the higher ideals they are pursuing. Indoctrination of the same in the students however remains an incomplete project.

The School Lobby as an Amorphous Space, the Outside and Inside of the School The lobby at EPS acts as a ‘liminal’ zone or the threshold giving a glimpse of the activities, rituals and rules of the school (Turner 1969; van Gennep 2004).14 The television set placed at one corner of the lobby keeps playing footage from school functions highlighting Indian cultural dance and 14 Victor Turner (1969) uses the term ‘liminality’ to talk about the threshold that, amongst other things, pilgrims face when they move from one stage to another. Turner’s idea of liminality can be understood parallel to van Gennep’s (2004) idea of Rites of Passage where an individual in order to move into a different stage of her life has to transcend the boundary and occasionally be in the liminal zone to reach the further stage in life.

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performances. As one hears the tabla recital by an exponent dressed in traditional Indian attire for a good 20 minutes, one seems to be automatically transported to a different space and time. The continuous airing of noble thoughts in red neon light adds to the sanctified feel of the place. ‘Don’t speak ill of others, hard work pays,’ ‘Be a candle and shed your light,’ ‘those who listen badly also understand badly’ are some of the adages that keep flashing on the screen above the reception desk. In one corner of the lobby is a cupboard adorned with trophies and medals won by the students at various competitions. A separate board enlists the names of school toppers at the secondary and senior secondary examinations. Lines of photographs of students participating in school tournaments are framed and displayed on the walls. The lobby acts as the meeting ground of a whole set of people broadly the non-academic staff, the teachers, the students, guardians and other visitors. Guardians approach the reception desk at the centre of the lobby to fix an appointment with the principal or other teachers. At other times, the school authority summons guardians for a variety of reasons, one of them being disciplinary breaches by their wards. Every day, I sit for at least 10 minutes in the lobby before entering the main school building. I call from the phone at the lobby to the school counsellor. She then speaks to the receptionist who then signs a slip, one copy of which I have to submit to the guard who sits at the corridor in the main building. As a passage, the lobby acts as the zone of surveillance and it has its way of asserting who are to be accepted as legitimate members of the institution. It acts as the ‘panopticon’ keeping an eye on the unfamiliar stranger (Foucault 1979).15 Lobby being part of the school but not the school per se again is a fluid space which includes disruptive elements that the rest of the school cannot accommodate. For instance, a student who has broken disciplinary rules needs to be separated from the rest. One day, Ashish, a student of class IX is sitting quietly in one corner of the lobby. He has taken the latest Amir Khan hairdo (actor, Hindi film industry) with razor marks on his head. He asks me if I am carrying kohl which he can use to conceal the hair cut. I offer him mine but he is not too happy with the effect and anxiously tells me that he has to find a permanent solution to undo the haircut. He does not know how to appear immediately ‘normal’ again. 15 Foucaldian notion of the ‘panopticon’ being a visible structure puts individuals in a mode of self-disciplining. The lobby fits into the idea where the officials at the reception desk can keep an eye on the outsider and control her movements without taking direct disciplinary measures (Foucault 1979).

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The lobby gives glimpses of the academic environment of the school through the displayed awards and certificates. It is the normative universe of the school which gets highlighted. Whether we focus on the programmes aired on the television or the innumerable quotes that keep flashing on the board, lobby becomes symptomatic of the attempts of the school to create more than just a studious pupil.

Ordered Multiplicity and Everyday Practices in the School This section through textbooks, classroom discussions and out of class conversations intends to examine the ways in which the principles of the school jostle with micro-practices specifically concentrating on Indian tradition, citizenship and consumption patterns. There is an attempt to highlight the dilemmas and dynamics of EPS as an educational institute. We may argue that the commonalities of the student community set the context for ordered multiplicity (Berti 2001; Foucualt 1981).16 On the one hand, there is no externally visible character organising the micro practices of the school. However, the physical location of the school, gender norms, age, material resources and cultural background of the students develop a familiar train of thought to judge various issues. The jumbled up ideas of the students, the aspirations of the parents and the ideals of the school talk to each other. The views of the students at times fall under the fold of generation divide when there is a negotiation at the level of the school authorities or with the parents. The fragmented nature of the opinions of the students are located in a fluid notion of class, gender and age dynamics bringing uniformity to the way in which they are seeing their world and imagining a future.

16 The process is understood through a philosophical idea of seeing order in multiplicity of ‘being.’ The prevalence of a way to communicate through a messy network of thoughts and opinions arise as individuals enter the social world; develop a pattern of locating interests and a way to talk about them. It is similar to Foucauldian idea of discourse in terms of having a specific stream of thoughts to talk about a particular topic (Foucault 1972). It is, however, different as these discourses are not seen in the chapter as historically given. They arise through the instances of students being together in a space and borrowing points of references from their immediate environment.

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The Meaning of ‘Indianness’ from the Students’ Perspective Students are experimenting with multiple routes of negotiation to interpret the ideals of the school. They are not homogeneous about their views regarding what constitute cultural ideas of being ‘Indian’. If we focus on the school, it clearly spells out what it means to be an Indian. The views of the principal and the lobby highlight traditional customs and cultural symbols like classical dances, recitals of Sanskrit hymns, modesty and meekness, exemplifying the traits of an Indian (Dumont 1980).17 Irawati Karve in Yuganta beautifully through the lens of gender brings out how in the classical Hindu Epic Mahabharata, most of the women characters from Kunti to Draupadi to Gandhari have been relegated to a dominated position bound by morals of being submissive, and fulfilling obligations (Karve 2006). Ruth Vanita similarly through the character of Sulabha in Mahabharata problematises the links drawn amongst merit, obedience and moral responsibility in the Hindu mythologies (2003). Over time, there has been sedimentation of similar narration of ‘meekness’ and ‘modesty’ in popular culture with regard to God fearing families and patriotic citizens like in Hindi movies.18 There are a number of ways in which the opinions of the students fit in the broader frame of inculcating Indian tradition and culture. One of the ways of looking at it would be through a smaller group of students who are integrated fully into the ideals of the school of respecting and nurturing classical Indian traditions. Another group of students reacted strongly to the principles of the school. For them being Indian is a hybrid construct which amongst other elements includes belief systems of the west. The attitudes with which the students differently engage with the school’s ideal of proliferation of Indianness largely arise from their immediate reality. The world they encounter every day outside the 17 Being an Indian is historically located in specific contexts. Although many scholars (Deshpande 2003; Singh 1973) talk about the heterogeneity of such a tradition, from time to time cultural, physical and historical specificities do provide a homogenous notion of the same. In many of the seminal works, we do find a link between essences of Indian society through institutions/systems like caste and organisations of life around it. In the conversations, renditions of Indian tradition appear to be affected by puritan notion of customs and habits depicted in tales of parental devotion like Shravana. 18 Some of the Hindi movies which have played along the virtues of worshipping God and parents are Kabhi Khushi Kabhi Gham and Hum Saath Saath Hain. Movies that are in recent times patriotic are Border, Gadar, Sarfarosh, etc.

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school develops as a position from which they evaluate the principles upheld by the school. If the students encounter very contrasting everyday realities from those forwarded by the school, they inquire about the practicability of those ideas that refuse to accommodate any variations. Students who view the benefits of following an Indian culture and tradition see it through the act of instilling ‘good’ habits. One of the ways in which they speak of this aspect is by practically quoting personal instances of showing respect to their parents, not answering back to them and condemning premarital sex. An example of obedience cited is how they readily become frugal when their parents ask them to not spend much in a particular month. Even with regard to pocket money for that matter, students say that they never make any demands for it. They get money when necessary. The good quality is also reflected in the ability to give commitment to different relationships according to a few students. Garvita, jokingly remarks, ‘Due to the influence of the west, a girl having a boy friend is found thinking about another one; however, the “Indianess” does not disappear as she would be scared to date both the boys at the same time.’ Indianness here is to comply with accepted standards of dating which are rooted in values like being faithful and steady. In contrast, the west is seen to allow risk and edgy behaviour. A number of students openly show their disregard towards Indian tradition. Some students using sarcasm speak of the ways in which the school can never reach an idealistic position of initiating a quintessential notion of Indian culture and tradition. If that has been the case, then the school uniform will be dhoti for boys and saree for girls, they add. Emphasising the discomfort of emulating the ‘native’ culture naively, Raina discusses the irrational aspects of many of the rituals especially in a religious context. She feels that Indian tradition is too narrow, superstitious and mentalities of the people are orthodox and static. She recollects, I had gone to this temple on my birthday and oh my God what a sight that was! There was water on the floor and the priest rubbed it with a towel and I was pissed off with the chaos that followed to get a piece of that cloth. Imagine the sweat and the dirt, I don’t get these rituals.

She candidly puts forth her bias for English songs over Bollywood music. She says that she admires the sense of freedom and progressiveness that the west espouses in lifestyle and thought. The trope of tradition and modernity is complicated especially when juxtaposed in the domain

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of religion (Gusfield 1967).19 Religion, primarily through rituals, carves a distinct reasoning. This aspect is viewed as odd by Raina as she claims that in the other spheres of her life she is acting in consonance with a logic which has an idea of utility and not as much of faith and belief. However, the interesting aspect is that the minimal spaces in which the younger generation choose to interact with religious customs have a bearing on other parts of their lives. The fact that they keep religious rituals in the backseat unlike for instance their parental generation is able to provide a sense of identity to the students belonging to the same generation. As the students interviewed are of a particular age group, the rejection of certain ideas as redundant does not appear to be unnatural as coevals are confronting similar levels of ambiguity. They are living in a zone of urgency where opinions with regard to their career are formulated than those of religion. Young people’s lives and their indifference to age-old tradition is characterised by the need to associate with activities that define their age group. And as such it provides a sense of bonding amongst them (Willis 1981).20 The influence of the west is mapped through physical appearances. Among the many symbols, the dressing style and preference for certain kind of garments over others dominate the understanding of what constitute the ‘west’. Dresses like denims for boys and girls, spiked hair for boys, short skirts for girls and lower waist pants for boys are styles which are seen as western. Another affinity towards the west is noted in their taste and choice of western music and movies. The preference for fast food like burgers and lazing at cafés figures as another area of manoeuvring western culture. Media is projected as the fastest growing window to the western world (Juluri 2002). Anjuman, a humanity student remarked, ‘I like VH1, it plays good songs, Star World is watchable, you get to know where the Indian reality shows are coming from’ (giggles). 19 In the Indian context, the idea of tradition versus modernity in the academic discourse has been analysed within the contours of continuity and change understating it in the broader realm of negotiation between both the spheres. The field of religion in practice appears as one of the fields where the traditional idea of rituals governs. 20 A few ethnographic works show how young people create subcultures either through resisting an idea or through reformulations of rituals that are attractive within the folds of their lives (Murdock and Phelps 1972). Paul Willis’ (1981) book is one such example where the emergence of certain lingo and rituals among the working class lads appears to be cool and communicable within the group of friends. In EPS, a group of students who call themselves ‘Mess Makers’ take part in physical forms of resistance against the school often damaging school property to draw attention and get reaction from the school authorities.

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A dichotomous notion of the constitution of the culture of the east and that of the west is visible. Indian culture and tradition primarily flows through morals and that of the West through commodities. This does not come as a surprise given the agents of socialisation for both phenomena are different. The influence of the east arrives from the embedded context of the family, and the school. On the other hand, in the context of globalisation, the circulation of goods has been one of the most important windows to the world. The students at EPS in their admiration for the west are not isolated. Young people all over the world occupy a certain cultural ‘scape’, nodes of which lie in the consumption culture of the west mainly America (Anholt 2007; Appadurai 1996; Bouissou 2008; Ritzer 1983).21 The packaging of the teen culture in the English language– centric media market makes the students relate to global images. Many of them carry an enthusiasm that is representative of the sensibility of the young to be carefree, fun loving and adventurous. Their favourite TV shows have bold ideas of individual freedom and choice, flexible ideas of dating and a general spirit of having a good time. Most of the shows aired on Star World, HBO and Zee Studio in India are American sitcoms like Friends and Big Bang Theory. The packaged landscape of commodities, mannerisms, humour and lingo is readily available to the students. It appears as a new universe from which a certain youth-centric lifestyle can be developed.

Citizenship In this section we focus on the notions of being ‘Indian’ from the perspective of the nation-state. The market-driven initiative of 1990s has brought a shift in the nativist understanding of citizenship. The shift has been from a society embedded in locally manufactured products to an economy which is increasingly affected by the global consumer market. The principles of IES are archaic in the 21st century as the generation of children which the school is engaging with can be aptly put as

21 Studies in different parts of the world like in China and in Europe show that the young people although have variances in preferences, they are nonetheless effective consumers of similar kind of products from electronics to music to attires (Kwong 1994). There are nodes which are central like the cultural influence of America aptly put by terms like ‘Mcdonaldization.’ Japan in the east is an important vantage point for creating a subculture of young consumers especially with relation to Manga comics and Anime shows (Galbraith 2012; Kinsella 1998).

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‘liberalisation’s children’ (Lukose 2009).22 In the following sections, we examine how ‘liberalisation’s children’ develop their own understandings of being citizens of India. Citizenship and Evolution of an Image in Classroom Practice The chapter on political system in class XII Humanities approaches citizenship in interesting ways. The chapter that led to a string of discussion in class is on the pattern of democracy starting from the ‘Era of OneParty Dominance’. The class moves from the different sections of the chapter looking at the rise of the Congress Party in India pre- and postIndependence to the formation of opposition parties. The teacher refers a lot to materials on current affairs like newspaper articles and relates them to the content of the text. In my understanding, it is these snippets of contemporary politics that give rise to much debate in class rather than the chapter in particular. For instance, the rise of the Indian National Congress as the single largest political party in India and in tracing its political journey since Independence, the period that is actively scrutinised is its recent run as the major stake holder in the UPA (United Progressive Alliance) government. The members of the party and their conduct are more interesting topics for the students than the institutional policies and status of UPA government in general. In the later part of 2008, the issue of horse trading in parliamentary elections has gained ample media attention. The discussions out of class centre on corrupt politicians excluding a few who are honest. Strong criticism is lashed out against corrupt politicians by the students. Rahul Gandhi is thought of as a youth icon by many and he is not expected to trade votes for money. One of the boys says that it is a popular story in his neighbourhood that the MLA (Member of Legislative Assembly) from his constituency is flooding the slums with money and goods to acquire votes. The students have animated discussions on the morality of political leaders. They are disturbed by the fact that people in power are enjoying so many benefits while others including their parents have to work hard and pay taxes. Often the separation appears as black and white, corrupt politician against honest taxpaying citizens. Many of the students do not want to probe deeper into the historical journey of the Indian 22 Lukose (2009) examines the complex ways in which the young people in contemporary India negotiate with newer ideas of global consumerism to create their own idea of citizenship and anxiety that follows these processes of negotiation.

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nation-state, the role and transformation of party politics in India which are few of the broad topics in the syllabus. The tendency to bend towards certain issues than others leads us to wonder about the conditions that create awareness about specific problems. An effective way to view the whole situation of students giving more importance to contemporary political situations than emphasising on contours of nationalism is through the ways in which these issues flow to them. While information on nation-building, economy and planning of the Indian nation-state depends primarily on textual descriptions, information about the current political environment flows from several sources. Information comes from multiple media like newspaper, TV and magazines. Discussions at home with elders, peers, gossip and rumours help to develop an extended view. Similarly, the unfolding of the problem in the present is one of the main reasons creating the interests of the students on such issues. However, the issue of temporality needs to be carefully examined as there are many other political issues that are talked about in the media at a specific time period. They are available amongst the public through demonstrations, banners and pamphlets. The crucial question is if over-representation of an issue in itself is the reason behind captivating the minds of the students. Something else also can create the chain of signification (Lacan 1977).23 By observing the ways in which the interests of the students in issues of corruption develop, there is a pattern to the nature of incidents that arrest the minds of the students. A story being vibrant, having strong moral connotation and an absence of self-referentiality in matters of responsibility get active responses from the students. This points out that in relation to the students, continuous association with an issue need not be seen as an interest in an in-depth understanding. One of the ways of looking at it is a movement away from structural understanding of a problem. In its place arises an imagining of the self as the scapegoat. In the corruption debate and also in relation to discussions on reservation, the self becomes the object of these debates. When the question of reservation is mentioned in one of the Commerce sections of class XII, initially there are no responses. But when the topic is broached further 23 Lacanian frame of meaning production arising through displacement and deference where the chain of signification gives a thickness of meaning in the form of metaphor and metonym and cannot be understood through the signifier alone.

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touching on issues of job reservation, the students are seen to be more forthcoming. Sandeep, one of the boys, remarks, I don’t have any view on reservation, I am neither for or against it but if I find reservation policies in my way of finding a job, I will definitely oppose it, there is no way in which reservation can act as a block for me in getting a job, it makes no sense.

Idea of a Citizen and the Other in Everyday Encounters Another way in which citizenship featured in the discussion is with reference to social realities that the students encounter in their everyday lives. The relationship of the self vis-à-vis the other becomes very prominent in understanding who visibly becomes a citizen of India and who is accepted with scepticism. Experiences at home in the form of encounters of members of other communities, personal accounts of elders and immediate outside environment including school consciously or unconsciously create an understanding of who is not part of the mainstream Indian society. Therefore, belongingness is not about self-awareness as much as about awareness existing as a result of imagining and having an other (Gorringe 2008). For instance, Sandhya talks about the ways in which the maid servant in her house is not allowed to drink water from the same utensils used by the family and she is served in steel glasses. She recollects once at home she had asked why the maid was made to drink in a steel glass. Her grandmother supposedly remarks that she is from a lower caste and cannot be allowed to dine from the same utensil due to rites of pollution.24 The exclusionary rhetoric at home runs parallel to another sort of typecasting at school. Baniyas are categorised as money-minded in outof-class conversations. This instance is different from the way in which a ‘Dalit’ and her idiosyncrasies are spoken about. The prejudices amongst classmates for each other do not run deep as most of the time these opinions arrive in the form of anecdotes. They are taken as stories whose main function is to act as a joke and a matter to laugh at. The jovial tone is possible also because those belonging to a particular caste group, at whom the jokes are aimed, participate in the humour. For instance, a Baniya girl of class XII played along her friend’s remark of stinginess by reiterating the fact that she prefers to throw her own birthday party 24 Purity and pollution are Hindu casteist ideas highly pronounced in the rules of commensality. The upper castes avoid drinking and eating from the same utensils as lower castes as it entails pollution and violation of caste norms (Ghurye 1969).

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at McDonalds than at any other fancy restaurant. Students hailing from different caste group see each other as having different traits. These traits seldom become the basis to exclude someone. Compared to the dynamics amongst classmates, people of the lower economic and caste backgrounds are not part of their cultural milieu. Many a times in different classes, I am confronted with a range of conceptions about Muslims. Students use the word mullah, a follower of Islam locating the kattar (staunch) Muslim in the narrow alleys of Chandni Chowk. One of the imageries plays on the stereotype of Muslims as being poor and peculiar. In the Commerce section of class XII, there has been an incident with a Muslim classmate who is unable to pay the tuition fees. Students find it queer that the mother of the girl came every month to school and created a scene. Dinesh reiterates, ‘Girl’s mother would scream and stress on the fact that no one should think they were poor.’ This particular girl later leaves the school. This sole incident at an experience level with members of another religious community shows lack of substantial communication. There is a necessity to locate the levels of familiarity which amongst other things is explicated through a joking relationship. Lower castes and the figure of a Muslim are not part of the everyday circles of interaction. The awareness about the people at the margin as different is not similar to the awareness that distinctions exist amongst friends at school. The former refers to an absence of the category from their universe and the latter state of affairs relate to the idea of co-existing with difference. If one takes on Benedict Anderson’s notion of seeing nation as an ‘imagined community’, it includes the ways in which that community is imagined through horizontal temporality using common points of association. At some point, a need arises to confront the bundle of allegiances amongst the citizens (Anderson 1991). Within the boundaries of the school similar kind of people validate a discourse of nationalism that unintentionally legitimises the other as non-citizens or outsiders. In EPS, it is difficult to understand a context of nation as an ‘imagined community’ without considering the members with whom one interacts on an everyday basis and collectively creates belongingness to a nation. Diverse imageries of citizenship are absent. For instance, the figure of the Muslim is the unfamiliar ‘other’ in the immediate context. In a broader context, othering is associated with particular events like partition and imagining an enemy nation, Pakistan. A few students claim that partition memories of killings still haunt the elders of their family. Their grandparents recollect the hard times when

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they had to give up their assets and run for their lives. In the present context of the students, although a lived history of violence between both the communities is absent, Pakistan still figures as an external entity. Through indirect references, anecdotes and experiences, the image of Pakistan serves to define better India’s customs, territory and its citizens. Roshni, a student has recently read Mukhtar Mai’s book, In the name of Honour. She expresses her anguish in relation to the text, ‘the position of women is terrible, a lady got gang raped at home. And the government did not file any case nor did the media take up the issue in Pakistan.’ A regular way in which Pakistan plays the role of an ‘enemy’ nation is in the game of cricket. Vivek remarks, ‘My neighbours are very strange, every time India and Pakistan plays, they support Pakistan, I find that very problematic, staying in India and supporting an enemy team.’ Cricket becomes a familiar context to affirm loyalties. In such contexts, showing support for another country with which there is a territorial dispute is perceived as an indecent gesture by the students. It is interesting to note the ways in which the figure of the ‘other’, in this case that of a Muslim person/country, creates a sense of disruption. A student of Humanities recollects that on one of her trips to Kashmir she was quite taken aback by the conduct of a waiter in a restaurant. He apparently remarks on her intake of chappati by saying that, Roti toh Hindustani khate hain (Chappatis are eaten by Indians). When she shows her reservations against such a comment, the waiter supposedly retorts back saying Hum toh Hindustani nahi hain, hum toh Pakistani hain (I am not Indian, I am a Pakistani). She says that even today she finds the incident unsettling as everyone thinks Kashmir to be a part of India and not Pakistan. The students perceive that the tag of an outsider has been cast by the Muslim community onto themselves. They seem to think that the lack of integration of Muslim community to the mainstream society stems from their own insecurities. The principal of the school is also seen to echo this opinion while talking about the lack of students from other communities apart from Hindus in the school. He says that it is not the school which is stopping students from other communities to take admissions; it is their wish to be part of other institutions. He mentions how the Sikh students prefer to go to the Guru Nanak School in the vicinity. The problem with these perceptions of insecurity is that they are viewed as coming from the community per se. Although in reality it is a projection, we move from an idea to an image (Cover 2006). This can be examined in the line of stereotypes and the ability for it to proliferate not necessarily out of intended consequences.

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We see how a passage given in one of the terminal exams about the disturbed relations between Hindu–Muslim relations post-Godhra incident is unable to elicit much opinion from the students: unkaa khoon khoon, hamara khoon pani? (Is their blood blood, ours merely water?) This melodramatic enquiry from a hindi film protagonist championing the cause of economic underdog in the 1980s sprang to mind as one absorbed media reactions, largely scripted by Hindu secular-liberal intellectuals, to the carnage that traveled from the charred Sabarmati Express at Godhra on February 27 to the streets of Ahmedabad the following day. The situation to say the least is grim .It may take days for the fire in Gujarat to be doused. For the moment it has caused substantial damage to India’s secular credential, Secular India is under attack today. As much from Hindu fundamentalists who swear by a temple no one seems to particularly want, as from those Muslims who consider carnages like Sabarmati Express a fitting response to that fundamentalism.

Many of the Commerce students say that the content of the passage is incomprehensible. They approached their teacher with doubts who apparently gestured at blindly copying the answers from the passage. It is never picked up in class after that day. This instance brings to light that in an atmosphere where interaction with members of other religious groups especially Muslims is limited, opportunities to deal with complex issues like secularism in the passage are lost. In this subsection the attempt has been made to examine the notion of citizenship that emerges from the idea of the other. The other is not just a figure of difference but is a distanced member of another community with whom the students do not interact on a day-to-day basis. Residential localities which do not house many members of other religious communities and inability to meet them in other social spaces like school or hanging out zones allow for the insular views to continue. Self as a Citizen The macro perspective of citizenship is tied to the idea of a political identity and systems. An individual’s notion of citizenship is based on relation with other fellow beings rather with systems and institutions per se (Ichilov and Nave 1981).25 The students at EPS are able to concepIn their study, Ichilov and Nave (1981) looked at how the idea of citizenship can be tied to the individual level and institutional level through the case of Israeli adolescents. 25

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tualise both these variations of citizenship. One understanding refers to the political culture in India in a historical time frame. There is further an understanding of citizenship closer to an idea of a community and those who do not belong. The individual experience of being a citizen in turn opens up a new register in which playing the role of a citizen takes a subjective turn. It is at the individual level formulating the role that they can play; a direct contribution to the country is perceived. India is visualised as a physical entity that needs to be looked after and conserved. The students highlight that it does not come naturally to them to be a good citizen. Some notion of training and sacrifice is attached to the idea of being a good citizen. Many of them feel keeping the country clean is an attribute of being a good citizen. Growing trees and helping others are other attributes of a good citizen. For instance, helping a blind person cross the street is characteristic of a good citizen. Being a good citizen at the individual level for the students is attached to the aspect of being reflective. In this section, citizenship ideals are interpreted by students at different levels. However, what runs common through all the rendition is an ethnic idea of the nation-state (Appadurai 2006).26 Gyan Pandey argues how Indian nationalism is the result of a crooked collective elite Hindu discourse which has been strengthened by various myths including Ayodhya and claims to the ancestral land of gods (2006). Although we observe the students’ capacity to break citizenship into micro practices, it is still based on an exclusionary narrative of a ‘Hindu’ nation. We see negotiations not in the matters of who constitute the nation but more in the direction of how the citizenship of a liberalised India is constituted. In other words, India is perceived primarily to be comprised of upper caste Hindus and variations in imaginations of citizenship are formulated within the group. Mainstream ideas of nationhood and exclusion remain intact amongst the students.

Consuming Beauty and Consuming Brands The official take on consumption at EPS is to do with humble bearing based on the idea of minimalism. Therefore, modern day understanding of consumption associated with globalisation and access to goods The hyphenated nation-state is based on primordial loyalties to show its way of existence as unique when compared to others. 26

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is confronted in the school through inculcation of regulated spending behaviour. It propagates habits of necessary consumption. In other words, the school wants the students to purchase things which they require and not go overboard with them. In this light, the school follows the Gandhian ideas of frugality who in one of his popular sayings elaborated that ‘the world has enough for everybody’s need but not enough for everybody’s greed.’ Accordingly, the school does not operate a canteen as it is seen to breed divisions amongst students. A strict prohibition against carrying electronic gadgets like fancy watches, mobile phones and jewellery is enforced. However, students at EPS consume less within school premises yet create an abstract universe of consumption by discussing about the various products out in the market. In the next section, through the motif of the brand and the aesthetics of beauty as an aspiring symbol, there will be an examination of the ways in which media images, peer pressure and status configure in consumption behaviour of the students. The two spheres intersect on particular issues. Beauty and brands as well is viewed like an accessory with which individuals transcend from the zone of the ordinary to a desirable self. Beauty and Aesthetics of the Body Doing fieldwork in a school, a single topic that acquires maximum responses from the students is the area of consumption. The students discuss about things they like to buy and the kind of body-image that they admire. The talks around consumption are often spontaneous. The students display a wide knowledge about the idea of beauty and the things that are considered beautiful. It is observed that apart from some variance in the notion of beauty, what stands out is the importance attached to such an attribute. The consumption of a beauty image in general is seen to boost self-worth, and guarantee fame. The ability to look good is portrayed as a natural inclination. In a couple of conversations in the off periods, series aired on Indian television are discussed. By and large, the conversation moves around the physical appearance of the actors. There is an aversion towards the ugly and immediate affinity to things that are visually appealing. In important ways, such behaviour points to the aspect of social constitution of beauty, the way in which a certain idea of it becomes more popular than others (Eco 2004). The students are not seen to deconstruct the popular conception of beauty circulating inter alia in the electronic media.

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One day, I find myself with a group of girls gossiping about Splitsvilla, a couples’ reality show on MTV.27 Sonal remarks that the attractive contestant Priyanka has a striking resemblance with her friend Aachal. They are comparing the different contestants on the show based on their body shape, the way they look and carry themselves. Soon enough the conversation shifts to the topic of vital statistics. The girls say that Marilyn Monroe’s statistics is passé and today something around 34-26-34 is the norm. Shailen is tensed about her figure and tells me that she has started skipping dinner to get in shape. She emphasises, ‘Oh you don’t know I am fat and have the tendency to put on more, am so conscious that I have stopped going for swimming classes because I have fat thighs.’ Ayushi reiterates, ‘Thin is beautiful, if someone comments that you are looking fat it is really depressing.’ Both Shailen and Ayushi agree that their parents are also worried about how they look. They point to the fact that for parents it is difficult to marry off fat daughters. Ayushi cribs, My parents are never satisfied, first they were running after my height and now weight. I want to maintain my figure even after marriage, those who say they are fine with being fat are fighting against depression. Imagine you cannot do so many things, wear good clothes or experiment with your look.

As the conversation spiralled through a range of issues from having a perfect body type and hinging that idea on being thin, strict control and surveillance of the body comes up. The way in which the girls conceptualised a ‘thin’ body to be a beautiful body is tied to control of the excess mass of the body. This in turn meant living up to some specific measurements. The parents are implicated in the debate. Their concern is ensuring smooth marital alliances. On the contrary, for the girls having a thin body is related to immediate gratification of wearing different attires and be appealing. It is problematic to analyse the aspiration towards a particular body-image as necessarily violating. Undoubtedly an idea of the body, controlled to follow some prototype of beauty in society, is primarily based on the body of a woman. Woman’s body arises as the one that carries the inscription of the norm and circulating the same in society at a particular point in time (Bordo and Heywood 2004). There is a need to 27 Splitsvilla is a couples’ reality show in MTV which shows the dating journey of strangers who have met in the course of the show.

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differentiate between ways of fantasising an aesthetic of the body-image as a symbol and the dire urge to map that aesthetics on the body. Apart from a few girls, who are making efforts to change the way their body looks, for many of them it is a fascinating topic of discussion, something light to chat about. The gossip stands apart from routine concerns of studies and thinking about a future career. In their day-to-day lives, they chose to dedicate their time to other pursuits rather than obsess about getting thin. The impact of the regular talks about beauty can be understood through a Freudian sense of the unconscious, whereby repressed desires erupt on several occasions and in different contexts (Freud 2003). In the case of Shailen having fat thighs are deterrents to certain kinds of activities and in the process she feels dejected. Girls at EPS have individual ways to tackle the question of beauty. In an abstract sense however, almost everyone is aspiring for a popular image of the beautiful body by participating in these discussions. However, the young ‘middle class’ girls do this out of volition. Therefore, more than a rejection of beauty, modes to imagine and live a desirable body are inchoate. Girls are likely to invest much more in it when they have sufficient free time in their hands. The notion of an attractive body for a woman at EPS reproduces the global fixation of skinny bodies. Whether we talk of the ‘size zero’ circulating in covers of fashion magazines or closer home Indian actor Kareena Kapoor flaunting her lean frame, the overall message for young women is to have a thin body. For the boys, there is a wider range of body-images that they aspire, like being a ‘metrosexual’ or ‘hyper masculine’. Each of these stereotypes is popular with sections of students in the school. A group of boys say that they spend around `2,000 on gyms every month. Visiting the gym regularly is seen as a very ‘macho’ thing to do. They insist that a well toned body is attractive to the opposite sex. With another group of boys however, different notions of appeal are prevalent. This set of male students believes that while the body as a whole matters, a lot of the part of looking good rests on the face. Parth is spending around `1,000 every month to visit a local dermatologist for acne treatment. He is paranoid, ‘I do not want to spoil my face, it is very important, looks give you confidence, and it matters while you are going out with friends, to draw attention.’ In another instance, a couple of boys are preparing for Independence Day celebrations. Since kite flying is a custom on that day, they are making a list of the things that they will require for the event. One of the things that stand out is a sunscreen

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lotion. I am curious to know why amongst paraphernalia of things like CD player, food, kites and cold drinks someone thinks of including a cosmetic item. To this, one of them remarks that they do not want to get tanned in the process of flying kites. One of the reasons they claim why they stand out as a group which they have named RDB is because they are all attractive and handsome.28 In EPS, aesthetics of beauty is largely influenced by media images; however, the variations that arose in considering some aspect like being thin or fair as beautiful are also reinforced by the immediate circle of peers. The discussions on beauty ranged from mere gossip to the efforts that the students make to be attractive. Brands that Spoke The link between brands and consumption in EPS can be seen through the processes of markets where certain brands have an inflated value compared to others (Arvidsson 2006). In turn, possession of so-called super brands enhances status. There are two ways in which this can be understood. At one level, almost every student is aware of many different designers and clothing brands available in the market. At another level, only a few brands can become a part of identity of the students. This means that few students have intimate relations with super brands by possessing them. Moreover, a few brands share that status in the market (Klein 2002). Brands are able to draw people through a promise of some form of exclusiveness. Brands are discussed not just through the frame of the commodity but there is an examination of the extent to which branding incorporates physical locations for the students. This brings us to sphere of brand explored in the light of meaning production. It not only allows a common terrain of aspiration but it also brings into effect a stream of consciousness that bends towards processes of individuation (Escalas and Bettman 2005).29 In this light, possessing a brand and going to a particular place adds on to the personality of the student as someone who is indistinguishable from the product and the place. In other words, 28 RDB acronym for a popular Bollywood movie Rang De Basanti emerged as a cult movie in early 2000s for youth in India showing the transformation of a group of cool urban boys into aware human beings trying to bring some positive changes to their immediate social reality. 29 Brands have the feature of attaching a distinct character to the person who possesses it. Individuals build an identity through the process of identifying to the supposed attributes of a brand.

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the fact that someone chose a particular brand and places over another entails that she already agrees to the collective ethos that these objects assumedly carry (Arvidsson 2006). Different sports brands like Nike, Adidas and clothing brands like Kazo, Marks and Spencer are popular amongst the students. They frequent eating joints like McDonalds and Pizza Hut. The aspiration to possess these brands and make them part of their identity is interesting to understand the ways in which young people attach values to brands in an attempt to create a projection of someone with taste and sense of style. Young consumers all around the globe are prospective buyers who are extremely educated about things out in the market and what a particular brand or commodity signifies (Latham 2002). Many a times, the students may not own the expensive items but the need to talk about sporting brands and brands of cars brings to light the assumed link between brands and the good life. Different localities and neighbourhoods in Delhi are part of the larger branding process. Although the school is located in North West Delhi and many of the students are from nearby areas, ‘hanging out’ in North Delhi is not seen as a ‘cool’ thing to do. Many of them mock at couples who come to the malls in North Delhi on dates. They find the idea of couples sitting holding hands in odd places like staircases of malls crass. They comment on the crowd of North and West Delhi which according to them is less sophisticated. In contrast, South Delhi is seen as hep and urban. Perceptions like these build the branding of a place. Brands are known to capitalise on qualities, actual and imagined. Although both North and South Delhi are equally urban in terms of the infrastructure and connectedness, the students view south to possess the attributes of being ‘urban’. This may be due to the earlier expansion of South Delhi through malls, shopping complexes and select eating joints. It may also be for very immaterial concerns of having collectively developed or reproduced forms of coding circulating in the society. In other words, South Delhi may have over time registered in the public imagination to be posh. The aspect of branding a place and having shared ways to do that through images of the people, and their etiquette focuses the ways in which aspirations are mapped through shared symbols of progress and status. There is a realisation of these markers of distinction and for some of them it is part of their present lived reality. While for others, they expect these status symbols to be part of their lives in the future.

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The minimalistic consumption attitude encouraged by the school is negotiated and rewritten by the students in making the school not a place to flaunt the possession of various products. It instead becomes the space where the newest trend is discussed. Therefore, the school at a dialogic level is extremely important as the students contemplate a lot about the things they like and the changes that they want to see in their personalities. The development of a taste at the level of discourse is formulated at EPS through opinions about things by categorising them as attractive, ugly or of no social value. Bourdieu’s work on taste puts into effect classification of subjects and also things into the ‘beautiful and the ugly’ (1984).30 In the student community, more than having an operational classification system in their everyday relation, it is the awareness of an aesthetic, the acknowledgement of a hierarchy of objects that is crucial. Even though, at EPS many of the high-end brands like Dolce and Gabbana, Chanel or Gucci do not configure in the list of preferences yet the possession of the same is no longer a privilege of the few. The presence of shopping malls in almost every neighbourhood corner, knock out goods and circulation of objects in adverts have made luxury products a part of everyone’s reality at least in the realm of imagination (Sundaram 2010).

Concluding Remarks School is a paradoxical site. On one hand, it is a pedagogic space. This includes the secular sphere of classroom lessons and sports-related activities where the students comply with the regulations of the school. In the normative domain of the school emphasising on building a complete, ‘EPS’ product, we see the students making maximum negotiation. The cultural imagination of the school wrestles with the outside environment of media products, global peer dynamics and consumer goods. In terms of values attached to control of the body and mind, students follow them as empty rituals without internalising them. The thrust of the school 30 Bourdieu’s (1984) work is interesting to understand the ways in which distinctions work between classes and it illustrates the circulation of capital, both cultural and economic, within a class. In EPS, it is difficult to speak about a strategic reproduction of class as there are no direct measures restricting the students from different backgrounds to attend this school. However, by virtue of its location and principles, it is seen to attract students from particular strata, Hindus belonging mainly to business or professional classes.

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to propagate ‘Indianness’ through cultural functions and resisting western ideas is met with hybrid understandings of being Indian amongst the students. Furthermore, the values attached to citizenship get a more nuanced understanding when we focus on the students. The top down idea of a good citizen of a great nation upheld by the school is broken into structural, everyday and subjective understandings of citizenship. Although the students largely reproduce the mainstream ideas of an ‘ethnic’ nation, ‘India’ is not an abstract entity for them. They encounter it as a stakeholder in the institutional framework of politics, as a community member vis-à-vis the other and also via the self as a citizen. Finally, we see the students in the sphere of consumption drastically bifurcating from the ideals of the school. The minimalist consumption behaviour promoted by school is contested by hedonistic ideas of looking good. Brands and beauty products exemplify a commoditised version of having a good life. Since the neoliberal policies adopted by the government in the early 1990s, India, especially the urban areas, has been flooded with global food, clothing and entertainment products. The circulation of these products adds a new dimension to the way in which the students are imagining their future. It is problematic to define the economic and cultural spaces these students will inhabit. It is co-evolving with the overall transitory society of urban India. Yet, some of the attributes highlighted are the urgency to reproduce the economic bases of the class they come from by getting profitable employment. The cultural universe of the students is a bricolage with elements of local culture along with global consumption and lifestyle choices. Interestingly, the local is understood as a vantage point to gaze at the world and not viewed as a timeless entity. In other words, the local for the students is the positioning of them as Indians. It does not espouse a traditional understanding of being Indian as much about the nation existing as the base from which to assess the world and its possibilities. This does not indicate a passive position. Rather, it captures the reality of how the contemporary urban landscape is already a frothy mix of customs, religion and cosmopolitan values. The students do not yearn for classical values but, rejoice in the ability to live a flashy lifestyle in contemporary times. Under the liberalised market regime, this tendency amongst other things has been equated with commodities as a way to live modern, carefree and stylish lives. We do not see students questioning the available choices and developing in the process radical ideas of change, sustainability and sharing. Desires are co-opted within capital, consumption and mainstream ideas of nationhood.

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References Althusser, Louis. 1971. Lenin and Philosophy and Other Essays. New York, NY: Monthly Review Press. Anderson, Benedict. 1991. Imagined Communities: Reflections on the Origin and Spread of Nationalism. London: Verso. Anholt, Simon. 2007. Competitive Identity: The New Brand Management for Nations, Cities and Regions. New York, NY: Palgrave. Appadurai, Arjun. 1996. Modernity at Large: Cultural Dimensions of Globalization. Minneapolis, MN: University of Minnesota Press. ———. 2006. Fear of Small Numbers: An Essay on the Geography of Anger. Durham; London: Duke University Press. Apple, Michael. 1995. Education and Power. New York, NY: Routledge. Arvidsson, Adam. 2006. Brands: Meaning and Value in Media Culture. London; New York, NY: Routledge. Berti, Enrico . 2001. ‘Multiplicity and Unity of Being in Aristotle’, Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society, 101 (1): 185–207. Bordo, Susan and Leslie Heywood. 2004. Unbearable Weight: Feminism, Western Culture and the Body. Berkeley, CA: University of California Press. Bouissou, Jean-Marie. 2008. ‘Why Has Manga Become a Global Cultural Product?’ Available online at http://www.eurozine.com/articles/2008-10-27bouissou-en.html (accessed on 14 February 2012). Bourdieu, Pierre. 1984. Distinction: A Social Critique of the Judgment of Taste. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. ———. 1992. The Logic of Practice. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press. Chong, Terence. 2011. ‘Manufacturing Authenticity: The Cultural Production of National Identities in Singapore’, Modern Asian Studies, 45 (4): 877–897. Cover, Rob. 2006. ‘Gaming (Ad)diction: Discourse, Identity, Time and Play in the Production of the Gamer Addiction Myth’. Available online at http:// gamestudies.org/0601/articles/cover (accessed on 12 June 2011). Deleuze, Gilles. 1995. Negotiations, 1972–1990. New York, NY: Columbia University Press. Deshpande, Satish. 1993. ‘Imagined Economies: Styles of Nation-building in Twentieth Century India’, Journal of Arts and Ideas, 24 (5): 5–35. ———. 2003. ‘Modernization’, in Veena Das (ed.), The Oxford India Companion to Sociology and Social Anthropology, vol. 1, pp. 63–98. New Delhi: Oxford University Press. Dumont, Louis. 1980. Homo Hierarchicus: The Caste System and its Implication. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press. Durkheim, Emile. 1973. Moral Education: A Study in the Theory and Application of the Sociology of Education. New York, NY: Free Press. Eco, Umberto. 2004. History of Beauty. New York, NY: Rizzoli.

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Escalas, Jennifer E. and James R. Bettman. 2005. ‘Self-construal, Reference Groups and Brand Meaning’, Journal of Consumer Research, 32 (3): 378–389. Foucault, Michel. 1972. The Archaeology of Knowledge. London: Tavistock. ———. 1979. Discipline and Punish: The Birth of the Prison. New York, NY: Vintage Books. ———. 1981. ‘The Order of Discourse’, in R. Young (ed.), Untying the Text: A Poststructuralist Reader, pp. 48–78. Boston, MA: Routledge. ———. 1988. ‘Technologies of the Self’, in Luther H. Martin, Huck Gutman and Patrick H. Hutton (eds), Technologies of the Self: A Seminar with Michel Foucault, pp. 16–49. London: Tavistock. Freud, Sigmund. 2003. The Uncanny. New York, NY: Penguin Classics. Galbraith, Patrick. 2012. Otaku Spaces. Seattle, WA: Chin Music Press. Ghurye, Govind Sadashiv. 1969. Caste and Race in India. Bombay: Popular Prakashan. Gobo, Giampietro. 2011. ‘Glocalizing Methodology? The Encounter between Local Methodologies’, International Journal of Social Research Methodology, 14 (6): 417–437. Goffman, Erving. 1959. The Presentation of Self in Everyday Life. Garden City, NY: Doubleday Anchor Books. Gorringe, Hugo. 2008. ‘The Caste of the Nation: Untouchability and Citizenship in South India’, Contributions to Indian Sociology, 42 (1): 123–149. Gusfield, Joseph R. 1967. ‘Tradition and Modernity: Misplaced Polarities in the Study of Social Change’, American Journal of Sociology, 72 (4): 351–362. Hallett, Tim, Brent Harger and Donna Eder. 2009. ‘Gossip at Work: Unsanctioned Evaluative Talks in Formal School Meetings’, Journal of Contemporary Ethnography, 38 (5): 584–618. Ichilov, Orit and Nisan Nave. 1981. ‘The Good Citizen as Viewed by Israeli Adolescents’, Comparative Politics, 13 (3): 361–376. Judith, Anodea. 2009. Eastern Body, Western Mind: Psychology and the Chakra System as a Path to the Self. New Delhi: Alchemy. Juluri, Vamsee. 2002. ‘Music Television and the Invention of Youth Culture in India’, Television and New Media, 3 (4): 367–386. Karve, Irawati. 2006. Yuganta: The End of an Epoch. New Delhi: Orient Blackswan. Kinsella, Sharon. 1998. ‘Japanese Subcultures in the 1990s: Otaku and the Amateur Manga Movement’, Journal of Japanese Studies, 24 (2): 218–316. Klein, Naomi. 2002. No Logo: No Space, No Choice, No Jobs. New York, NY: Picador. Kwong, Julia. 1994. ‘Ideological Crisis amongst Chinese Youths: Values and Official Ideology’, The British Journal of Sociology, 45 (2): 247–264. Lacan, Jacques. 1977. Écrits: A Selection. London: Tavistock Publications Limited. Latham, Robert. 2002. Consuming Youth: Vampires, Cyborgs and the Culture of Consumption. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press. Leriche, Leo. 1991. ‘The Sociology of Classroom Discipline’, High School Journal, 75 (2): 77–89.

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Lucas, Peter. 2002. ‘Mind-forged Manacles and Habits of the Soul: Foucault’s Debt to Heidegger’, Philosophy of the Social Sciences, 32 (3): 310–328. Lukose, Ritty A. 2009. Liberalization’s Children: Gender, Youth and Consumer Citizenship in Globalizing India. Durham, NC: Duke University Press. Murdock, Graham and Guy Phelps. 1972. ‘Youth Culture and School Revisited’, The British Journal of Sociology, 23 (4): 478–482. Nath, Vijay. 2001. ‘From “Brahmanism” to “Hinduism”: Negotiating the Myth of the Great Indian Tradition’, Social Scientist, 29 (3/4): 19–50. Pandey, Gyanendra. 2006. Routine Violence: Nations, Fragments, Histories. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press. Parsons, Talcott. 1951. Social Systems. London: Routledge. Ritzer, George. 1983. ‘The Mcdonaldization of Society’, Journal of American Culture, 6 (1): 100–107. Saavala, Minna. 2010. Middle Class Moralities: Everyday Struggle over Belonging and Prestige in India. New Delhi: Orient Blackswan. Seidler,V. 1998. ‘Embodied Knowledge and Virtual Space’, in J. Wood (ed.), The Virtual Embodied, pp. 17–20. London: Routledge. Sharma, Chandradhar. 1987. A Critical Survey of Indian Philosophy. Delhi: Motilal Banarsidass Publishers. Singh, Yogendra. 1973. Modernization of Indian Tradition: A Systemic Study of Social Change. New Delhi: Thompson Press. Sundaram, Ravi. 2010. Pirate Modernity: Delhi’s Media Urbanism. London and New York, NY: Routledge. Thapan, Meenakshi. 1991. Life at School: An Ethnographic Study. Delhi: Oxford University Press. Turner, Victor. 1969. The Ritual Process: Structure and Anti-structure. New York, NY: Aldine De Gruyter. van Gennep, Arnold. 2004. The Rites of Passage. London: Routledge. Vanita, Ruth. 2003. ‘The Self Is not Gendered: Sulabha’s Debate with King Janaka’, NWSA Journal, 15 (2): 76–93. Veblen, Thorstein. 1899. The Theory of the Leisure Class: An Economic Study of Institutions. London: Unwin Books. Wagner, Helmet R. 1983. ‘Towards an Anthropology of the Life-world: Alfred Schutz’s Quest for the Ontological Justification of the Phenomenological Undertaking’, Human Studies, 6: 239–246. Williams, James. 2000. ‘Deleuze’s Ontology and Creativity: Becoming in Architecture’, Pli, 9: 200–219. Willis, Paul. 1981. Learning to Labour: How Working Class Kids Get Working Class Jobs. Columbia, NY: Columbia University Press. Žižek, Slavoj. 2004. Organs without Bodies: Deleuze and Consequences. New York, NY; London: Routledge.

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Kiranjyoti Vidyalaya: A Sociological Narrative of a Government School Anannya Gogoi

Introduction

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ociology of schooling, as a sub-branch of sociology of education, intends at a comparative study of schooling theoretically and empirically. Major areas of research include issues regarding schooling and nation-building like enrolment of students in schools, formal and informal structure of schools, institutionalisation of schooling and impact of government policies on schools.1 Understanding the sociological 1 I paid my first visit to the school on 18 September 2008 and ended them on 16 February 2009. I primarily focused on the students of class IX A. The reason for choosing this class included, (a) class IX did not have board exams. (b) They had Civics as one of the subjects in their social studies course. (c) Spatial segregation of the classroom from other classrooms that helped me to interact with the students without being scrutinised by the principal, (d) the class had a mixed population representing students from—different parts of Delhi, migrants and different ethnic and religious backgrounds. Total number of students in the class is 61, out of which 34 are girls and 27 boys. The first reaction of the students and teachers was that they thought of me to be a trainee teacher and therefore conversed with me in a cautious and formal manner. My key

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and cultural dimensions particularly includes the study of the impact of social stratification and cultural capital in determining identity and status of students among themselves and among teachers (Baker and LeTendre 2000: 345–364). While most of the areas regarding the reciprocal relation of government and schools are dealt by surveys and other descriptive studies, ethnographies provide a ‘thick description’ (Geertz 1973: 3–30) of issues like social stratification, cultural capital, hidden curriculum and process of identity formation in schools. Each school provides a unique arena for a holistic process of socialisation and social interaction leading to the creation of separate individual and group identities of the students. The basic principles of this ‘game’ (Mead 1934) for creation and representation of the ‘self’ include the building up of peer groups, taking up of roles prescribed in the school curriculum and the development of an informal culture among the students. Besides these interactions within the school there are external agents and ideologies which shape the heterogeneous nature of schools in each society. In India, the above fact is visible in the existence of chains of schools including convent run schools, Missionary schools, Central schools or ‘Kendriya Vidyalayas’, Public schools, ‘Jawahar Navodaya Vidyalayas’, ‘Sarvodaya Vidyalayas’ and other government schools.2 Each of these schools has a different historical background, a unique ideology behind their birth and a different composition of student–teacher population. The current study is based on a ‘Sarvodaya Vidyalaya’ named ‘Kiranjyoti Vidyalaya’ in a state of northern India. The school belongs to a larger chain of Sarvodaya Vidyalayas. These are composite schools that have primary, secondary and senior secondary sections together. The primary reason behind the establishment of the school, which is described in this study, was to provide uniform education to all students in place of the differential standards of teaching prevalent in the schools run by the state municipality board.

informants, two girls, however, were more relaxed with me and shared their experiences. It is through them that I made friends with others later on. I frequently interacted with the class IX civics teacher and occasionally talked with other teachers also. I attended four social studies classes, one political science class and two staffroom sessions. I also distributed a questionnaire to thirty seven students. 2 A brief profile of these schools is presented with the discussion of citizenship education.

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The School at First Glance Kiranjyoti Vidyalaya is a government school founded in 1986. It is a Sarvodaya Vidyalaya run by the Directorate of Education of Delhi.3 It is located beside the inner ring road of Delhi and can also be accessed by a metro station situated nearby. The school is surrounded by housing colonies for lower level government employees, plush private bungalows and apartments. There is no market or commercial establishment adjacent to the school compound. However, there is a small market complex at a distance with Xerox shops, a photo studio and a stationery shop that can be accessed by the teachers and students of the school. The school is a co-educational institution with 1,450 students and 60 teachers. In total there are 28 classrooms, including the music room, science laboratory, home science class, computer room, library and CAL. Lab (laboratory for Computer Aided Learning). It has two academic divisions, primary section of the school and senior secondary section. Both these sections are run by the same principal. The building for senior secondary school has four storeys and an assembly ground. The primary school stands at the far end of the school compound and has two floors. There is a common playground for both primary and senior secondary schools. The universe of this study consists of only the senior secondary section of the school, and the descriptions in this chapter are based on the fieldwork done only in the senior secondary section of the school. The secondary section consists of grades VI to XII and each grade has three sections or classes (e.g., class IX A, B and C).

3 Directorate of Education of Delhi is an apex body that aims at implementing The National Policy on Education formulated in 1986 and modified in 1992. The aims of the directorate include provision of

education of a comparable quality up to a given level to all students irrespective of their caste, creed residence or sex. It aims at promotion of a national, a sense of common citizenship and composite culture and strengthening national integration. It lays stress on the need for a radical transformation of the education system to improve its quality at all stages and gives much greater attention to Science and Technology. All children are proposed to be provided free and compulsory education up to 14 years of age. For further details see http://edudel.nic.in/directorate.html (accessed on 10 December 2013).

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Upon entering the main entrance gate of the school, one can see a space for parking of two wheeler vehicles and a few cars belonging to the teachers. In the front lie the assembly ground and the verandah from where the assembly is conducted. The entrance to the senior secondary building is to the right of this verandah. This entire area is watched by a gatekeeper, who is supposed to check on the guardians who want to meet their children or the principal, prevent outsiders from entering the school premises directly and prevent students from going out before the final bell rings signalling the end of school timings. Any outsider is required to sign in a register stating the purpose of visit and timings; this is done every time one visits the school. After entering the senior secondary building, we see a painting of Goddess Saraswati on the wall adjacent to the music room.4 On the right is the class XI B, and on the left there is the Work Experience and Home Science room. The principal’s office is on the first floor along with the science laboratory. The corridor leading to the office has four notice boards on the walls, each containing social messages on environment protection, work and discipline and photographs of school functions/ celebrations and excursions. The walls of the science laboratory similarly have diagrams and formulas of science and economics and collages containing pictures of female social activists teaching a group of girl students. The second floor has the library, a laboratory for Computer Aided Learning or CAL. Lab and the notice boards for the daily list of absentee teachers and their substitutes. The third floor has classrooms and the social science lab, which is a small cabin made of plywood. Each floor had toilets; some of the places and corridors are dark and some are dustier as they are not enclosed by walls. The classes are arranged in a haphazard manner, so that class VI is not immediately followed by class VII. The classrooms also do not face each other due to the corridors. An arrangement such as this facilitates the intermixing and interaction of students from different classes. Junior students can be heard talking to seniors addressing them as sister (didi) or brother (bhaiya) in the corridors without any hesitation. 4 Goddess Saraswati is viewed as the Hindu Goddess of wisdom, music and art. Therefore, her presence through symbolic paintings, statues and other forms of representations in schools is thought to be symbolic of the pursuit of wisdom and also an acknowledgement that her blessings are present in this endeavour. Saraswati Puja or ritual worship of the Goddess is observed on different dates of the Hindu calendar in different parts of India. However, in this particular setting of the school the picture of the Goddess is not ritually decorated with flowers or incense sticks.

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Other Key Features about the School The academic year begins in April and lasts till the month of March of the next year. The subjects offered are Hindi, English, Sanskrit, History, Political Science/Economics, Music/Home Science, Multimedia, Physical Education including Yoga. The senior secondary classes do not have Science or Commerce, therefore many students leave the school at class X and new students who belong to the arts stream join. The medium of communication among the students as well as the teachers is Hindi. The uniform consists of white shirt, grey trousers/skirt, blue socks, black shoes and belt, girls from class IX onwards have to wear Salwar Kameez and blue ribbons. The school closes for summer break in May, autumn break in October and winter break in December. However, a part of these breaks is kept for coaching camps for students of classes X and XII. All national holidays belonging to different religions are observed. Nevertheless, it is only the Hindu festivals that are celebrated mostly in the school. The school timings are from 7:00 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. in summer and 7:30 a.m. to 12:40 p.m. in the winter. The first bell rings five minutes before the daily assembly followed by four academic periods of an interval of 35 minutes for different subjects. Similarly, another four consecutive academic periods are followed after a 20-minute lunch break. Regarding the school fee, the students have to pay `60 quarterly, which they can pay by themselves in class. The fee is directly collected by the class teacher. The students belonging to the Schedule Castes (SC), Schedule Tribes (ST) and the Other Backward Classes (OBC) (recognised in the constitution of India) have to pay less, i.e., `40. On the other hand there are welfare schemes provided by the Directorate of Education of Delhi as per the Government of India for the single girl child of a family who is enrolled in school and students from SC, ST, OBC and minority communities. The single girl child gets monetary assistance at regular interval from the government under the Delhi Ladli Scheme initiated by Women and Child Development Department of the Government of National Capital Territory (NCT) of Delhi on 1 January 2008.5 Merit scholarships and financial assistance for the purchase of stationery are also provided by the Directorate of Education for the students belonging For further reference, see http://delhi.gov.in/wps/wcm/connect/doit_wcd/wcd/Home/ Delhi+Ladli+Scheme/ (accessed on 10 December 2013) (Thorat and Senapati 2006). 5

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to the SC, ST and OBC categories.6 There is no annual fee and payments for field trips and picnics are provided by the school itself. The observation about the student population and their economic background is that majority of them are from the lower middle class backgrounds. Many of the parents are employed in government jobs— mostly clerical, some are bus drivers and some have small-scale private businesses like shops, selling artificial jewellery, etc. More than half of the students resided in nearby areas or the residential quarters for the government servants. Others came from different parts of Delhi. The common feature of the student population was that they were largely second generation immigrants from other northern states of India. Therefore, they always mentioned that their ‘original home’ was somewhere else where their grandparents or other relatives resided. The students expressed their identity, not in terms of caste or religion but in terms of their ethnicity and ‘locality’ or residence. Many of the students specifically in class IX A were Garhwali, Pahari, Kumaoni.7 The regional identities of the students appear as a prominent distinguishing criterion of identification in the school. Having a common religion among the majority of the students and lack of understanding of the socio-religious concept of caste among the students do not highlight the cultural specificities among the students. This lack is fulfilled by the criterion of regional identity. The difference between the ‘local’ and the ‘foreign’ is prominent among the students. This difference exists despite the fact that the students may be second or third generation immigrants in Delhi and therefore they are more or less assimilated to the larger society in Delhi. However, this differentiation does not necessarily involve discrimination among the students. In fact the students from other parts of the country displayed a lot of enthusiasm in describing their ancestral place and culture of that place while interacting with the researcher (The School’s Diary 2008). 6 The constitution of India attempts to provide equal opportunity to the members of castes, classes and religious minorities who have been deprived for centuries due to the domination of certain groups over educational and occupational opportunities. The Articles 15(4), 16(4) and 46 are some of the articles of the constitution of India that are formulated for restructuring the institutionalised social relationships in Indian society and ameliorating the relative position of the lower caste and minorities. 7 These communities originally belong to Kumaon and Garhwal region of Uttarakhand, another state in northern India in the lap of the Himalayas. The term ‘Pahari’ generally refers to people who live in the hilly areas.

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School as an Organisation The features of the school discussed earlier provide a background for understanding the school as an organisation. The prescribed rules and practised roles together uphold this organisation. When analysed this organisation consisted of hierarchies which are based on an elaborate division of labour at different levels. The enacting of prescribed rules according to situational needs, with varying degrees of confirmation and deviance, continually adds new features to these hierarchies. Kiranjyoti Vidyalaya highlights this organisational structure through its elaborate arrangement of positions and duties that are distributed among the teachers and students of the school. The school is directly under the Directorate of Education of Delhi and hence the Directorate is the source of the rules which govern the various activities of the school. However, the actual manifestations of these rules take on vibrant forms when they filter down the hierarchies among the students as well as the administration. The administration is in the hands of the principal who follows the orders given by the Directorate, which come as circulars to all such government schools. These may include instructions about a new format of the morning assembly or notification of holidays and international events like the global hand washing day. The opinions and the ideas of the school principal reflect the ideals and goals which are prescribed for the school by the Directorate. Regarding the inception of the school itself he explained that there are no different policies or aims of the schools as such. But ‘Sarvodaya’ schools in Delhi are a solution to a specific technical problem. He said that earlier the primary schools were entirely run by MCD (Municipal Corporation of Delhi). The students from these schools could not adjust or fare well in the secondary schools later. The Sarvodaya schools were therefore established in order to ensure that the students received uniform and good education throughout their student life. Hence Sarvodayas have primary sections and the project has been successful until now. From the primary sections to the senior secondary level the school tries to impart a uniform progressive standard of education. At the time the study was conducted, the majority of the student population was Hindu and about 100 were Muslim students, a handful of Sikhs and very few Christians. The main objectives as stated in the school diary are imparting education—academic and moral. Academics are a big concern but not the sole concern. This is evident in the promotion of sports and different

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celebrations by the principal. In the principal’s address in the school diary he has written, ‘Education process should be expanded beyond school. School/class should be taken as a second home.’ The aim of the school as stated by the principal is to bring out the hidden talent of the students. Morals to be taught in the school included loyalty, honesty and scientific perspective/attitude. From this particular opinion it can be deduced that the student is not only perceived as an individual but also as part of a group to which he or she owes his or her loyalty. The principal also stressed that the students should prepare for school themselves. This statement clearly stresses desirability of disciplined self-dependency of the students. He was also particular on the point that parents should meet the principal before they meet teachers for various reasons which indicated that the principal was a representative of the entire group of teachers in the school as an organisation. Thus it was observed that the aims and objectives of this school not only consist of those directed by the Directorate of Education but also include the principal’s idea of a holistic educational process which includes learning of and adhering to moral values and the maintenance of proper discipline. This objective is quite akin to Emile Durkheim’s concept of moral education which emphasises on discipline as the first principle along with attachment to social groups and autonomy (Durkheim 1961). It is not only the prescribed rules of the directorate but also conformity to the accepted norms of conduct such as self-discipline and self-service that construct the discourse of holistic education. Other strata in the organisational hierarchy of the school become prominent when we look at the administration of activities in the school. It was observed that the principal is helped by a few senior/permanent teachers in these activities. These senior teachers look after the maintenance of the school like cleaning, organising the classes, the library and organising various activities and celebrations in the school. A few teachers from this group also took charge of the four houses that the student population is divided into. The other teachers include those who do not participate in the administrative activities but are responsible for classes and activities centring around the subject that they teach and specialise in. Their work includes project work and educational trips.8 Apart from 8 This grouping of teachers is not formal and they are given various responsibilities on the basis of their experience in the school and on their own interest to take up these responsibilities.

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these, there are the trainee teachers who are not permanent and teach as substitutes for only a few months. There are quite a number of visually challenged teachers in the school who teach various subjects. Generally a student reads out from the text and the teacher explains it. Almost all the students respect the visually challenged teachers and help them to walk around the school. However, a few students in the class take advantage of the situation and tend to go in and out of the class when such a teacher is teaching. Co-curricular and extra-curricular activities include sports, home science and music classes. Different teachers are assigned for these jobs. There is also multitasking among the teachers. For example, the sports teachers (a man and a woman) are also responsible for coordinating the assembly. They seem to be the busiest ones as the school participates in various state-level and national-level sports events. The students engaged in sports, a quite large number, are clearly distinguished from other students. They are given special permission for not attending classes and leave from the school for the sports events. Music, both vocal and instrumental, is the next most sought after activity. However, the population largely includes girls unlike in sports where there are a large number of boys. The school takes part in various local and inter-school music events. The additional duties of the music teacher include organising the celebrations of various festivals and competitions in the schools such as drawing, rangoli making, etc.9 This is also because the present teacher is trained in drawing. She is responsible for the notice boards and the paintings that decorate the different walls of the school. Home science classes, again attended mostly by girls, include cooking, stitching and making various items for decorating the home. They have to showcase their talent annually in front of the teacher and sometimes during various celebrations. The student population is divided into four houses named on different freedom fighters.10 This unique naming of the houses was done by 9 Rangoli is an art form of Indian decoration in which symmetrical patterns are made on the floor with the use of different materials like coloured powder, grains, flowers and small stones. Rangolis are considered to be auspicious and are often made at the doorsteps of a house or a place of religious significance (Selvamony 2006). 10 These freedom fighters took part in the Indian national struggle for independence from the British rule. Most of them are regarded as revolutionary freedom fighters. A brief discussion of their contribution to the freedom struggle is discussed in the context of citizenship education imparted by the school.

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the former school principal. When asked about the reason behind this naming, the present principal replied that this was completely under the discretion of the earlier principal. These names can be changed if a new principal wants to do so. But such a change had not happened until the time of completion of the fieldwork for this study. The students’ reaction to this order of naming the different houses is that these freedom fighters should always be respected by the people in India; therefore, the naming is a gesture of showing respect towards these freedom fighters. This naming system of the different houses is a reflection of the acknowledgement of the Indian heroes of the freedom struggle in India. It also indicates that these heroes are desired role models for the upcoming generation of students. The house leaders are both teachers and students. There is one teacher who heads the house with other two assistant teachers and a boy and a girl student. Each house is allotted a month in which they are responsible for the maintenance and supervision of the school. This includes coordinating the assembly, supervising the cleaning of the school building, maintaining the notice boards, looking after the implementation of disciplinary measures, such as preventing students from coming out of the classes during the class hours. Apart from this they also have a school head boy and a school head girl. The head girl and head boy are considered to be the best in academics and in handling various duties assigned to them. They were generally selected from class XII. General consensus among the teachers regarding their academic performance and performance in co-curricular activities is taken as primary criterion for selection. No election is carried out in the process. However, there was no head boy or head girl at the time when this study was conducted. This was because a boy and a girl from class XI were equally qualified for the position as compared to the candidates from class XII. Class XI was considered to be one of the best in the history of the school according to one teacher. Such an organisational structure of the school illustrates the unspoken hierarchies that are active in day-to-day functioning of the school. For example the head boy or the head girl is a designation that is superimposed on the students by the teachers for aid in the functioning of the school. They are set apart from the other students by the recognition of their performance in academic and co-curricular activities as well as assignments given to them. Other students react to this differentiation by recognising the authority of the head boy and head girl, vested upon

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them by the teacher’s themselves.11 When the students were questioned about the head boy and head girl they clearly displayed admiration to these designations and believed that the person holding that position must definitely have talent. This admiration could also be a result of the fact that the head boy and head girl were generally senior to them. The structure and functioning of the school as an organisation thus rests on the principles of functional form of stratification (Davis and Moore 1945). Leadership in various activities is considered to be a functional necessity and particular teachers are elected to these positions through a common consensus about their abilities and earlier performances. This differentiation between the leaders and others gives rise to different hierarchies in the school on the basis of division of labour. Although no material reward is given as such to these leaders, they are awarded with authority over others, respect and sometimes appreciation also.

Rituals: The Interplay of Tradition and Current Practices The organisational structure is instrumental in performance of the activities that are needed for vocational and academic aims of the school. Thus it depicts the instrumental culture of the school (Bernstein, Elvin and Peters 1966). The hierarchies that emerge in these structure act as divisive forces among different categories of students. On the other hand day-to-day practices of teachers and students compose an expressive culture among them which is further manifested and enacted through various rituals. Contrary to the organisational norms these rituals, in many instances, act as forces of group solidarity. The traditional ideologies acting behind this expressive culture further give different meaning to the activities in school. The conceptualisation of the school as a distinct form of space itself highlights the context in which rituals are viewed. While conducting a group discussion, in response to my question about what they thought about school, one girl student explained this view in the following way, the first word that comes to her mind is mandir or temple. ‘Guru or the

11 Since the positions of the head boy and head girl were vacant at the time of fieldwork the actual manifestation and reaction to this authority could not be recorded.

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teacher is like the pujari (priest) who gives gyan (wisdom/knowledge).’ Everyone else present in the group nodded and supported this view. Thus the sacredness of school comes from the consideration of its space and teachers in their ideal models. The school shows itself as ‘something else’ than its actual manifestation in the mind of the students and hence becomes a ‘Hierophany’ (Eliade 1957). The school is a sacred organisation demarcated from the outside/mundane world. The understanding of educational institution as a sacred space has been an inherent part of the Hindu culture due to the existence of Gurukul system of educational institution in India.12 The traditional ideology and practices of the Gurukul give meaning and define the social order through the activities of the school and beliefs of the students in the current time period also. The traditional ideology makes itself evident in the enactment of various day-to-day practices in the school such as students touching the feet of the teachers occasionally and wishing them, seeking the blessing of the teachers. Thus these activities create meaning which are over and beyond the specific situational meaning by relating a student to the traditional order of Indian society (Bernstein, Elvin and Peters 1966). The continual construction of school as a sacred space is also observed in the various rituals practised in the school. The most important of these rituals is the morning assembly. Similar to any puja or prayer service it has to be done in a particular, sacred time span and therefore both teachers and students have to be punctual for it, the assembly too has strict timings. The principal specifically emphasises on taking a bath in the morning as an act of purification of mind and body and also a preparatory ritual for the assembly. The principal’s speech is not compulsory and he can be also replaced by any other senior teacher or guest if there are specific issues to be addressed. The attendance is taken in the assembly itself by the class monitor to save time during classes. Arriving at time for the assembly is extremely important. The students as well as the teachers are required to come five minutes before the actual timing of the assembly. Making the students fit and active for the entire day is one of the goals of this assembly. Therefore, the students are required to do a short drill coordinated by the sports teacher or his assistant students.13 12 Here the image of the Hindu Gurukul system of education is referred to. In this system the Guru or teacher, who belonged to the Brahmin caste, taught students from other castes about various subjects’ prescribed in the Hindu scriptures and texts. However, the students did not mention Gurukul in the conversation. 13 Physical education is one of the important parts of academic curriculum in all educational institutions. In India we find both traditional and modern educational discourses

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The assembly is, however, not a religious ritual in terms of the songs and prayers. These are provided by the Directorate of Education in audio cassettes and CDs and have to be played in the assembly for the students to repeat them. They are carefully picked so that they do not contain any explicit symbolism of any particular religion. Vande Mataram and the national anthem are a part of this secular ritual. Other songs include, alokit path kare hamara he jag ke antaryami or illuminate the path we are following; O almighty and we shall overcome sang in Hindi as Hum honge kamyab; Sare jahan se accha Hindustan hamara, or our nation is the best of all; humko man ki sakti dena or give us the mental strength to conquer minds. A prayer song and a patriotic song are prescribed for each day along with the Jana Gana Mana and the Vande Mataram.14 However, many a times they do not sing the prescribed song for the particular day and repeat alokit path kare hamara.15 Thus the assembly reflects the ideals of spiritualism without carrying the influence of any particular religion. Therefore, it can be considered as a consensual ritual whereby all members of the school come together on the same platform and represent themselves as a community embedded within the larger Indian community (Bernstein, Elvin and Peters 1966). Further, the assembly also reflects the conformity of the school to certain universal ideals such as perseverance and self-development. The morning assembly is not an exclusive ritual. It provides space for many other activities and inclusion of people from outside the school community. For example, the observation of global hand washing day, as forwarded by the Directorate of Education and the paper craft show by an artist, provides connection with the larger community and extracurricular knowledge. The annual examination is another formal ritual which is guided by the rules of Directorate of Education. The students of classes X and XII regarding the relation between fitness of body being related to the fitness of mind. Therefore along with traditional instruction on different kinds of yoga and meditation, modern knowledge and practice of physical health is also imparted through educational institutions. Physical education is a separate academic discipline in various universities of India. 14 Apart from Martin Luther King Jr’s ‘We Shall Overcome’, Rabindranath Tagore’s Jana Gana Mana and Bankim Chandra Chatterjee’s Vande Mataram, the composers of the other prayer hymns belong to different time periods. Their names were not listed in the school diary consisting of the prayer hymns. 15 This repetition of the same song was merely due to convenience as the students have to sing these songs after memorising them without looking at the lyrics.

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have to take exams conducted by the Board of Secondary and Higher Secondary examination which become a rite of passage for these students to enter into new disciplines as well as new institutions which have an important role to play in the future course of their career. Besides these there are class tests and unit tests for all students of the Senior Secondary sections. Class tests are held every week on Thursday instead of the assembly. Other rituals include the formal celebrations such as Independence Day and Republic Day and informal rituals like celebrating festivals such as Diwali. Formal rituals like cultural functions are conducted according to certain rules that pre-decide the kind of programmes that would be held. The students do not have a choice here and have to sing and dance according the songs chosen by the teacher. On the other hand, informal celebrations provide students for self-expression such as Teacher’s Day observed on 5th September where the senior students take on the role of the teachers. These seniors dress like the teachers and preside over the classes although they do not teach. This practice has been carried out as a tradition by earlier senior batches of students. The reaction of the seniors was that the teachers deserve a break from their regular hard work of teaching and hence this practice is necessary. On the other hand the juniors believed that it is just a fun activity for seniors as they get a chance to dress nicely and show their authority as seniors.16 This particular ritual clearly demonstrates the difference between the juniors and the seniors in the school and thus can be considered as a differentiating ritual in contrast to the other rituals discussed earlier (Bernstein, Elvin and Peters 1966). Similar to that of Teacher’s Day, celebrating the festival of Diwali is a ritual where students get a chance to assert their solidarity and have fun together. The students collect money among them and bring sweets and items for decorating the classroom. They make rangolis and invite the teachers to their classrooms to celebrate the festival along with them. The principal and senior teachers informally declare the best class in terms of decoration and other preparation. It is a matter of pride for the students to have this honour as it is a completely self-initiated celebration. A religious ritual thus takes on a secular nature as it does not consider the religious affiliation of the participants. Another important fact about the celebration of Diwali is that it is celebrated post date. Diwali is a 16 The comments of the junior students were given in a jovial spirit rather than showing any offence for the seniors.

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national holiday in India similar to other important festivals of different religions. However, other religious festivals are not celebrated post date with the same zeal as in case of Diwali. This emphasises the adherence and recognition of the religion to which majority of the students belong. Therefore, consensual and differentiating rituals can transform according to the functions that they perform in different situations.

Discipline as a Manifestation of Institutionalised Authority Discipline is the other side of the same coin as rituals. The punctuality and code of conduct needed for the performance of the earlier mentioned rituals and other duties is many a time achieved through disciplinary measures. The failure to adhere to perform these activities results in various punishments inflicted upon students who break rules. For example, the students who are late for the assembly and who do not adhere to the uniform are made to run around the playground. The senior students who have a larger share of the responsibilities on their shoulders are specially warned and scolded by the principal and other teachers. These students are made to stand in different rows and their names sent to their respective class teachers. The class teacher warns the students who are regular in committing these faults and makes a mental record about them. In case of serious offences like absence from class for more than the days permitted by the school, bringing and having intoxicating substances to school, carrying mobile phones, etc., the students get a red card. Getting three red cards means expulsion from school. Nevertheless Red Card holders are not rare but these students keep themselves safe from getting three Red Cards. They are specifically found among the outgoing batch in classes X and XII. The students who break rules receive these punishments without any opposition but when they were asked about their experience, they replied that they thought rules were necessary and so were punishments. The only thing that the students do not approve of is of a few teachers who they think are too harsh regarding punishments.17

17

This observation is further elaborated with regard to the student’s views on teachers.

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Besides these, the students are also not supposed to go out of the class without a pass, during class hours. The monitors are incharge of these passes. Only two people can go out of the class at the same time. Thus the disciplinary measures are also manifested through the hierarchies operating at the level of the classes. The most striking disciplinary measure in the school is that of the closed circuit cameras. These are placed at strategic places, like the corridors of classes X and XII and a few other classes. The entire school is thus monitored by the principal, who watches this footage through a television. When I asked him about this system, he said that it was initiated by the school and not on the orders of the Directorate. It was basically for security reasons, so that outsiders do not walk into the school without permission. He did not mention about surveillance of the students but added that the cameras also help him to keep an eye on the teachers, whether they are teaching properly are not. When asked if this kind of surveillance would have any negative impact on teachers and students the principal firmly denied that possibility. The principal’s access to monitor the specific groups of students and spaces of the school gives him a continuous flow over the information of the school thus increasing this disciplinary power. It was further observed that the students belonging to the classrooms where these cameras were put up relatively maintained more silence and kept to their specific seats unless it is absolutely required. On the other hand the students belonging to classrooms without cameras found the classroom a safer place to talk and walk around than the corridors as the latter were observed through the cameras. Nevertheless all students showed awe towards this method of maintaining discipline. Thus the closed circuit cameras work as a Panoptican in Foucauldian terms ‘Hence the major effect of the Panopticon: to induce a state of conscious and permanent visibility that assures the automatic functioning of power’ (1977: 201). The closed circuit cameras, therefore, makes the institutionalised authority structure in the school more pronouced. Entire school life is under the surveillance of this authority and thus it limits the space in school where the students can express themselves on their own terms. Another power equation in these measures for discipline is regarding the senior/junior divide. The seniors, especially students from classes XI and XII, are vested with a certain amount of power and responsibility to monitor the juniors. This equation is disturbed when the juniors became involved in the various school activities that entitle them to a certain amount of power. This is the case with class IX C girls, who also conduct

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the morning assembly on behalf of the sports teacher.18 Students from class IX C view the seniors and specially the senior girls, as being unnecessarily strict and actually being jealous of them. Students from other classes were more or less comfortable with their seniors and juniors. The body too becomes a site for imposing discipline and punishment. The boys are commented upon for their loose ties, accessories like glossy watches and haircuts. However, a lot more strictness is imposed on the way the girl student dresses and behaves. Short skirts and dupattas taken in the wrong way, salwar suits without collars, wearing kajal, tying the hair in a single ponytail rather than two pigtails with blue or white ribbons are strictly prohibited. One of the girls from IX A was rebuked in front of the entire assembly for having a few hair loose on the forehead which were in fact baby hair and could not be tied up. This incident suggests that the practice of disciplinary rules in the school can neglect and be indifferent to a genuine problem of an individual student or a particular situation. The school’s injunctions can therefore sometimes border on the ridiculous and suggest that the school is keen to stay in control at all times. The flow of authority and power from the teachers is met by different reactions among the students. The students often resisted these disciplinary measures in many ways. For example, almost all of the students transgressed the petty rules of the school such as taking passes and wearing the dress in different way, often without prior intention of breaking rules. In case of the taking a pass to go out of the classroom it was observed that if a student could explain to any of the monitors that he or she has to go out because of an absolutely genuine reason such as fetching drinking water from the tap and which does not involve passing by the staff rooms or has minimum possibility of coming face to face with a teacher the monitor may let the student go without a pass. However, the monitor did so only with a warning. The students also believed that this strictness of rules actually depends on the mood of the teacher; therefore, they still do not conform to the dress code and hope for good luck in getting away with their transgression. In one instance after the completion of the daily assembly I met a girl from class IX C girl and asked if uniforms were checked every day, 18 The schools has two teachers for conducting sports, games, drill and coach the students who take part in interschool, state and national level sports competitions. The monitoring of the drill performed in the assembly is the responsibility of this sports teacher but the commands for the entire drill in the assembly are given by the student who has been chosen by the sports teacher.

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she said that sometimes students were caught and sometimes they were ignored. She replied, ‘It all depends on the mood of the teachers.’ Students on the other hand indulge in extreme acts like pretending to have a fit in order to excuse themselves from a particular task or stealing things like mobile phones, which teachers may use freely during the class while the students themselves are not allowed to have them.19 However, many students believe that this discipline is for their own good and they themselves judge others on the basis of these disciplinary criteria such as following the proper dress code, respecting teachers, being punctual and the like. These different reactions of the students to the disciplinary measures of the school suggest that although the students accept the rules as necessary for the school life they have not yet completely internalised the rules. Therefore, there is a gap between what they believe about the rules and their own practices and reaction to disciplinary measures, especially towards punishment.

The Classroom as a Space for Reinterpreting Pedagogy Besides the predefined curricula, ideologies and practices including rituals and discipline, the school is an arena for the continuous recreation of the curriculum, ideologies and the school life itself through an interaction of formal and informal practices. The classroom is a visible example of this fact. In the presence of the teacher the classroom becomes the space for a combination of formal and informal interaction between the teacher and the students. The teachers remind the students about maintaining discipline in the classroom in terms of bringing the required books, dressing properly, doing homework, maintaining silence and responding to her questions in a formal manner. She sternly tells them to be careful the next time or punishes the students who regularly break rules by making them to stand up for a few minutes. The classroom for the teacher is also a space for informal discussions, which are, of course, related to the topic that is taught. The teachers hold the view that bringing in examples from our everyday life and our little experiences helps in attracting attention of the students and provides the 19 The phenomenon of fits is further explained in the section on teacher–student interaction.

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scope for greater interaction among the students. Thus, the teachers do allow a certain amount of space for the students to express themselves. In order to check the transgression of limits of such self-expression the teachers uses verbal ridicule rather than corporal punishment. The reaction of the students to this kind of punishment too may vary from individual to individual. Thus the classroom is an arena for a holistic interaction among the students and between students and teachers. It is also a space for building up personalities for not only students but also the teacher as an ideal teacher. Therefore, the formal structure of the curriculum may be molded, by the individual ‘agency’ of the teacher in the classroom (Giddens 1984). The students react in two different ways at the same time. They become silent and scared when the teacher punishes the students who did not bring the referred books to the class but when the teacher starts to talk about interesting facts and examples from daily life, they become more comfortable and respond to the teacher promptly. The students were fond of teachers who bring forth these interesting facts and examples and maintained a balance between strictness and jovialness. During the absence of the teacher the classroom becomes a space for bonding among friends of a group. A visible example of this is seen in terms of the sitting arrangements. In presence of the teacher the students remain seated in their seats until the teacher asks them to stand up. Besides boys and girls sit separately in different rows clearly demonstrating gender segregation in front of the teacher although the teacher does not say so. On the other hand in the absence of the teacher the students leave their respective seats and may sit on the desk or sit beside the girls to talk.20 However, the students are not allowed to go out of the classroom even when a teacher is not present or if teachers are having a meeting or some other activity. This time is utilised for doing pending work by some like copying notes if anyone was absent. Girls engage is talking and singing songs from Hindi movies and albums while boys continuously ask the student monitors to give them passes to go out of the class for purposes like filling in bottle with drinking water, to go to the toilet or a casual stroll across the corridor consciously avoiding the gaze of any teacher. 20 There may be multiple reasons behind this avoidance of the members of the opposite gender. Any generalisations on this will depend on further research on similar patterns of sitting arrangement in schools across India since there are no institutionalised rules for this gendered sitting arrangement in schools. However, some explanation of this avoidance can be found while analysing the student culture in the upcoming sections.

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The classroom, hence, is interpreted according to the presence or absence of the teacher. When the teacher is present the classroom becomes a field for recreation of meanings of pedagogy. The teacher and the students mutually determine each other’s role. The students accept the teachings as well as punishments bestowed upon them by the teacher while the teacher moulds her behaviour and technique of teaching in order to capture the attention of the students in the classroom. On the other hand without the teacher the meaning of the classroom as a space is transformed into, one where the students can express themselves.

Teacher–Student Interaction Teachers and students have their own cultures of interaction in this school. The interaction among the teachers and the culture that emerges from these interactions impact the overall organisation of the school and give it a unique character. For the teachers of Kiranjyoti Vidyalaya the school is not an institution where they just come to teach. It is also a place for developing social ties among themselves as well as students. For example, the social studies teacher of class IX and the computer teacher compared the school to that of a family where they had to care for all and listen to each other’s problems. These social ties, however, tend to became polarised, due to different reasons, which lead to the formation of groups among the teachers. The division of labour, often informal rather than prescribed by the authorities is one of the reasons for this grouping.21 The various groupings include firstly, the administrative core consisting of the principal and a few senior teachers who help him in the management of the school. Secondly there is the teaching staff that is mainly responsible for classes and their own subject of specialisation. The third group consists of the teacher trainees who are temporary and act as substitute teachers. There are two senior most teachers who are always found interacting with students. They are revered by the students as the students always wish them by saying Namaste or touching their feet, maintaining silence in their presence. Namaste and touching the 21 The terms used to denote the various groups are given by me for my own reference. In practice the teachers address all teachers uniformly, using Mrs, Madam and Sir.

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feet of elders and revered persons is a widely used form of greeting in the Indian Hindu society. Therefore, the use of this greeting in this school reflects the fact that the practice of greeting the senior teachers is more inclined towards traditional Hindu orientation. All students adhere to this practice irrespective of their individual religious orientation. Thus, age and seniority are the determining criteria of this specific form of greeting. Apart from these teachers, there is the non-teaching staff like the gatekeeper and the person who cleans the school. Another reason behind the creation of such groupings among teachers is their physical segregation. The administrative core assembles in the library, whereas the teaching staff sits either in the staff room or in their respective laboratories and project rooms. They often work alone in these laboratories. The trainee teachers are completely separated from the two groups discussed earlier as they serve part-time in the school and come to the school only during their specific class timing, they rarely visiting the staff room. The code of conduct is more formal among the members of the administrative core unlike in other two groups. The teaching staff appears to be more jovial and interact more with the students. The staff room topics of discussion for this group include issues about their family, students and the curriculum. Although these teachers take an active part and support all the activities of the school, they express the view that there is lot of scope for improvement in the school and hence the senior teachers in the school should take a step in this direction. One teacher hence remarked, In spite of the fact that there is only a little amount of resources utilized in the school, which is provided by the directorate, these kids try to make a difference. They do want to know and do new things. I have tried helping them, but you know how the system works. New innovations should be considered by the senior teachers.

This conversation also highlights that the opinion and action of the senior teachers count a lot and are of utmost priority for the development of the school and they are considered as the authority figures by junior teachers. From this interaction and opinions it can be deduced that the junior teachers focus primarily on their interaction with the students and refrain from involving themselves in the administration of the school, unless the senior teachers invite them to take part. The senior teachers were never seen talking with the junior teachers regarding the school administration or showing interest in doing so since they mostly

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gathered in the library rather than the staffroom. However, the behaviour of the senior teachers towards the junior teachers was very cordial. Hence, the friendship and sharing of responsibility among the teachers is determined by the covert informal division of labour and seniority in terms of service in the school. The teacher–student interaction is also a very important element in the ‘imagination’ and creation of the school community. It also reflects how one group constructs an image of the other. This mutual defining of characteristics of the two groups again heavily impacts their day-to-day interactions in the schools. According to the teachers, the students are not interested in academics, discipline and character-building but always find ways to upset the order of the school. They are overtly courteous to the teacher, for example they touch the feet of their teachers and say Namaste. Many a times this practice is carried out only as a mere formality. Saying Namaste and touching the feet is not a compulsion. I have generally found that this was done for the senior-most teachers out of respect or for other teachers as a way of acknowledging their presence and authority. Students may use other forms of addressing the teacher such as ‘good morning’ or just folding the hands. These views about students have led to the creation of various categories among students in the minds of the teachers. According to the teacher, a handful of students and mostly boys are the problem creators (bigre hue larke). They clearly identify these students and mock them if they try to be good. She recognised all the naughty/bad children and when they touched her feet to say namaste she would say, Maska maar rahe ho, mujhe sab pata he, Jyada sarif ban ke dikhane ki koyi jarurat nahi he (‘trying to impress us, I know, don’t try to act as if you are gentlemen, it is of no use’). This statement reflects the practice that the teacher, as an authoritative figure, keeps a constant vigilance regarding the behaviour of the student and continually scrutinises the students who are thought to be the problem creators in the school. Similarly the students constantly try to impress the teacher and portray themselves as disciplined persons. These teacher–student interactions, therefore, appear to be an unfolding drama where both of these groups try to represent themselves and remold their identities continually through the ‘expressions that they give’ (Goffman 1959). Another set of students on the other hand are identified as the sincere students who have the potential for development. They are the all-rounders and are good in studies as well as take responsibility for

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various school activities. The teachers connect more with these students and trust their opinion about anything that they want to know, which includes opinions about other students. Many a time, in the classroom the teacher expresses disbelief if a student from this group does not bring a book, does not do homework or is late for school. Yet there are other students who simply are the victims of unfavourable circumstances. They are the ones to be taken care of, by the teachers, like members of their own family. A teacher, who teaches in class IX A, mentioned that the students suffer because of problems in their family. The teacher tries to comfort and motivate them by showing compassion and listening to them. Some of them are the most unfortunate as they are not mentally stable and have epileptic fits. In most of the cases the teachers, parents and the students attribute this abnormal behaviour to the impact of supernatural forces and black magic (Bahari Asar). Other student categories include the silent studious ones and the average type who mostly conform to the rules and help in maintaining a good environment in the classroom. Thus unlike the students who are considered as the problem creators the students belonging to the latter categories are viewed by the teachers through a fixed lens. These students are not constantly scrutinised by the teachers. From this categorisation of students on the basis of their behaviour it can be deduced that the Sarvodaya still has a long way to go in order to realise its primary aims and ideals. Challenges to provide uniform education to all students appear not only in formal academic pursuits but also in informal conduct in the school as a community. Only then the teaching learning process will become holistic. Like the teachers, the students also react in a certain way to the school as an organisation and towards the teachers. They appreciate the principal’s advice but do not see the practical application of this in the school. The teachers are liked by the students on the basis of two contradictory qualities—understanding the problems of the students and sympathising with them, and their strictness in discipline. The students, therefore, consider strictness as a necessary attribute of the teacher. This, according to the students, not only maintains decorum in the school but also discourages ‘the teachers’ pet culture’ (terms that are used to describe these students are teacher ki chamchi/chamcha, one who serves the will of the teachers) which may lead to biasness and conflict among students. A teacher who is rational in judging students is highly respected. For the girls this strictness is also necessary in order to discipline the boys who are always the ones to create problems. Nevertheless, strictness and use of force beyond a certain limit, which reflects irrational behaviour,

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is attributed to a teacher’s bad mood. The students who suffer in such circumstances often withdraw from any kind of interaction with the teacher and think that teacher simply does not like him/her. I have often noticed that the peers of this student help him/her to look at the positive traits of the teacher by narrating their own experiences with the teacher rather than joining in the criticism. One particular incident was noted in this regard. Girl1 said that the ma’am was very strict. Girl1 had fringe hair—baby hair on the top of her forehead and however much she tried to tie them up with her plait they would come out. The teacher scolded her in front of the entire school during the assembly. She said, Meri uske sath nahi patti, meaning ‘we both are not compatible.’ Girl2 said that she should not be afraid of ma’am, she was a nice person otherwise and that girl1 should try to explain things to her if this happens next time. This example reflects how students construct the image of individual teachers and act according to this image when they are in company of the particular teacher. Teacher–student interactions, therefore, rely on how the ‘other’ is imagined on the basis of their actions. A teacher who is perceived as unnecessarily strict by some students may be a rational administrator for the others. On the other hand, students are perceived by teachers on a more fixed set of characteristics according to the performance of students in academic activities, maintenance of discipline and showing courtesies. Another element of this imagination of the ‘other’ is the communicational distance between the students and different groups of teachers. Senior teachers and teachers who do not teach the students in their particular class are treated more formally by the students. These teachers are sometimes misunderstood by the students. On the other hand the teachers with whom the students interact on a daily basis in the classroom become more familiar with the students. Thus, differences of seniority have an impact on the teacher–student interaction as well.

Student Culture The different peer groups among students resemble the categories earlier discussed with reference to the construction of the image of student personalities by the teachers.22 The most liked group is that of the ‘all22 This ‘naming’ of student groups is, however, entirely for my own convenience and is not used by the students or the teachers.

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rounders’, followed by the ‘averages’, then the ‘silent studious’ ones. The problem creators are rebuked all the time as mentioned earlier. A whole lot of other factors apart from studies, and common co-curricular activities, are taken into account while conforming to the membership of a group. This includes trust and helpful attitude on part of the aspiring candidate, a particular code of conduct, and often residence, i.e., belonging to the same neighbourhood. The students who have been shifted from other sections of classes or who have migrated from other schools tend to form separate groups and often became the ‘averages’. The ‘all-rounders’ are also the good girls and boys who do not use abusive language. These students include the monitors and the toppers in academics and are identified by both the teachers and fellow students. The behaviour of the ‘all-rounders’ towards each other is cordial and somewhat formal. They dress according to the prescribed rules, i.e., smartly and are not fashionable and do not wear accessories. Thus, members of this group who do not conform to these codes of conduct or deviate from them and engage in activities like talking behind their backs about them are immediately cast out. For example, Rashmi from class IX A mentioned that Rachna was otherwise very good in all the school activities including studies but was very short tempered and rude. This is why she is not good friend with the monitors. An example of these ‘all-rounders’ is the monitors of class IX A and the girls from class IX C who are identified by both the students and the teachers. The average types can again be divided into the jovial average types and the fashionable average types. The jovial ones are distinguished by their singing aptitude, more friendliness that allows space for informal behaviour such as hitting each other as a ritual of developing familiarity and their frankness in talking and criticism of unacceptable things. This group is the most open one in interaction and often newcomers are incorporated into it. Majority of the students belonged to this group. The fashionable average types, on the other hand, make an effort to be more presentable by tying their hair in different ways and wearing accessories like bracelets, nose pin, anklets and other small things. These accessories are hidden from the teachers except the visible ones like the nose pins. They are the ones who have romantic relations and are thus mostly couples. They also have certain marked traits like walking in the corridors, wearing the uniform in a peculiar way, etc. Nevertheless, they are not deviant or offensive. The problem creators are mostly the local students who are originally from Delhi and from the nearby localities and residential areas. Names of

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these localities were well known to all teachers and students of the school because of their behaviour. According to other students, these deviant students did not respect teachers at all, used bad language and dressed untidily. These boys are known for their disrespect towards girls, even female teachers. Some of the girls are labelled as problem creators just because they associate with these boys. These girls, therefore, deviate from the common expectations that a good girl should be modest and avoid the company of anyone who creates trouble for the teachers and other students. These kinds of girls are very few. A respondent (student) expressed her views about this group in the following way: Rashmi said that people do not understand the importance of school, i.e., about learning and the relationships between teachers and students and among students. How they should respect each other. Instead they criticise the teacher and develop ‘loose’ (immoral, derivative: loose character) boyfriend, girlfriend relationship. She narrated that when she and her friend were walking across a park to go to a nearby shop, they found a girl who was junior to them with her boyfriend. They did not want to talk with her but the girl came up to them and started ‘boasting’ about her affair with the boy, Ajkal toh yeh sab hota hi hai (these things are a part of normal life nowadays). ‘As if we are deprived if we don’t have a boyfriend, just imagine.’

Although this was an individual opinion the other girls sitting with her did not oppose or express a different opinion on the same issue when generally they would correct each other if they thought it was wrong. The silent and studious girls and boys are the most closed group, in terms of mobility. They often form dyads rather than groups. They speak very little and do not like to make any noise. There were two such girls in class IX A itself. These girls stick to doing homework in the class and do not engage in any activity. If they do not have any work they would just put their heads down or look outside the window and talk about the various things that they see. They are extremely mild and soft spoken while talking with others. The group members of any group are supposed to care for each other. This includes providing company and helping to solve their petty problems, keeping secrets. A day before a Delhi tour organised by the school, the following incident took place: Smita was thinking of not going to the picnic as she didn’t have a ‘partner’ meaning friend to hang-out with. Everyone else had ‘partners’. A Muslim girl protested that she had asked Smita to be with her. She sometimes stays with Smita. Smita acknowledged this and thanked her.

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Now she will go to the picnic. This incident exemplifies how friendship among the group members is initiated on the basis of mutual caring and how these social relations are continually asserted. It also illustrates how ‘ingroup’ membership becomes a very significant element for the orientation of a student in performing the co-curricular activities in school. A student accomplishes learning in a school not in isolation, as a single individual but in a group. Understanding of activities in school and enjoyment depends on his or her ability to relate to these activities through the group. Sharing food is another important feature of group bonding. They share their tiffin and other snacks brought from the mobile snack vendor or Chaat wala. Moreover, the group members also act as go-betweens among couples. Trust and exclusivity are the major criteria for being in a group and their breach is often the only cause of expulsion from the group. Friends also provide financial help by lending small amounts of money. The seating arrangement—two rows are for girls and two for boys. The jovial averages sat at the front rows. The studious girls sat on two benches after the front rows. All the monitors, boys and girls from the ‘all-rounder’s’ group sat at the middle or next to middle benches. The fashionable averages and the problem creators sat at the last benches. The brotherhood and sisterhood among the boys and girls respectively cut across group boundaries. Both boys and girls compete for dominance in the class in terms of academics and other activities. Girls view boys as being carefree and always playing pranks. On the other hand, the boys accuse the girls of having loud voices and trying to be over smart. According to the girls an ideal boy should be one who respects and helps girls. When I asked the boys about only girls coming first in the class they replied that only four girls were among the top 10 academic toppers of the class, holding the ranks 1st, 2nd ,4th and 6th and that the others were all boys. The debate regarding who is the best takes on a rigorous form during informal parties like Diwali celebrations and ‘off’ periods. The students then engage in various competitions like quizzes on Bollywood. At one of these gatherings the students sang all recent songs in Hindi from Bollywood; Rashmi then began singing some Garhwali songs and dedicated a song to me. The group differences between these girls were forgotten and they all had fun together. Finally they began to sing Bollywood songs challenging the boys saying that the ‘girls are best’ and boys are useless/insensitive and dumb. The boys kept looking at

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them and smiled. Suddenly a girl called Rachna stood up and started dancing, others joined. The boys said something and they were immediately challenged by Nisha, the second monitor to dance with them. The boys backed off. There was another song, making the same demand on the boys. The particular person who could not answer the question in such competitions is punished by a member of the other group and does whatever the latter tells him/her to do. Generally, the person who gives punishment is the one with whom the offender is romantically associated. Hence, it is observed that the students unconsciously construct among themselves individual identities based on gender through the interaction between boys and girls. They learn to identify different categories of people of the opposite sex such as the studious persons, the persons whom one can joke and play pranks with and the persons with whom they need to maintain social distance in front of others and even show mock hostility in front of others on account of being romantically associated with by other students and friends. But generally boys and girls as a group consider each other as competitors and play this out in several ways in class and outside it as well. Growing ‘boyfriend–girlfriend’ relationships are a major concern among the teachers. According to them, the student’s preoccupation with this phenomenon is actually diverting their attention from studies and creates a sense of helplessness among the school authorities, as they cannot actually do anything about such relationships. Most of the students, on the other hand, view these relations as an inevitable part of being at their age. I asked if there were any couples in the class and she, Rashmi, pointed me to a girl and a boy who were sitting at the next bench. They were keeping their heads low on their school bags and were whispering to each other. The girl with whom I was talking gave an ‘eye’s roll on’ and said, Bhare pare hain sare (the class is full of couples). I asked her if she did not like this and she replied that everyone knows that this won’t last long, at this age and actually didn’t make any sense so why should they mess up their life and tell lies to their parents. They are aware that these are not permanent relations and are actually another facet of friendship. The students believed that this practice is against the ideals of being a good girl or boy as the couples tend to deceive their parents and teachers in the process. According to the students these relationships sometimes also act counter to the other friendship ties as the couples tend to spend less time with their peer group

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and therefore are criticised. Therefore, an ideal friend or classmate is one who does not deceive or tell lies, does not ignore his or her friends and gives equal attention to all relationships and acts responsibly. Although the individual is given his or her space to express oneself, yet it is group solidarity and loyalty to the group that stands as a determining criterion of evaluation of the student’s status. Moreover the values that are preferred among the groups represent their inclination towards old rather than the new. They sing songs from current Bollywood movies yet they make space for and appreciate folk songs from different local cultures of India. Similarly, although they acknowledge the change in practices centring around romantic relationships yet they think that the obvious display of these should be avoided in school. Thus, the student culture of this school is not one of transitions from the traditional, old culture to the new one but is in fact a constant process of a culture in making through evaluation of the new through the lens of the old. Another facet of the student culture is the consumer behaviour of the student group. Due to their less advantageous economic background, students cannot engage in high consumerist behaviour. However, they do accommodate certain form of moderate consumer culture in their social activities. These students cannot afford to visit expensive restaurants or buy branded clothes. But before we discuss the kind of activities that the students practise as consumer behaviour, let us look at the social and cultural milieu in which they are situated and which may have a reciprocal relation with their consumer behaviour. The students like to hang out in nearby parks and markets and watch the latest Bollywood movies. At home, the families of these students buy things for daily use, which include food and household goods from the nearby shops. For clothes and accessories, they go to the nearby market. This market contains both expensive showrooms that have fixed rates and other shops and street vendors where one can bargain and get things at a lower price. There is also a weekly market that is held every Wednesday where clothes, accessories, toiletries and other things are available at about 1/3 of the rate that is available in the former market. This is also a place where people go with family and friends and enjoy fast food and snacks. Since a substantial number of students reside at the government quarters for government employees near this weekly market they too are a part of this kind of a consumerist culture.23 It is an inter23 I have visited these two markets and have seen many of the students along with their family and friends in the weekly market.

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esting fact that such kinds of weekly markets are held in different parts of Delhi. However, nothing can be generalised for the other students who do not reside in the area near the school. Besides it cannot also be called a common culture of the students as a group because they go to these markets mostly with their families. Nevertheless this behaviour of the students highlights a different culture of consumerism that is intrinsically related to social class. It has already been pointed out that the students belong to lower middle class and lower classes; therefore, the choice of commodities including clothes, accessories and food items does not fluctuate. Besides, consumerist behaviour among these students is highly defined by the dependency of these students on their family. The student as a consumer is more influenced by the choices made for them by their family members. In the market they are seen to be accompanied mostly by their parents. Even if they go to the market with their friends they are not outside the purview of parental surveillance since their kin and neighbours also visit these markets. Thus kinship ties rather than peer groups are a more prominent determinant of consumerist behaviour among the students of this school. Watching television serials is a favourite past-time of these students, especially among girls. In many of the discussions with the students they mentioned their favourite serials and characters. An ongoing serial named Balika Badhu or ‘Child Bride’ on child marriage was their latest favourite. They asked my name and when I replied one of them shouted that it was similar to Anandi, the name of a character in a particular TV serial that dealt with the issue of child marriage. This particular television series that is based on the negative aspects of child marriage happens to be the favourite among a large section of the students. This was one of the most popular series of the time. Nobody mentioned quiz shows or other TV shows that are broadcasted specially for education of the children by the government and by the media channels even though they are easily available. Therefore, with regard to the practices centring around the adaptation to popular culture, it can be deduced that the students follow the recent trends and preferences of friends and family members. Although they cannot afford expensive material goods, they are still aware and follow the recent trends in fashion and gossip that is released through the medium of television serials and films. I asked whether they watched movies also. A boy replied yes and a girl immediately accused him of going to the cinema by bunking classes; everyone laughed. This impact happens to the extent that they idolise the film stars actors in

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the serials. When I asked them who their ideal was, apart from home, they did not understand. I explained to them, asking about their favourite person. Mostly took the name of film actors. A girl went ahead and brought a notebook where she has kept all the photos of Salman Khan she ever got. However, imitating the screen world whether the movies or serials was discouraged by the students themselves and often considered it an illusion.24 They do know the difference between the reel world and the real world. Nevertheless, they do follow the various reality shows based on national level competitions on singing and other talent hunt series. Many of them aspire to be singers. Then I asked what ‘the craze’ in class was for. Again majority of them said that it was music. Almost every girl could sing. I asked them who had the highest status in the class. When they did not understand the question, I asked them if a student who got the highest marks was praised or a student who was friendly with all or one who was stylish. They again replied that undoubtedly a student who is friendly with all will be praised and liked. Hence dress is not that important. Dress habits of the students only have a very moderate relation with their status and it can be said that having accessories like cell phone, wristwatches, bracelets, etc., is considered to be a forbidden symbol of status. These things especially if they are too colourful and obvious are not allowed in the school. Thus a very few of the senior students who sometimes do sneak in cell phones hide these in their handkerchiefs or in their bags. I have not seen the students using these phones other than to play games installed in their handset. Fancy wristwatches are used by both girls and boys whereas heavy bracelets are worn by the boys. With regard to beauty and fashion, it can be said that the girls and boys are not particular about branded clothes or any particular type of dressing pattern. But the girls definitely consider wearing jeans and t-shirt as more fashionable. Salwar suits, sarees and lehngas are luxuries meant for special occasions like a family function or the Teacher’s Day at school. Besides these, using heavy makeup, like using lipstick and kajal is a big ‘no no’ both inside and outside of the school. While having a group discussion about fashion the comments given in the following paragraphs were recorded by me: 24 This comment of the students was not based on in-depth understanding but a casual and taken for granted idea of the reel and the real worlds.

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I changed the topic and asked what ‘style’ meant for them. They again gave the names of dresses that they would like to have and Nisha mentioned that she liked to apply ‘light makeup’. However, they strongly disapproved of doing all this in school—pulling up the skirts, taking the dupattas in a wrong way, applying too much kajal in an obvious manner. The reason the girls gave was that it was an overdone attempt of the person to portray herself as likeable and admirable. The concept of style and beauty among the students hence rests on simplicity rather than explicit show of deviance from accepted norms in school in dress and overall display of one’s personhood. Although this deviance and display of new fashion is visible in the school it is still not accepted as a desirable trait among students of the school and is subject to severe scrutiny. I asked about Prarthana—a girl from the more fashionable girl’s group who dressed up in this manner. Nisha and others protested that she just tried to ‘show off ’ her straight hair and is not actually a fashionable/stylish person. Nisha said, woh bus sabko dikhana chahtihe hai ke stylish hai (she just wants to show that she is stylish in front of others). They sometimes used the word ‘loser’ to tease persons who failed in something like keeping loyalty with group members, sometimes studies (very rarely), not being able to do better than the boys or following their ‘orders’ (excluding romantic relations where the boy and the girl may dictate to each other) and also the ‘wannabes’. But when I asked them what ‘loser’ actually meant, they could not provide me with the literal meaning and said that ‘one who is loose, dhila dhala or clumsy is a loser.’ Hence we can say that status is not related to the use of branded things. In fact it is related to the non-use of unnecessary expensive clothes and accessories. One particular incident was recorded about one of the most popular girls in the school. I asked the girls from class IX C whether there was a head boy or a head girl. G2 replied that there was none. G3 said G2 was the most popular girl of the school; she was strict and performed all the activities sincerely. G2 thanked her for the compliment. Students admire a fellow student more when the latter follows the rules regarding the uniform and practise simplicity in dress and behaviour. Hence in this regard the students have internalised the ideals set by the school to a large extent. This attitude can also be attributed to the fact that the majority of the students belong to lower income families and thus luxuries are not a part of their daily life. Rather these students believe that judicial use of limited resources and money will help in a better living. This belief cannot be taken as equally effective in practice.

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The teachers play an important role in the inculcation of similar values. They forbid students to deviate from the uniform dressing patterns which leave very little scope to express their consumerist behaviour. An example of this is the following recorded conversation. After we entered the class, she (the teacher) immediately told the students who have not brought their books to stand up. Almost all the boys did not bring it including the student monitor and a few girls. The teacher said, Yes, you remember to not wear your tie and leave open you collar buttons to reveal your baniyan (vest) color, ha? And you remember to do all such funny things in school, but you don’t remember to bring your books to school, ha? All of you will not look at the students who have brought their books and disturb them so shift to the left row of benches, stand there raising your hands.

And so it happened. From this particular incident it can be observed that the teacher as an agent of the school authority constantly scrutinises the behaviour and dressing style of the students. At every opportunity the teachers reminds the students about the rules and regulations of the school. Dressing is an integral part of the maintenance of discipline in the school and hence it is regulated with strictness. Further the teacher also relates dress and conduct of a student to his or her performance in studies and other activities. The student is scolded and mocked upon his or her dress for neglect in studies indicating that the students who do not follow dress codes and codes of conduct prescribed by the school may also fail to perform well in studies. This again illustrates that discipline in dress and conduct is viewed by the teachers as intrinsically related to the holistic development of the student in school as an institution. The consumerist behaviour of the students is reflected in other activities also. Gift giving becomes an important form of activity in this regard. It is an important symbol of creating as well as maintaining friendship. But then these gifts do not necessarily have to be expensive but definitely unique. One student explained it in the following way: Smita joined me and said that a lot had happened with her since the last time I visited the class. She had been abandoned by all her friends again and that too on her birthday. I asked why and she said that she did not know. She had invited all of them to have snacks with her in the break time and only one or two joined. In another incident Rohit gave her a very beautiful gift. She had asked him why he had spent so much money on the gift,

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to which he replied, ‘Why are you thinking about the money? Friends should not think like that.’ She was all in praise for Rohit. Although in the above incident the boy gave an expensive gift, it should be treated as an exception. Further the meaning of ‘expensive’ will also be relative and depends on the socio-economic status of a person. Often the gifts are handmade such as cards, decorative pieces and less costly items. All students engage in this kind of gift exchanges, especially when they celebrate birthdays of their friends. However, it was observed that girls exchanged gifts among themselves more. Moreover gift giving is more among friendship groups. In the earlier described incident Smita is a close friend of Rohit’s girlfriend or the girl monitor of the class and often mediates between the couple when they have fights over trivial teasing of each other. Thus although this kind of gift giving is an important part of the student culture, financial limitations on the part of the students exemplified by this incident do not allow the culture of gift giving to flourish on a grand scale. Buying and sharing food for friends is another aspect of this consumer culture. Giving a treat is definitely a rite of developing familiarity. The food basically includes easily available items like some Indian snacks available in the mobile Chaat house costing a minimum of `2 and maximum of `10 per serving. Having small ‘parties’, where everyone contributes, is very essential for students. Only a few of the students have visited places like McDonald’s and were not much fascinated by them. The students try to fit in these expenses to their budget or pocket money. This amount is basically either five to ten rupees per day or a hundred rupees per month. They also often buy gifts for their parents on special occasions out of this money. The observation of a lack of a culture of consumption among the students thus indicates that this culture is immensely limited by their financial background. However, the students do find out means to incorporate a few of the practices in gift giving and sharing of food according to their convenience. The concern for money and the disapproval of branded clothes and costly gifts thus becomes an ideal to be followed by the students. Although there are students from better financial backgrounds, most of them mix well with the other students and try to practise the same ideals of being economic in their expenditure. Thus all these incidents and observations indicate that the students of this school have successfully set a very unique culture of consumption of their own. This culture accommodates gift exchange, sharing of food, display of fashion and adaptation to popular culture that very delicately fits and

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suits their socio-economic background. Exchange of gifts is desired yet expensive gifts are avoided and not preferred by the students. Care of one’s personality and beauty is admired but display of too much makeup is rejected. Thus the students have very carefully set their ideals of consumerism. Those who deviate from these ideals are disapproved of; they are either ignored or set as undesirable examples.

Citizenship Education: Its Meaning and Arenas of Practice The school with its multiple dimensions such as rituals, student and teacher culture is not only a community that engages itself in the pursuit of knowledge but also is an apparatus for the construction of ideologies and practices that are related to the larger issues of the national community. For example, maintenance of disciple, along with being a specific practice of the school, is an overt expression of a larger ideology of citizenship education. It is a well-known saying that the teachers are the pillars of the nation. They train the young minds of the students how to survive and prosper in the civil society. These students are the valuable human resources of the country in whose hand lies the future of a nation. They are expected to contribute to the nation’s economy, take part in the governance of the country as rational voters or as honest and dynamic politicians, be representatives of an emerging superpower called India in the global scenario and also be agents of change for a better, brighter and unified culture of the national community. Hence it is considered essential that students be taught all about their nation including its history, all the basic ideals of the constitution of their nation, their duties and rights, how to cooperate in the maintenance of a peaceful and progressive nation and the functioning of the government of the nation. Schools, therefore, become an ideal institution for imparting this kind of a citizenship education. It is the school which brings a student out of his or her familial environment characterised by informal, cordial relations and teaches to interact with fellow students, teachers and others in a more formal and responsible way.25 Hence it is the medium of school 25 Responsible in the sense that while interacting with others they cannot take liberties and have to be careful so as not to hurt the sentiments of others and maintain an invisible gap that is a characteristic of impersonal relationships.

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through which an individual for the first time becomes a full member of an ‘imagined community’26 called the nation. In schools, citizenship education not only is directly imparted in subjects like civics, social studies, history and others but is also imparted through various formal and informal rituals such as the assembly celebration of Independence Day, Republic Day, fancy dress competitions, etc. However, the nature of citizenship education is not uniform in all schools. There is a vast difference between private schools and government funded schools and again there is a great difference between ‘Kendriya Vidyalaya’, ‘Navodaya Vidyalaya’, ‘Sarvodaya Vidyalayas’, ‘Army Schools’ and other such categories of schools. Army schools, as the name suggests, practise more rigid disciplinary measures based on the ideals of the Indian Defence Services. Army schools or commonly referred to as Army Public Schools have been set up to extend education to the children whose parents serve the Indian Armed Forces. Children not belonging to army backgrounds or whose parents do not serve in the army are also allowed admission into these schools. There are around 125 Army schools in the country. The curriculum extended is based on the pattern of Central Board of Secondary Education. The main Army school is the one that is located in New Delhi. The Army schools are administered by Army Welfare Education Society. Apart from education, these schools organise many extra-curricular activities for their pupils.27 Jawahar Navodaya Vidyalayas again focus on admitting and training talented students predominantly from rural areas and children from less advantageous socio-economic family backgrounds.28 The first school was established in 1985 in Amravati, Maharastra, and the objectives of these schools as formulated by the ‘Navodaya Vidyalaya Samiti’ are as follows: 1. To serve the objectives of excellence coupled with equity and social justice. 2. To promote national integration by providing opportunities to talented children, largely rural, from different parts of the country, to live and learn together and develop their full potential. As explained by Anderson (1983) and Marshall (1950). For further reference see http://www.bestindiaedu.com/schools/army-schools.html (accessed on 10 December 2013). 28 For further reference see http://navodaya.nic.in/welcome%20sbs.htm (accessed on 10 December 2013). 26 27

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3. To provide good quality modern education, including a strong component of culture, inculcation of values, awareness of the environment, adventure activities and physical education. 4. To ensure that all students of Navodaya Vidyalayas attain a reasonable level of competence in three languages as envisaged in the Three Language Formula. 5. To serve, in each district, as focal point for improvement in quality of school education through sharing of experiences and facilities.29 Hence we see that the operation of private and public schools not only imparts citizenship education but is guided by a peculiar ideology and a variety of historical backgrounds. Likewise there will no doubt also be a difference among the kinds of citizens who will be reproduced by particular schools. Kiranjyoti Vidyalaya belongs to a larger chain of Sarvodaya Vidyalayas. These are composite schools that have primary, secondary and senior secondary sections together. The technical reason behind the establishment of such schools was to provide uniform education to all students which was earlier hampered by the differential standards of teaching prevalent in the schools run by the municipality. However, the name ‘Sarvodaya’ itself indicates a significant reason and history about its use. It was first coined by Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi in 1904 in his translation of John Ruskin’s (1960) essay ‘Unto this last’ (Kumarappa 1953). Sarvodaya meant ‘good of all’ or ‘welfare of all’. These goals of Sarvodaya indicate upliftment of all sections of people: downtrodden, exploited and the least for example the lower and untouchable castes, tribes and poor of the country. It was not just a translation but Gandhi’s own experiment with truth, non-violence and interpretation of compassion and selfless social service that strengthened his concept of Sarvodaya (Mahatma Gandhi’s Vision on Sarvodaya). He gave three basic postulates of Sarvodaya: trusteeship based on equality of opportunity, economic equality that could be achieved through eliminating the gap between the rich and the poor and community based effort to achieve these goals rather than institutionalised efforts (Kumarappa 1953). However, for the training of the people of India about these ideals we need an institution 29 For further reference see http://navodaya.nic.in/welcome%20sbs.htm (accessed on 10 December 2013).

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that would work from the grassroots with various formal and informal tactics and thus has the characteristics of a community. School fulfils these functions efficiently. The ideology of Sarvodaya hence would differ from that of Navodaya as it would not only train talented minds but would uplift the less qualified minds to the level where they can be at par with others. Hence any institution, organisation or association that uses the term ‘Sarvodaya’ indirectly states its aim to develop all sections of the people at two different levels: to bring the marginalised sections of people into the mainstream and to carry on a universal developmental process. Therefore, the students of the Sarvodaya schools have an additional task of proving themselves as equal citizens of this nation along with making a significant contribution for the development of the country. This ideology is very well reflected in the Kiranjyoti Vidyalaya and other Sarvodaya schools in their effort to employ a uniform standard of education right from the primary levels. A substantial section of student’s population in the Kiranjyoti Vidyalaya is second and third generation immigrants from Himachal Pradesh and other nearby states. They identify themselves as Garhwali, Pahari or Kumaoni. Many of the students also come from lower middle class and working class economic backgrounds. This variety of socio-economic backgrounds among the student population of the school is reflective of inclusion as a practice under Sarvodaya. Students from these diverse backgrounds come together to practise a system of education that is heavily inclined towards competition with other schools, especially private schools, at a single arena of the capital metropolis of Delhi. The students of this school have a double task of first adjusting with the educational system in the schools of Delhi and then competing along with others to establish themselves as capable of being better citizens. This realisation of their process of mainstreaming is clearly evident in the students’ ideas of what the term ‘Sarvodaya’ means. In response to a questionnaire some of the meanings that the students gave to the term ‘Sarvodaya’ were: ‘sab ka uday, the rising of everyone,’ ‘any person can rise in the world.’ Right of education is allowed to all children even if they are poor’; ‘everybody should achieve success in life.’ However, this realisation is not absolute and is not expressed by the teachers in any form. Another strand of thought and practice in citizenship education is the formulation and naming of the student houses in the school based

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on revolutionary freedom fighters of India.30 The four functional houses into which the student’s population is divided into are: 1. Chandrashekhar Azad—The green colour is used to symbolise this house. It is named after a famous Indian revolutionary Chandrashekhar (1906–1931) who called himself Azad, meaning ‘free’, and called the ‘prison’ his home (Singh 2009: 2). He is also called Panditji as a sign of respect. After the Indian Rebellion of 1857, he was the first among many Indian revolutionaries to use arms in their fight for independence against the British rulers.31 He formed the Hindustan Socialist Republican Association and was mentor to revolutionaries such as Bhagat Singh, Sukhdev, Batukeshwar Dutt and Rajguru.32 The goal of this association was full Indian independence and they wanted to build a new India based on socialist principles. Azad and his companions also planned and executed several acts of violence against the British. After the last chase by the British against him, Chandrashekar Azad is believed to have shot himself on 27 February 1931 as he pledged to remain ‘free’ or Azad. 2. Ram Prasad Bismil house that is signified by the saffron colour is named after Pandit Ram Prasad Bismil (1897–1927), an Indian revolutionary. He was a member of the Arya Samaj and also of the Hindustan Socialist Republican Association.33 Through this association he came in contact with a league of other revolutionaries including, Ashfaqulla Khan, Chandrasekhar Azad, Bhagat Singh, 30 Although armed rebellion against the British rule on India has a long history, Chandrashekhar Azad and Ram Prasad Bismil belong to a group of revolutionary freedom fighters which was formed on the basis of a different ideology. The Hindustan Socialist Republican Association, consisting of the former two freedom fighters, Bhagat Singh, Sukhdev, Rajguru, Ashfaqullah Khan and many others, aimed at total independence or ‘Purna Swaraj’ or complete independence and practice of socialism. The association was inspired by the Russian Revolution and was also known as ‘The Philosophy of Bomb’ due to its bold declaration of ‘Counter Terrorism’ against the Imperial British Government (Singh 2009). 31 1857 Rebellion or the Sepoy Mutiny is widely regarded as the first war of Indian independence. The religious discrimination of the Indian soldiers by the Britishers was the primary cause of the rebellion. This rebellion led to the end of East India Company’s rule in India and the administration was put directly under the queen of England. 32 These freedom fighters were members of the Hindustan Socialist Republican Association. 33 This is the same association where Chandrashekhar Azad and his ‘comrades’ were members. See footnote 32.

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Sukhdev, Rajguru and others. Along with nine revolutionary colleagues, Bismil executed a meticulous plan for the looting of the government treasury carried in a train at Kakori near Lucknow, Uttar Pradesh, on 9 August 1925. The incident created a great upheaval in British India. The retribution was severe when the revolutionaries were caught. In a long drawn case, Ram Prasad, Ashfaqullah, Roshan Singh and Rajendra Lahiri were sentenced to death. Ram Prasad Bismil was hanged by the British authorities on 19 December 1927 in Gorakhpur. 3. Veer Savarkar—white colour. Vinayak Damodar Savarkar (1883– 1966) is also a revolutionary freedom fighter of Indian independence. He is especially known for his support to Indian nationalist organisation in London named after the Indian house.34 Veer Savarkar was an adherent supporter of the political ideology of Hindutva.35 4. Sardar Patel House—blue colour. Named after Vallabhbhai Patel (1875–1950) also called The Iron Man of India, he followed a more moderate and diplomatic policy backed by military power as a second option. He is also remembered as the ‘Patron Saint’ of India’s civil servants for playing an active role in the foundation of all India services after Independence and defining its features (Kumar 1991; O’Malley 1931). This practice of the school, of naming the houses after some noted revolutionaries, reflects the effort to instil the revolutionary ideals of dynamic action for self-improvement but is tied along with the larger encompassing Gandhian ideology of peace and non-violence. It signifies the importance and power of particular individuals and groups that act as active agents in any process of social change conducive for the development of the nation on the principles of self-dependence. Thus it is in 34 India House refers to both a residential quarter and a nationalist organization in London, from 1905 to 1910. Pandit Shyam Krishana Varma was the founder of India House and also the Journal: The Indian Sociologist. For further reference see http://www.sscnet. ucla.edu/southasia/History/Hindu_Rashtra/veer.html (accessed on 10 December 2013). 35 V.D. Savarkar defined Hindutva, as an identity and practice, in opposition to ‘Hinduism’, as a philosophy. Further, for him the practice of Hindutva was the only way to fight against the imperial British rule. For this people belonging to other religions and cultures should ‘oblige’ (Joglekar 2006: 122) to the Hindu civilisation (Savarkar 1922). The current usage of Hindutva has additional political and cultural connotations to the definition given by Savarkar.

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the arena of the earlier mentioned ideas that the school seeks to impart citizenship education. In practice citizenship education in the school is imparted in the classroom as well as during various formal and informal interactions of the students and teachers. Thus the classroom has explicit aspects of imparting citizenship education like textbooks, whereas the assembly and various disciplinary rules and regulations have implicit aspects like character-building. The civics textbooks directly provide the knowledge about the rights and duties of Indian citizens (Democratic Politics Part 1). Class IX civics textbook contains the following topics, all in Hindi: 1. Samkalin Vishwa me Loktantra (Democracy in a globalised world) 2. Loktantra kya? Loktantra kyon? (What is democracy? Why is there democracy?) 3. Sanvidhan Nirman (The formulation of the constitution) 4. Chunavi Rajniti (Electoral politics) 5. Sansthao ka kaam kaaj (the work of various organisations, both government and non-government) 6. Loktantrik Adhikar (rights in a democracy) While explaining these texts in the classroom the teacher also uses examples that may be familiar to the students. In a classroom session (class IX A) the following conversation took place: Classroom Observation: the teaching of Chunavi Rajniti/Electoral Politics: Teacher: Which elections are we going to have these days? Student : Vidhan Sabha. (Elections for the legislative assemblies or the lower house) Teacher: How do they campaign? Student : Loudspeakers, flags, etc. Teacher : What is important for casting a vote? Student : Age 18 years is required. Teacher: What about the maximum unit of age? Student: ??? Teacher: There’s no such limit. Haven’t you seen old people sitting in wheelchairs casting their votes, on TV? Teacher: What is the consequence of elections? Student: (Boy) Prices came down. Teacher: Is it or is it just that the politician make promises to do so?

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Don’t they try to lure people to cast votes for their parties through these promises? Student: Teacher: Student: Teacher: Student: Teacher: Student: Teacher:

Yes. Who is standing for Delhi’s Chief ministerial post? V.K. Malhotra and for our area (the same boy)—Mr ….. Who is standing against V.K. Malhotra? (the same boy)—Shiela Dikshit. And the majority wins. It is important to vote in a democracy because it is ‘our’ rule. But do you say who you have voted for? Student: Yes. Teacher: No, because it is supposed to be a secret vote. It depends on us whom we vote for. After elections nothing turns out according to our expectations. Sometimes you’ll hear people saying that this or that person will win but that doesn’t happen and a third party wins. Now what are the strategies of campaigning? The candidates hire people to shout, film stars to speak for them, who always come late and they also provide food and refreshment. The second two reasons are mostly why people attend these functions, don’t you hear your neighbours and other people saying how close they had been to a film star or how good the samosas (an Indian snack) were. And they will ask you to come next time too. But this is wrong, the people who are competing for the authority to run the country, which is such a work of responsibility, ultimately end up fighting for a vote bank.

Therefore, while explaining the text the teacher also discusses the ideal morals of being a good politician and a good citizen. This is a covert criticism of the existing loopholes in Indian politics and also indicates what must be done to attain a better future. The responsibility is left to the students as to how they take this education and employ it to judge for themselves when they become voters or politicians in the future. In this interaction it can be observed that the teacher goes beyond the text and connects with the students’ imagination to fulfil the objectives discussed earlier. Thus this classroom interaction creates a space for the students to interact with the teacher and identify with her ideas on better governance and politics. Thus the meaning of citizenship education not only encompasses what is prescribed in the text or the formal meaning of citizenship but also is created and recreated in these classroom interactions.

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Understanding Citizenship through Rituals and Student Culture The assembly on the other hand imparts secular ideals, both through the regular prayers and principal’s speech. A prayer song and a patriotic song are prescribed for each day along with the Jana Gana Mana and the Vande Mataram.36 The regular singing of a patriotic song along with a secular prayer song and the national anthem is supposed to foster strong nationalist feelings among the students towards a unified India that does not discriminate anyone on any grounds. This practice counters the effect of using other Hindu symbols in the school like the existence of a picture of Hindu Goddess Saraswati or the Goddess of wisdom and celebrating Diwali. Besides this, the Principal’s speech given in the assembly itself is generally based on the ideals of being a good student and hence a good citizen of the country. He specifically tells the students to strictly follow their routine work and to ignore all kinds of hindrances that come in the way. He also stresses on how discipline is so important in order to be a good student and to be successful. During one assembly speech the Principal gave the following comment on the upcoming elections: November is a month of activities and holidays—sports, election and others. But you should keep up your studies. One would now hear all the campaigning and fuss about the election, many of your parents and relatives will go there, but your duty right now is to study. So you should remember that the politicians are here for their own benefits, so do not drift away towards all these issues and keep up your studies.

Hence the teachers and the principal not only provide a descriptive account of Indian politics but also indicate the ideal ethics for a politician to follow; moreover, they emphasise that the primary duty of a student in school is to follow his/her curriculum. Right now he or she should prepare himself or herself for taking other civil and political responsibilities rather than jumping into political interests. The statement of the principal could also imply that politics for students is not a desirable activity until and unless the students first excel in academics and prove themselves fit enough to earn a livelihood. Thus the morning assembly as a ritual is an arena to set the ideals of students as future citizens of 36 The morning assembly has been discussed earlier in the section titled ‘Rituals: The Interplay of Tradition and Current Practices’.

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India. These ideals are not based on textual or institutionalised rules but are derived from the consensual opinion of the teachers. Hence in this particular ritual the ideals regarding citizenship flow from the top of the hierarchical structure of the school as an organisation. The students, however, connect more with the other forms of knowledge about citizenship that are derived from different texts and experiences. Most of the students define a good citizen as someone who obeys rules and regulations and performs his or her duties. These rules and regulations are mostly concerned with the preservation of the environment by keeping it clean.37 They also include obeying traffic rules and other such rules that help to make one’s own life and others’ lives more comfortable. The duties similarly include helping others especially when they are in distress, disciplining oneself and being honest. The school encourages group activities and upholds the ‘freedom fighters’ as role models of good citizens. However, this contribution of the school and the principal is often not recognised. The students take them as forms of enforcement of a kind of moral education that cannot be and is not practised in the school as well as outside. The freedom fighters are considered sacred and are set apart from the common people. They have to be respected, but following their footsteps is thought as difficult and often impossible. Similarly, the school as an agency of citizenship education as well as other forms of knowledge should ideally be a temple, a mandir for everyone.38 But in practice these rules, advice and examples set in this institution are very hard to follow in actual situations for the students. From the students’ point of view, competition without sportsmanship, helping others but being biased towards others and the fear that they might suffer from academic losses and betrayal are the reasons why people fail to be good citizens. Instead, they land up breaking all rules and thus create inconvenience to one another. In the student’s view there is no sense of belonging to one’s own community and therefore the nation. A common example of this systemic failure is the family. The students link the evaluation of virtues of good citizenship to that of their immediate experiences in family relations. The fights between family members regarding property and maintaining relationships without any strong emotional bonding just for the sake of receiving favours and help disappoint the students. Their question is—if strong relations like blood 37 38

Environmental science is one of the subjects offered in the secondary schools. This view of the students is discussed with regard to rituals.

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ties cannot compel people to help each other and fulfil their duties how can some abstract moral rules, with no authority to implement them, ever create good citizens? Apart from the family, day-to-day experiences like eve-teasing, accidents, thefts, etc., raise similar questions. Most of the girl students feel that they always have to be cautious in whatever they do. This robs them of their sense of freedom and independence and therefore hampers their progress. In such a situation they cannot fulfil the duties of being a good citizen. So the students realise that there is a huge gap between ideals and practice in everyday life due to the problems faced by them in different spheres of life. Thus the students find stark contradiction between the ideals of good citizenship promoted in the school and their own experiences in the private and public domains. This in turn creates confusion and hindrance in internalising the qualities of being a good citizen as taught in the school. The flip side of this is the feeling of nostalgia that students experience towards their native villages. They believe that the space, time and circumstances in these villages, even in today’s world, provide scope for spreading community ties and environmental preservation. Though they visualise their career in the city, they yearn to visit their native villages. Hence, though residence, education and social ties in the capital city of Delhi make the students more aware of their national identity, for them the practice of good citizenship requires a favourable social setting and the students identify more with the village communities as having the potential of providing this social setting. These villages or the native place becomes an imagined39 and temporal retreat from the complexities of the city life that are responsible for creating a gap between the ideals and practice of citizenship. The success of the school in inculcating the virtues of citizenship including secularism is viewed in many respects by the students. We find that the few children who form the religious minority in the class are blended in a good way with the others. The students refused to see any kind of differences among themselves because of their religious identity and ideologies. This is shown by the fact that students of different religions form intimate friendship groups and dyads. There is also one inter-religious romantic relationship and the students treated this couple 39 Imagined because of the fact that the students mostly visited their native villages during the time of festivals and when they have vacations. Therefore, they are not familiar with the irrespective villages in a holistic way.

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similar to that of other couples. As described by the students the pattern of courting in this couple was similar to that of the other couples belonging to the same religion. When asked about the role of religion in the Mumbai terror attacks on 29 November 2008, one student asked me: ‘Didi [sister], did the terrorist who opened fire on the street ever realize or think about how many people were Muslim or Hindu in the street? I don’t think so.’ The others nodded in affirmation. She was a Hindu girl aged 14 years. Therefore, even though the larger symbolism of the school and learning practices are heavily inclined towards the inculcation of Hindu ideology, as in the students’ houses and rituals, the expression of secular ideals on the part of the individual agency of the students is visible in situations of national crisis. Thus these students do reflect on the events that take place around them and consciously engage themselves to their social world. Hence the meaning of secularism is independent of what is symbolised in the school and is derived more from the larger Indian society. The scene was different in class XI A where the Muslim girls formed a different group and generally kept themselves separate from the others. However, they themselves as well as other groups in the class did not mention religion as a reason for this segregation. Rather it was because these girls came from a different class section (academic division of the student population) and were new to the class; they also belonged to the same neighbourhood. This opinion indicates a denial of the visible religious affiliation on the part of the students. Besides an important fact in this regard is that these students are older to the students in class IX and hence the denial of their religious affiliation may be a result of their different experiences and understanding of religion. Moreover, in class IX there were fewer students belonging to religions other than Hinduism which makes inter-religion friendships necessary. Another area in which this kind of a citizenship education has succeeded to a certain extent is the construction of the ‘ideal Indian girl’. The strictness regarding the uniform, the posters and collages including pictures and life history of women activists, library books on the ideals for Indian women, the home science and singing classes all contribute to this project. The girls themselves try to imbibe the virtues of modesty, docility and other feminine qualities and construct ‘good’ and ‘bad’ identities for girls with regard to a student’s conformity to these ideals. For example, wearing of heavy makeup is considered undesirable as it means overdoing the presentation of oneself and singing becomes the

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most sought after career followed by teaching which are considered good careers for girls rather than for boys in comparison who seek to join the police services, for example. Girl students, therefore, have internalised the ideals that their families have set in them and which are further inculcated by the school in its delineation of ‘good’ and ‘bad’ identities for girls. Thus traditional ideals are still influential in defining the desired characteristics of citizens of India who are girls. Although education of girls and academic excellence is desired and promoted, girls are still expected to follow the traditional gendered code of behaviour in their private and personal domain. Further, the contradiction between the ideal and the practiced citizenship is somewhat resolved in the social studies class. Subjects like disaster management and environmental science also help in the process by providing knowledge about real and perceived pros and cons of our actions in making our surroundings and thus the nation a better territorial and natural space. The quest for solution of this dilemma, between the ideal citizen and the actual practices in real situations, is reflected in the students’ choice of their favourite freedom fighter. Instead of Gandhi who preached humble tolerance and non-violence, most of the students name Bhagat Singh as their favourite hero, who has been portrayed as a symbol of dynamic and progressive activism. Therefore, the contribution of violent activism, ‘the philosophy of bomb’ initiated by Bhagat Singh and his fellow freedom fighters is not only accepted but remembered, praised and imbibed by the students.40 This can also be considered as an effect of the discourse hidden behind the naming of the four functional houses that the student population is divided into. Hence, although there are prescribed and hidden discourses of citizenship education in the school, the students tend to interpret citizenship and citizenship education in their own terms. Thus citizenship education flows in various arenas of interactions in the school. The sources of this education also vary. They may arise from the prescribed rules and norms given in the textbooks or positions of authority like the principal and senior teachers, or the day-to-day experiences of the students. It was observed that the individual rationality of the students does have a significant role in the rationalisation and acceptance of the curriculum and ideology imparted in schools. The discourse of citizenship education in 40 A description of ‘the philosophy of bomb’ and other activities of Bhagat Singh is given in footnote 30.

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this school is not absolute but is characterised by dilemmas and continuous reconstruction of the meaning of being a good citizen. Therefore, citizenship education is a discursive field of various ideologies, practices, experiences and perspectives of both teachers and students in the school.

Concluding Remarks The school viewed from a distance appears to be a formal institution with impersonal relations among students and teachers. It seems that due to the fully laid out curriculum and routine there would be no time to interact among them, other than academically. However, when observed from within, the school seems to be a full-fledged community. The students and teachers have a definite ‘we’ feeling among them, a code of conduct carried forward as tradition, recognition of authority and leadership, celebration of togetherness and scared adherence of rituals are all characteristics of this community. The school, therefore, provides the space and time for both the students and teachers for self-expression and building relations that act as support systems in times of stress. The relations among teachers and students also help in developing strategies to deal with challenges both in the school and outside as seen in the case of the teacher comforting the students who suffer from problems in their families. This understanding of formal duties and informal interaction can be considered as the principle driving force that helps in the smooth running of the school. There is, however, a lot of difference between the ideals that are preached in the school and the actual practiced culture. There are different degrees of acceptance and practice of the ideals that are derived from the larger social order. In the field of discipline, rituals and general conduct the prescribed norms of the larger society and institutions like the Directorate of Education are followed to a greater degree. On the other hand, regarding the internalisation of the ideals on citizenship, students as well as teachers rationalise the values and ideals according to their situational needs and beliefs. This can also be regarded as one of the means of creating an individual, unwritten culture of its own that would clearly distinguish it from other similar schools with the same formal and written directives. Nevertheless these practices do not depict a counter culture practised by the members of this school and are very much part

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of the Indian society that is characterised by vibrant diversities of ideologies, perspectives, beliefs and practices. Student culture and the practice of consumerism among the students highlight another aspect of the school as a community. These are the more flexible arenas of self-expression in terms of individual personality of a student and also as member of a particular group. Here students redefine their class, gender and social identity through different practices. Therefore, as Hollengshed had analysed, status and role of students and teachers in this school as an organisation are derivative from the formal organisation of the school, the system of student’s organisation and the network of interpersonal relationships (Gordon 1963). Thus, from all these dimensions of practices in school as a community, it is evident that an individual, teacher or student, lives a complete life encompassed within an overall culture of learning and shared relationships.

References Anderson, B. 1983. Imagined Communities. London: Verso. Baker, D.P. and G.K. LeTendre. 2000. ‘Comparative Sociology of Classroom Process, School Organization and Achievement’, in M.T. Hallinan (ed.), Handbook of Sociology of Education, pp. 345–364. New York, NY: Springer. Bernstein, B., H. Elvin and R. Peters. 1966. ‘Ritual in Education’, Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society of London, series B, 251 (772): 429–439. Davis, K. and W. Moore. 1945. ‘Some Principles of Stratification’, The American Sociological Review, 10 (2): 242–249. Democratic Politics Part 1 . New Delhi: NCERT. Available online at http://www. ncert.nic.in/NCERTS/textbook/textbook.htm?iess4=2-6 (accessed on 24 April 2013). Durkheim, E. 1961. Moral Education: A Study in the Theory and Application of the Sociology of Education. New York, NY: The Free Press. Eliade, M. 1957. The Sacred and the Profane: The Nature of Religion. New York, NY: Harcourt, Brace and World, Inc. Foucault, M. 1977. Discipline and Punish: The Birth of the Prison. New York, NY: Vintage Books. Geertz, C. 1973. The Interpretation of Cultures. New York, NY: Basic Books. Giddens, A. 1984. The Constitution of Society Outline of Theory of Structuration. Berkeley, CA; Los Angeles, CA: University of California Press. Goffman, E. 1959. The Presentation of Self in Everyday Life. New York, NY: Anchor Books.

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Gordon, C. 1963. ‘James Colman on “The Adolescent Society”’, The School Review, 71(3): 377–385. Joglekar, J.D. 2006. ‘Veer Savarker Father of Hindu Nationalism’. Available online at www.lulu.com (accessed on 10 December 2013). Kumar, D.R. 1991. Life and Work of Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel. New Delhi: Alantic Publishers and Distributors. Kumarappa, B. 1953. ‘What is Sarvodaya’. Available online at http://www. indianfolklore.org/journals/index.php/Ish/article/download/543/643 (accessed on 15 October 2011). Mahatma Gandhi’s Vision on Sarvodaya. Available online at http://dspace. vidyanidhi.org.in:8080/dspace/bitstream/2009/3123/2/UOM-2005-1826-1. PDF (accessed on 15 December 2011). Marshall, T.M. 1950. Citizenship and Social Class, and Other Essays. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Mead, G.H. 1934. Mind, Self and Society. Chicago, IL: The University of Chicago Press. O’Malley, L. 1931. The Indian Civil Service 1601 to 1930. London: Frank Cass & co.Ltd. Ruskin, J. 1960. ‘Unto This Last’. Cornhill Magazine. Savarkar, V. 1922. ‘Essentials of Hindutva’. Available online at http://www. savarkar.org/en/hindutva-hindu-nationalism/essentials-hindutva (accessed on 24 April 2013). Selvamony, N. 2006. ‘Kalam as Heterotopia’, in M. Muthukumaraswamy (ed.), Folklore as Discourse, pp. 166–190. Chennai: National Folklore Support Center. Singh, M. 2009. Encyclopedia of Indian War of Independence, vol. 4. New Delhi: Anmol. Thorat, S. and C. Senapati. 2006. ‘Reservation Policy in India—Dimensions and Issues’, Indian Institute of Dalit Studies Working Paper Series, Vol. 1, No. 2. New Delhi.

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Schooling, Identity and Citizenship Education* Meenakshi Thapan

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f we take the view that the ‘cosmopolitan imagination’ is a preoccupation of contemporary times, and a ‘way of viewing the world in terms of its immanent possibilities of self-transformation’ (Delanty 2009: 3), we ought to be concerned about the role of school education in this process.1 Schools are sites for the development of consciousness in the young, looking out into the world, where, apart from knowledge and skills, there is an awareness of the inequalities, struggles and possibilities *Earlier versions of this chapter have been published as Schooling, Identity and Citizenship in Yogendra Singh (ed.), Schooling, Stratification and Inclusion: Some Reflections on the Sociology of Education in India. NCERT, 2011 and as Imagining Citizenship: Being Muslim, Becoming Citizens in Ahmedabad in Economic and Political Weekly, 2010, Vol. XLV, no. 3. I am grateful to NCERT, Delhi and EPW, Mumbai for permission to include the material in this chapter. I also thank Ajay Choubey, Varun Roy and Mayuri Samant for their invaluable assistance in fieldwork in Delhi and Ahmedabad and to Professor Sudershan Iyengar for his continuing support in Ahmedabad. 1 I use the term ‘cosmopolitanism’ to essentially mean an emergent and novel way of viewing the social world in terms of ‘people’s experiences, identities, solidarities and values’. This represents what Delanty, following Strydom, refers to as ‘a new conception of immanent transcendence’ (2012: 41). More precisely, this is a way of viewing the social world in terms of its immanent possibilities for self-transformation and which can be realised only by ‘taking the cosmopolitan perspective of Other as well as global principles of justice’ (ibid.).

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for change. At such centres for learning, it is presumed that sympathy, empathy and concern for others, all necessary ingredients for social life, will flourish. The cultivation of what we might call ethical subjectivities is considered essential to the lives of these institutions where children and the young spend large portions of the day, away from the civilising efforts of their parents, larger family and the community in the company of their teachers and peers. In many ways, schools seek to cultivate ethical forms of behaviour among the young. However, the means they employ and the kinds of values they espouse do not always fall into the domain of either the secular or ethics as we understand the terms in popular parlance.2 Most schools, therefore, seek not only to civilise but to moralise, in a didactic and axiomatic manner, about the kinds of people they want coming out of their care. Such didactic modes of communication are not restricted to schools that are run by religious foundations of different kinds but are also prevalent in a variety of government and private schools. This moralising role of schools is not a new phenomenon but one that is increasingly relevant to the contemporary context where violence, discrimination and hatred are viewed almost as the norm. As a consequence of the moralising tenor of school initiatives, in its efforts to care about the citizens it seeks to produce, are in fact born citizens who are immune to such forms of morality and construct their own worlds that are constituted by their experience of the world as they know it. This chapter seeks to examine the relationship between schooling, citizenship and identity in the complex, multi-layered and pluri-vocal processes and settings that characterise schooling in contemporary, urban India. ‘Good’ citizenship education has been characterised as the ‘test’ of effective schooling (Hennessey 2006: 198). We need to consider, however, the possibility of whether or not existing schools in the public education system, anywhere in the world, can indeed educate for truly democratic citizenship. This is due to the rigid and often authoritarian structures within which they operate and the limited resources that are available to them. In many countries, these may include the lack of a well organised curriculum, teaching material, appropriately qualified personnel, infrastructure and other resources. I am also concerned with the ways in which minority institutions, such as schools run by 2 By ethics, I am referring to ethical forms of behaviour in everyday life, taking decisions that are based on considerations for others, and for justice in an increasingly fragmented social world.

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Muslim trusts, articulate and conduct citizenship education in a city like Ahmedabad that has witnessed communal riots periodically and horrific violence against the Muslim community in 2002. Generally speaking, in this chapter, I am not concerned with discovering the most authentic component of citizenship education for democracy in government or private schools in the urban cities of India, nor to understand its outcome for purposes of social change. I seek, however, to understand the ‘idea’ of citizenship that is sought to be inculcated through civic education in our schools, the manner in which classroom encounters take place and processes of communication within them. I view citizenship not as a legal status but as a social process that leads to the production of values concerning freedom and autonomy, as well as those that construct students’ perceptions of their relationship with society. In addition, preparing students to frame and understand questions of justice and morality is central to my understanding of citizenship education. It is not enough, I argue, for students to be concerned about their rights and duties in an environment that emphasises loyalty, obedience and sacrifice as central to ‘good’ citizenship. It is far more important for students, for example, to be aware of the rights and injustices that others experience, of the struggles that are endured on the path to freedom from oppression, of forms of caste, religious and gender inequality that are traumatic and often result in death for the victims. At the same time, the school environment or school culture is not constructed by the official school discourse alone but is simultaneously created and subverted by students, teachers and management who seek to bring their meanings to the situation. In this sense, I am concerned with how citizenship ideals are formulated, evolve, are negotiated and expressed in the everyday lives of schools. The teaching of certain subjects such as history and civics no doubt creates the space for particular constructions of citizenship education, as does the school assembly every morning, but this is not the only space within which such education takes place. The experience of students in this process of developing an identity in relation to what they learn at school, experience at home and in the community, and give expression to, in the articulation of this complexity, is equally important.3 My method in this chapter is to focus on one government school in Delhi and two schools run by private trusts in Ahmedabad to develop 3 I have not, however, been able to examine all aspects of identity formation and focus on schooling alone in this essay.

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an understanding from a micro world that to my mind encompasses the larger world, mirroring all the complexities and conflicts that prevail outside. I seek to understand how some selected schools for children from the Muslim community in Ahmedabad try to recover and establish their identity through their pursuit of citizenship ideals. Such schools undoubtedly exist in an atmosphere of exclusion and marginalisation and seem to understand that in order to be accepted by the majority community, there would have to be a change in being Muslims in particular ways. Citizenship education is therefore constructed and articulated in the language of acceptance: to have ‘good manners’, be neatly dressed, ‘control’ emotions, especially anger, and be committed to religion but within the parameters set by the majoritarian community. In this manner, the more recently established schools have apparently internalised the civilising mission of the Hindu right in order to gain acceptability and integration with the dominant community. However, in older, well-established schools, there is a critique of the state and of the breakdown of Hindu–Muslim relations that has resulted in the prevalent ghettoisation in different residential pockets of Ahmedabad. I would also like to emphasise that my concern in understanding citizenship ideals and their pursuits in schools is not with textbooks of civics or history as they have been ably studied by Krishna Kumar (2001) and Manish Jain (2004, 2005), among others, but with schooling processes and practices and the experience of children as they seek to make sense of their sometimes turbulent and chaotic world. I begin by trying to understand the relationship between schooling, identity and citizenship before I move on to ethnography of secondary school experience in an urban government school located in North Delhi. I then move on to an analysis of the schools in Ahmedabad to arrive at an understanding of what it means to belong to a particular community in Ahmedabad and the efforts of some schools to develop citizenship education in difficult circumstances.

Citizenship and Identity The relationship between understandings of identity and citizenship is fraught with tensions and uncertainties as there are conflicting expressions and understandings of citizenship based not just on the varying backgrounds of students that endow them with different forms of capital

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but, most importantly, on the images and understandings of citizenship given out in the classroom and beyond. This complex situation plays itself out in the lives of students who experience identity and subjecthood in vastly different ways. It is important to emphasise that identities are in no way experienced as exclusive and, as Hasan and Asaduddin point out, ‘identities are inclusive and often rooted in local cultures, languages, oral traditions, influenced by complex historical processes’ (2002: 15). However, the efforts of fundamentalists, theologians and politicians have in the past damaged this multi-layered experience of identity which is often axiomatically boxed into particular cultural or religious idioms.4 It is also important to understand that, sometimes, formal constructions of citizenship, and attempts to assist minority groups, in fact enable the formation of divisive identities. The rhetoric on ‘good’ citizenship, enshrined in particular values, was framed by nationalists in their emphasis on education as developing the moral fabric of a Hindu society based on ideas of education that included character-building, sportsmanship and fair play, derived from British understandings of education. Identity formation at this time included ‘the propagation of manly virtues, such as willpower, honor, and courage’ and van der Veer considers how these were appropriated and transformed by national and imperialist projects and produced most successfully in schools, sports and boys’ movements (2001: 84–85). ‘Muscular Christianity’ and ‘Muscular Hinduism’ were the two significant motifs in schooling and leisure pursuits at the time linked closely to religious ideologies. The relationship between masculinity and national regeneration has been emphasised, e.g., the Hindu discourse is concerned with the threat that Muslims are seen to pose to ‘Mother India’. Muslims are portrayed as ‘excessively masculine and militant’. Linked to this was the idea of racial difference between the Hindus and Muslims as Hindu ideologues took up the idea of the ‘Aryan race’ as the defining characteristic of a Hindu identity. Such an ideology is undoubtedly reflected in the schools run by the RSS in North India.5 It is not only in such schools, however, that we find expressions of such ideologies and schools in India are often sites for the inculcation of particular kinds of religious and politically motivated values. Cosmopolitan learning is therefore not part of the agenda 4 See Gupta (2008) for an understanding of the early encounter with religious identity among very young school-going children in a Delhi neighbourhood. 5 See Sarkar (1996), Sundar (2005) and Trivedi and Trivedi (2000) for studies of such schools.

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in such institutions that moralise and sermonise on the virtues of patriotism, religious ritual and practice, the nation, without paying any serious attention to the everyday dilemmas that envelope young people’s lives in urban cities. ‘The politics of culture [is] usually not acknowledged in the school’ that are arenas ‘for cultural politics, where different cultures interact and negotiate their contradictions’ (Madan 2003: 4655). In schools, there must be an understanding of these differences and the ways in which resolutions are sought and arrived at. However, this is often not considered of significance to government school pedagogies in particular that rely instead on the faithful reproduction of state directed initiatives and directives regarding civic education.

Civics and Citizenship Education The National Curriculum Framework (2005) lays out its aims in very concrete ways signposting the National Policy Document (1986) as its inspirational document emphasising among other things: To promote equality, it will be necessary to provide for equal opportunity for all, not only in access but also in the conditions of success. Besides, awareness of the inherent equality of all will be created through the core curriculum. The purpose is to remove prejudices and complexes transmitted through the social environment and the accident of birth. (National Policy on Education, 1986 as cited in NCF 2005: 5)

To this end, it developed one of its guiding principles as the following: ‘nurturing an over-riding identity informed by caring concerns within the democratic polity of the country’ (ibid.). This is no doubt a laudable aim but not one that is necessarily pursued in schools around the country.6 In school, formal citizenship education takes place through the teaching of subjects such as history and civics. Apart from providing information about the government, the study of civics generates knowledge about students’ rights, duties and privileges. Knowledge about how the government works, the various structural institutions, constitutional frameworks and other details about government education is considered

6 See Madan (2003) and Jain (2004) for critiques of earlier policies and of what actually goes on in schools in the name of civic education.

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essential to develop a critical approach to how government functions.7 It, therefore, appears as an essential component of the curriculum and the focus of most schools engaged in citizenship education through the curriculum is thus on government education and on inculcating civility in a deferential context in largely subordinate relationships. Citizenship education rarely encourages questioning or challenging authority or taking issue with the practices of the state and in that sense is far removed from the critical pedagogy as we understand it. The idea of the ‘good’ citizen instead serves to dwell on and reproduce ideas about the ‘practice’ of good citizenship through developing certain socially desirable behavioural traits and practices. This is done through developing a respect for authority, the rule, the law, socially constituted and legitimised norms for good behaviour that are rewarded and reproduced, and through rituals and ceremonies in school, a reiteration of national ideals, a celebration of collective life and the value of an ideal community.8 The obedience that is sought to be inculcated reflects a concern with developing a particular kind of subjectivity that recognises the necessity of compliance and agrees to submit, rather than question, in view of the complexities that prevail among the school lives of children. Apart from this limitation, the more damaging omission is the complete lack of actively developing a concern and empathy for others regardless of their caste, class, religion or gender.

The Government School These complexities vary among schools and are sharply marked in private schools with a clientele from the low middle classes and certainly A textbook prepared for the ICSE Board (Oomman n.d.) tells students that the study of civics answers the following questions: ‘What are the powers of government? What are the government’s responsibilities? Who is the state? How is government organised? Who is the nation? Who is a citizen? What rights does a citizen have? What are the duties of a citizen?’ 8 It is suggested that there is a tendency to collapse ‘character education’ into ‘citizenship education’ although the former is clearly concerned with the moral upliftment of the individual in and beyond the school. Citizenship education, on the other hand, is concerned with ‘the exploration and search for and abuses of moral thinking and conduct principally as it emerges from, and relates to, social and political frameworks’ (Davies, Gorard and McGuinn 2005: 347). 7

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in government schools that cater to children from the lower socioeconomic strata.9 The Directorate of Education (DOE), under the aegis of the Government of NCT of Delhi, offers the following goal as part of its ‘vision’: ‘To make students responsible citizens who may meaningfully participate in national effort’ (DOE website). None of this is, however, explained in the document which later elaborates, ‘Education holds key to economic and social growth. Quality of life of an individual is also governed by the education. Accordingly, high priority has been accorded to education by the Government. Sufficient funds are allocated to education sector in annual plans’ (NCF 2005: 5). This kind of a good intentioned but vague beginning, with poor articulation of real objectives, and an emphasis on ‘national effort’ seen in terms of only ‘economic and social growth’ can perhaps lead to a lack of understanding and complete confusion, among school teachers, of the components of citizenship education in schools in a rapidly growing and changing society like India. There are 1,040 government schools in Delhi alone run by the DOE. The schools are divided into different districts, and within those, there are zones, and each zone has a given number of schools. For example, there are two zones in the north district of Delhi with approximately 30–35 schools in each zone. In some re-settlement colonies, there are 4,000 students in one school with very large numbers of students in each class.10 The Government Boys Senior Secondary School (GBSSS) is located in one of the two zones in the north district, in a crowded part of North Delhi, close to the inter-state bus stand, in the vicinity of a movie theatre, narrow alleys and petty shops.11

9 See Thapan (2006a) for an analysis of pedagogy and citizenship among students at a private school run by the Arya Samaj in North Delhi. 10 Source: Interview with the Principal, GBSSS. 11 There are a total of 932 students in this school (at the time fieldwork was conducted) and of the 45 students who took part in this study, the fathers of 32 are engaged in some kind of skilled or semi-skilled occupations and private business. These include that of telephone mechanic, fitter in railways, jewellery shopkeeper, bus driver, policeman, artist, property dealer, clerk, guest house manager, messenger with a government agency and the like. The rest include those who earn their livelihood from setting up a small moveable stall selling towels, a barber, gardener, labourer, cook, milkman and other such occupations. All the mothers are ‘housewives’ except one, a widow, who works at home by cutting out and preparing stickers for sale.

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History Teaching and Values of Freedom The relationship between the teaching of particular subjects and the development of values and a morality is evident from the teaching of history. An important part of history teaching in secondary schools in India is the portrayal of the national struggle for liberation from British rule. The aim appears to not only provide information about the past that was so significant to the development of an independent India but more importantly to constitute an ideology of patriotism, loyalty and fearless commitment to the cause of political freedom. At the same time, it also provides an apparently neutral but obviously tempered view of Hindu–Muslim relations at the time and does not fail to emphasise the role of Gandhi, Nehru and other nationalist leaders. The values espoused by Gandhi as crucial to his strategy for wresting freedom from the British are mentioned but not explained in a detailed or nuanced telling of the times. In this context, Krishna Kumar argues that as Gandhi is given a ‘unique status’ in these texts, his ‘motivation, his philosophy and his logic need to be understood as the basis for the appreciation of his actions’ (2001: 138–139). However, the textbooks provide a minimal understanding of terms such as ‘truth’ and ‘non-violence’ and therefore Krishna Kumar poses the question, ‘is a nominal understanding of such ideals adequate for appreciating Gandhi’s political leadership?’ (ibid.: 139).12 Undoubtedly not, as evidence from the school shows us. The writings of class IX students in GBSSS point to their complete disavowal of privileging the authority of the textbook in articulating their preference from among the leaders of the national struggle against the colonialist regime. They are almost unanimous in voicing their preference for the one leader who, in their minds, used violence and led a passionate struggle against authority and British rule. Gandhi is clearly not the preferred choice. An almost equal number of students prefer Gandhi and Bhagat Singh over other leaders. However, while Gandhi is appreciated for his gentleness, non-violent methods and qualities that make him into a ‘Mahatma’, Bhagat Singh is also valourised for his spirit of sacrifice and the belief that had he not been there, India would not have attained freedom from British rule. The reasons they give for their support of Bhagat Singh point to the ideals of aggression, violence, fearlessness within an overall language of social acceptability, viz., the value 12 NCERT textbooks have subsequently been revised post-NCF (2005) but may not be in use in all schools.

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of ‘sacrifice’ for the nation-state. Although textbooks do not ‘teach’ this particular contribution made by Bhagat Singh, students seem to have imbibed it from somewhere. The popular culture, through Bollywood films, television, folklore, stories, comic books, no doubt influences student constructions of valour and heroism. We need to also understand the role of the peer group which further develops these understandings into a more coherent perspective and provides legitimacy to that which would otherwise remain embedded in the ‘private’ worlds of children, unspoken and unknown to others, especially teachers and other adults. In an informal conversation with class XII students in GBSSS, a question about why Gandhi is called ‘Bapu’ triggers off a spate of negative responses: ‘He is not Bapu but Sautela bapu (step-father), ‘you know he sold our country, he is responsible for creating Pakistan,’ ‘Today, India, Pakistan and Bangladesh would be one country.’ The support for Bhagat Singh is unanimous; on being asked about their choice among the freedom fighters, the students reply in chorus—‘Bhagat Singh’. Quizzed further for their reflection on the Bhagat Singh’s ideology, they reply, desh sewa (service to the nation). This value of selfless service to the nation, and the heroism embedded in the value of sacrifice, reflects an ideal of citizenship in the minds of students and is no doubt derived from the emphasis on patriotism, respect for national boundaries and the emergence of a self in relation to this narrowly defined identity that is sought to be inculcated through public events in the school, such as the morning assembly. Morality is, however, not reflected in respect for the nation-state alone, but also through other ideals of citizenship such as ‘good education’ and ‘good behaviour’. Our understanding of this aspect of schooling would be incomplete without an understanding of the assembly at GBSSS.

Morning Assembly at GBSSS The morning assembly at GBSSS is an important component of the school routine as it is a daily collective event symbolising a coming together of students and teachers to ritually celebrate their common presence in the space of the school.13 It is also a requirement from the 13 Elsewhere, I have identified the morning assembly as part of a set of rituals and ceremonies that are essential to maintaining a sense of communitas, or we-feeling, in the school culture. See Thapan (2006b); see also McLaren (1986) and Benei (2009).

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DOE and is therefore indispensable to the curriculum. The assembly at GBSSS is held in the playground, an open space, the only one available for such an event. The whole playground is occupied by the students in groups for the morning assembly. When all the boys stand in neat rows, the commands ‘stand at ease’ and ‘attention’ are loudly pronounced in Hindi. Religious and patriotic songs are played on a public address system and the students repeat them. The national anthem is also played and receives the deepest attention and respect from the audience. This respect is well ingrained in all students who display remarkable restraint in their behaviour by standing still, poised and focused completely on the singing of the national anthem. There is also a complete immersion in the singing of religious songs, again well inculcated in the students, at school and perhaps at home as well. The symbolism of the national anthem as worthy of highest respect and stature is fixed in the minds and hearts of all children and the teachers. Group solidarity and loyalty are undeniably centrally focused in the singing of this important piece which symbolises not just the nation but also the individual’s relationship to the nation through embodied gestures that signify respect and deference. The development of boundaries at this stage is quite sharp. There is not only a sense of ‘my nation’ but also of ‘my religion’ that comes from the songs and music as well as from the lectures by teachers on this occasion. A clear sense of religious identity is therefore linked to national identity in the choice and repetitive singing of particular kinds of songs. There is undoubtedly an exclusion of all other religions in the choice and it is not clear whether this is at the direction of the DOE or is the school’s or a particular teacher’s choice. Further inculcation of ideals of ‘good’ behaviour and religious practice takes place through the brief lectures and homilies presented by various teachers. Good behaviour is expected to flow from such a virtuous life that includes ‘peace in the mind/heart’. This is symbolic of the value of ‘goodness’ that is perhaps associated with an ideal citizenry and its meaning is not lost on the students who tend to mouth similar homilies in interaction with them. Citizenship education takes on the form of character education in such contexts as teachers strive to ensure that ‘good’ character forms the basis for ‘good’ citizenship. Teachers also use the assembly to provide their perspective on the mix between religion and everyday life. This includes references to popular gods as well as to Hindu leaders and the element of discipleship that is considered central to being a good Hindu:

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Hanuman is God of Thoughts. You all should be acquainted with good thoughts because it will give you self-satisfaction and moral height. Students should always be obedient and see the example of Vivekananda and his guru Paramhansa. Vivekananda was the best student of Paramhansa and it was because of his obedience that the guru blessed him to be successful and he remained immortal even after his death. Besides Vivekananda, other disciples were Eknath and Balanath who have set examples for a cordial Guru–chela relationship.

The emphasis on a good disciple is unmistakable and reflects the effort to suggest obedience, loyalty and subservience on the part of the student. The attempt to inculcate a religio-national identity, appealing to ‘good’ thoughts and ‘peaceful’ minds, is part of the attempt to locate national identity in a well-marked and clearly defined religious identity. To put the assembly in the perspective of the student culture is interesting for it reveals their cynicism towards school culture: students believe that the songs are for the benefit of the officers from the Directorate, who may visit the school, ‘to keep them happy’. While this may appear to thereby suggest that there is no serious meaning attached to such music, the repetitive nature of the ritual, enacted on a daily basis, has the potential for developing an identity in the context of national and religious boundaries. Although students have clearly articulated perspectives on the values espoused through the school’s efforts to instil citizenship ideals, they tend to adhere to the norm within the student community so as not to stand out as offering a radically different perspective. Students express and share their views without any hesitation in their peer group. Fear of being different of standing out, from the peer group, as well as from the culture of school life, is however rather strong, and conformity becomes the norm to ensure a sense of security and safety among children against the largely dominating world of the adults.14 This in its own way creates and sharpens the culture of sameness, already promoted in all schools, so that difference is emphasised and becomes an alien presence. Identities are therefore formed, and reaffirmed, in relation to those others who are more or less alike, have unopposed views and are largely defined by their cultural and religious roots. 14 Among others, this aspect of school culture is well articulated by Vikram Seth at a speech at his alma mater, the Doon School: ‘the ethos was one of conformity, of fear of public opinion, of hostility to anyone who was eccentric or odd in any way’ (2007: 392). Seth highlights with honesty what is well known about school life: the desire to fit in, be part of the crowd, thereby indistinguishable and similar to everyone else is very strong.

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Classroom Encounters: Creating the Other In this student culture, the pedagogic encounter that takes place in the classroom has a particular value because it allows for the expression of views and perspectives in front of the ‘authority’ of the teacher, depending on the particular teacher who is present in a classroom on a particular day. The classroom is also that space where ‘legitimate’ knowledge is transmitted which sets the agenda for what students understand about the ‘idea’ of citizenship, as derived from textbooks and from the teacher’s perspective. A classroom encounter between teachers and students at GBSSS goes like this: The teacher enters the class at 12:30 p.m. (several minutes late). There were only 18 students present and seven of them were without books. Teacher:

Today I am going to teach a very important chapter and questions are bound to come in the examinations. I’m going to teach you about Democratic Rights.

The students began whispering. Two students who were sitting at the back bench went forward to sit at a front desk. Teacher: Student 1: Student 2: Student 3: Teacher:

What are the Fundamental Rights given to the Indian citizen? Right to Equality and Right to Freedom. Sir, we have right to religion. Right to protest against inequality. Yes, you are all right. Well tell me why are rights given to the citizen?

There is no answer from the students. Teacher: Student 1: Student 2: Student 3: Teacher:

Who gives us the rights? The government gives us the rights. Society gives us the rights. The Constitution gives us the rights. Who protects the rights?

There is no answer, and then the teacher explains. Teacher:

The law protects the rights. We cannot develop without rights neither our society can develop. The rights are sanctioned by the society and protected by law.

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Tell me what is the importance of rights? Sir, Rights are important for the development of humanity. ‘Good’, the teacher encourages other students. For the development of society.

Good, the teacher looks at the book and then again asks the students. Teacher:

Is India a secular country?

The reply ‘Yes’ is in chorus. Teacher: Student 1: Student 2: Teacher:

Student: Teacher:

How can you say that India is a secular country? Sir, we have freedom to enjoy any religion we want. Sir, there are many religions practiced is our country. You both are right. In India, many religions are practiced and we are free to enjoy any religion we want. Nobody can be punished on the basis of religion. In our constitution the word ‘secular’ is clearly mentioned, the Government cannot interfere on the basis of religion. Sir, then, why is some religion given more preference like the Muslims of our school are paid `300 every year? See, the government adopts measures to bring the minority religion to the mainstream and government gives financial help to those who are below poverty line.

Now show me the home-work and, those who have not done, stand up.

The efforts by the state to include poor children from a community that is a religious minority by offering cash incentives for school attendance in fact end up highlighting their difference from the rest. Often, at assembly, announcements are made asking these children to bring their guardians to school to collect the money. As this lesson on ‘rights’ very clearly shows us, Muslim students are seen as being privileged because they receive an annual cash allowance. Considering the overall background of children in this school, as underprivileged and first generation learners, the animosity that is built up against Muslim students who are favoured with special dispensation, is a real and palpable presence. The teachers have not yet evolved a method through which they can actually rectify some of these misapprehensions through dialogue and discussion, and perfunctory reasons are provided primarily to close discussion rather than open them up in any meaningful manner. The students are left with an inadequate understanding of the issues at hand and a feeling

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of resentment remains present in their understanding of a minority community and its presence in their midst. This pervasive culture of the authority of the teacher, and the school as an institution, surrounded by ambiguity and confusion, in which the only semblance of order comes from the commands at morning assembly, or from the principal’s office, where large charts detailing the day’s activities, the timetable, various lists and notices are prominently displayed, constitutes the school culture. It is also the chaotic and turbulent world in which students learn to survive, rebel and also manipulate to their advantage. The principal’s complaint that the largest problem he faces is that of truancy is easily understood as he really does not have very much to keep the boys in school. Some teachers themselves go 20 minutes late to class, but freely use corporeal punishment to check latecomers or those who don’t bring their books to class, twisting their ears and caning them on their backs with complete abandon and fearlessness in the presence of the researcher. The boys exit from the school gate in full view of anyone who cares to watch, telling the lone researcher who observes their departure that they are going to watch films, or play cricket or just hang about with other boys outside. What emerges is the complete uselessness of it all and the ideals for citizenship education are, no doubt, lost in this bedlam that passes for education in this school.

Two Schools in Ahmedabad In the following vignettes, of two secondary schools in Ahmedabad, an attempt is made to foreground the forces that shape the development of citizenship education in particular kinds of schools and the ways in which these are articulated and experienced by participants in schooling processes. School A, an English medium private school, is located in Danilimda which is adjacent to the Shah Alam area in Ahmedabad, which is dominated by the minority Muslim community. At one time there was a substantial Hindu population in the area as there are apartment blocks named Ravindra Park, Sridevi Park from the time when Hindus lived there. The growing population of Muslims in this area led to the emigration of Hindus and Danilimda is now a Muslim-dominated area. Due to this process of ghettoisation, there are incidents of communal disturbance even today as a result of rivalries that stem from the celebration of

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religious festivals such as Diwali. There are other social problems including those related to the education of the community. This is evident from the recent controversy regarding the residents’ demand for starting a municipal school as there is not a single municipal school in the area, and especially after 2002, Muslim children do not gain admission in other good schools in the city.15 This was also reported by members of the management of different Muslim schools and points to the urgent requirement for the school in the area as well as to the larger question of the condition of education for the children from the minority community. Against this background, the principal aim of the management of this school is to improve the existing condition of education for Muslim children. The school under study is affiliated to the Gujarat Education Board and mainly uses the textbooks of the Gujarat Board. They have also received a yearly calendar from the Gujarat Education Board which the school is obliged to follow. Apart from the holiday schedule, which does not include a schedule for Ramazan, it is not clear to what extent this calendar was being observed in this school. The culture of discipline is not just limited to the students, teachers also adhere to a strict dress code. The Hindu teachers wear a dupatta and the male teachers have a uniform as well. It is mandatory for all Muslim female teachers to wear burkhas. They cover their heads with a scarf and wear a long skirt which covers the whole body but they have lively countenances, and communicate easily with both male and female children. All (both men and women) are well-qualified (with postgraduate degrees, some with diplomas in education), rather young, amiable, gentle, with a very easy manner of relating to children. Even while scolding children on the sports ground for being out of line or improperly dressed, there is an ease and gentleness in their manner towards children. The identity of being a Muslim school is distinctly presented when the administrator of the school says: ‘it is perhaps the only school in Hindustan that gives vacation for Ramazan.’ Certain ‘rules’ of discipline vis-à-vis religious practice are drawn from the religion, and at the same time, there is an attempt to overcome an uneasiness attached to certain aspects of this religious identity through an exaggerated emphasis on developing ‘good manners’. Embodied forms of discipline drawn from religious beliefs implicated in the teachers’ uniform are no doubt an assertion of their identity. At the same time, the school’s approach that emphasises ‘good manners’ is rooted in an attempt to overcome this 15

Source: Interview with president of the trust that governs the school’s functioning.

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identity characterised by the popular construction of Muslims as barbaric and aggressive. This simultaneous assertion of identity and turning away from how the community is commonly perceived reflects the complexities and conflicts at the heart of the Muslims’ experience of identity in ghettoised Ahmedabad: independent and fearless, conservative and loyal to religious discourse, rejecting aspects of identity that emphasise aggression and barbarism. The internalisation of these ideals as pursued by school management and teachers is, however, in question as students are not passive recipients of citizenship education and always seek to modify it according to their understandings, depending on social class, family and community and peer-group cultures. The principal of the school (a professionally well-qualified woman) emphasises the importance of inculcating the values that express good behaviour, discipline and good manners in Muslim children. She told us that in this school, there are children from different economic backgrounds and this is possible in Islam, i.e., for students from different socio-economic backgrounds to study together in the same institution. Being converted to Islam from Hinduism, she has experienced both the religions and ‘seen the separatism in Hindu religion which is certainly not here.’16 One of the major aims of the school is ‘brotherhood’ she said, and added, ‘though Islam teaches brotherhood, Muslims are very aggressive’ and that ‘they are very emotional’. On the other hand, she told us, ‘Hindus think and work.’ However, after receiving education, Muslims are being ‘awakened’ and education is therefore very important. One of her aims is to give education to this community and teach them to think and work and develop what she called ‘sophisticated personalities’. This effort to develop and nurture conduct suggests her acceptance of the popular view that Muslims are overly aggressive and prone to emotional outbursts and is in consonance with the views of the dominant community. The emphasis by the school management on discipline, good manners and good behaviour can be understood as an attempt to address what the school management considers popular constructions of Muslims in the society. Such values (which are an aspect of character education) are reinforced in the school through various formal and informal schooling processes and practices at different sites. In the morning assembly, e.g., after the singing of prayers and some nazams, children are told various stories about ‘good’ behaviour. There is always a moral in 16 In particular, she was referring to the caste system and other forms of stratification that exist in Hindu society.

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the story which is carefully explained to the students. The content of the different songs sung during assembly, including the nazams, addresses themes such as religious faith, equality, saying no to hatred among people, etc. Apart from all the important aspects of the assembly in this school, it also seeks to transact the culture of discipline. Through various activities such as two periods of drill every week and constant instructions to maintain discipline by the principal as well as the appointment of volunteers to monitor whether or not students are wearing the correct uniform, this culture of discipline is viewed as being inculcated among the students. This may seem similar to the efforts at character-building and disciplining the body that is characteristic of schooling processes, especially through the systematic playing out of the morning assembly which is representative of the school’s coming together as a community. They take on a more significant symbolic value, however, in view of the school management’s emphasis on character education as a citizenship ideal in a particular context. The principal also continuously seeks to redress the students’ behaviour through her meetings with parents but there is an apparent lack of emphasis on corporeal discipline. Instead, the use of constant commands, coaxing and talking to students and to parents, takes place to ensure compliance in the behavioural domain. In addition, her views on the need to make Muslims ‘sophisticated personalities’ are suggestive of the urgency and force with which she seeks to bring about a lasting change in the children’s overall behaviour patterns, and thereby, to construct and shape their identities as Muslims. These are to be the model citizens to partake of social and cultural life in contemporary India. In supporting and furthering this viewpoint, and seeking to implement it as a pertinent goal in the school, the principal has constructed citizenship ideals that sustain the views of the majority community. School B, a private unaided English medium school, is located in another so-called ghetto, a thickly Muslim-dominated area called Juhapura. Juhapura is considered the largest Muslim ghetto in the country with a population of over four lakh people. Local activists of nongovernmental organisations tell us that this area is often referred to as ‘mini-Pakistan’ by the Hindu population in the city. Over the years, many Muslim parents have moved their wards to schools in Juhapura thereby creating a need for good English medium schools in the area. This is one such school to which a large chunk of 150 students transferred in 2002 from another school in Vejalpur area which is a Hindu-dominated area.

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Juhapura appears to be a lower class area with poor civic amenities due to the lack of attention from the government to the civic problems. The school is located on the second floor of one building of a shopping complex which is over-run with small shops. The school space is rather small with five to six rooms, and it, therefore, functions in two shifts. In the morning there is a secondary section and the primary section is held in the afternoon. The school started in 1989 and there are 600 students in the school, among whom 250 are girls. Since it is a nonaided school, the monthly fee of the school is `300—with `350 as the term fee. Evidently, the students belong to the weaker sections of society. There is no explicit presence of a Muslim culture in the school except for the fact that the school has vacation for Ramazan like other Muslim schools. School discipline seems to be the most important factor to the extent that there are even ‘prescribed’ modes of communication in the school. For instance, a permanent notice board at the entrance to the school displays clear instructions regarding the mode of communication between the teachers and the parents. The board also contains information such as timings to meet the principal, specific timings to fill up the fees and strict instructions for the parents to send their wards regularly to the school attired in the proper uniform. It clearly states that the parents are not allowed to meet the class teachers without the permission of the principal. Such a display points to an explicit culture of discipline in the school. It came up from the discussion with the principal that even students are not allowed to interact with their respective class teachers without the prior permission of the principal-in-charge. The principal-in-charge appeared to be a strict disciplinarian and in his perception, the primary goal of school organisation is to teach discipline, good manners, which include speaking in English, and good behaviour such as respect for elders. The principal also seemed to be quite aware of the low socio-economic background of the students coming to the school, and in that particular context, emphasised the necessity of values such as discipline and good manners. Unlike the principal of School A, who underlined the need to reconstruct Muslim identity, due to certain inherent shortcomings, in School B, the emphasis is on the lower socio-economic background of the students and the need to educate and civilise the poor Muslim. In School B, the moral space of the morning assembly has been replaced by the seamless display of photographs, messages from quotations written on the walls of the corridor and classrooms in the school. The entire territorial space of the school has been taken over for purposes

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of displaying the moral objectives of the school whatever form these may take. This includes sayings like ‘an apple a day keeps doctor away,’ ‘early to bed and early to rise makes the man healthy, wealthy and wise,’ ‘faith is force of life,’ Sang teo rang (‘you are known by the company you keep’), ‘hatred is like a fire it makes even light rubbish deadly,’ ‘experience is the best teacher,’ ‘honesty is the best policy.’ It would appear that character or civic education in this school is not geared to any particular religious or ethnic identity. At the same time, photographs of Mahatma Gandhi, Jawaharlal Nehru, Subhash Chandra Bose, Bhagat Singh, Rajendra Prasad, Indira Gandhi and Rajiv Gandhi displayed on the corridor walls point to the nationalist framework of citizenship education prevalent in the school. The formation of houses is one of the formal processes through which citizenship education takes place in this school. Houses point to the bearing of nationalist ideas on the teaching of citizenship education. All the houses in the school are named after heroes of the nation in different fields. It appears that the basic purpose is to familiarise students with these luminaries and to inculcate nationalist feelings in them. The great people after whom the houses are named are perceived as role models for the younger generation. Thus, houses are named after Shivaji, Tagore, C.V. Raman and Ashoka and we decided to find out what students in these houses think of them. Class VIII students in Shivaji House told us that Shivaji was a ‘great king’ and that is why they have a house in his name. They think that he was great because he fought a lot of wars. One of the boys said that he was not only brave, but he was also intelligent because he killed Aurangzeb cleverly. The boy did not believe that Aurangzeb was ‘bad’ and said that all these kings were fighting with each other and war is destructive because many people get killed. But in spite of saying all this, he insisted that Shivaji was great. Tagore House students emphasised that Tagore is an important figure because he wrote the national anthem. They said he also worked for people and society and the others who did this were Gandhi and Bhagat Singh. According to them, Gandhi was great because he practised satyagraha but they could not explain what satyagraha is. They did not know anything at all about Bhagat Singh. Ashoka House students said Ashoka was a great king. One of the boys said he spread Buddhism and non-violence, and added that, non-violence is a good value because then there will be no wars. He could not say anything about Buddhism. C.V. Raman is an important figure for the students because he is an

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Indian scientist who received the Nobel Prize. One of the boys also said, ‘we also want to become like him.’ Gandhi was a clear first choice for alternative house names because he was a great freedom fighter, ‘there is no one like him’ (unke jaise koi nahi), Mangal Pandey was another favourite as in the students’ perception, he is the ‘first martyr’ (pehla shahid), Chandrashekhar Azad was suggested as an alternative choice as one girl said, he was ‘brave as he told the British … you can never catch me.’ Their lack of knowledge about the leaders after whom the houses are actually named indicates the students’ complete lack of affiliation or attachment to these figures who are distant from their everyday lives and have no place in them. This could be true of children in any school, and what stands out therefore is, the students’ choice of alternative figures which indicates the students’ willingness to support rebellious figures, who were ready to die for causes they deeply believed in, and so the spirit of sacrifice and of putting society before personal well-being is an important value for them. In this way, these children are quite similar to students in GBSS who also value sacrifice and service to society above all else. Clearly, students do not often imbibe what they are meant to either through textbooks or schooling practices. In School B, students subscribe to a citizenship ideal that celebrates the rebel, the martyr and the hero without necessarily rejecting official prescriptions in toto. These students are in a sense ‘good’ citizens, as they accept the house names for what they are, leaders and great men, but desire for themselves a personal choice that valourises the brave and the radical. It is striking that no houses are named after any Muslim national hero. The fact that Ashoka and Shivaji were chosen and no Muslim ruler, like Akbar, could be viewed as a mere coincidence. Two possibilities may explain the choice of house names. Either this school also accepts the hegemony of the kind of citizenship education informed by majoritarian historical narratives, or the school authorities feel the pressure to present themselves as nationalist in terms of the prevalent hegemonic discourse. The physical location of the school might play a role in this construction. This is the hegemonic discourse that is prevalent in the city of Ahmedabad against which the school authorities might feel the need to present themselves as nationalists. While this school is not clearly articulating the need to change Muslim identity in a particular direction, or to make Muslim children apparently more balanced, less emotional and aggressive, it is undoubtedly indicating its preference for the projection

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of a Hindu nationalist ideology into the development of the child as a citizen of India. I have briefly tried to examine how some private schools for Muslim children in Ahmedabad, with its background of communal riots and extreme violence against Muslims, tend to imagine citizenship through their experience of being marginal, errant and excluded citizens of India. The process of ghettoisation of territorial spaces has resulted in exacerbating differences between communities and in the everyday living in fear of the other. The sharply drawn boundaries not only exclude others, but also enclose those within in a possibly constraining space. This experience shapes their search for survival in a dominant, hegemonic discourse which will annihilate them if they do not submit to its parameters of what constitutes an ‘authentic’, ‘civilised’ and acceptable citizen of India. I have tried to foreground the experience of those the state seeks to ‘correct’ and what it has done to their perceptions of educating Muslims to become ‘acceptable’ and ‘authentic’ citizens of India. The Gujarat state, in this context, is apparently unconcerned with the emotional and psychological development of children affected by the brutal killings and trauma they were witness to in 2002 and the impact this may have on the formation of identity among Muslim youth. The outcome is fear of an uncertain future. The possibilities for change lie in students’ voices, and in their resistance, that offer the only hope for a movement away from fixed notions of citizenship education and of what it means to be a Muslim in contemporary India.

Developing Alternative Modes of Citizenship Education The conditions we encounter in urban schools in contemporary India are fraught with complexities, conflict and difficult situations of different kinds. This is the reality of our schools, especially those run by the state. In addition, the social condition of acute poverty disallows some to come to school and those who do perhaps never achieve their goals. Minority communities must deal with their exclusion and marginalisation, and as this chapter has shown, they develop different strategies to emulate dominant ideals of citizenship education and to portray themselves as amiable and benevolent others. The question of critical significance, to the purpose of this essay, is about how prevailing school cultures inflect

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ideals of citizenship education and in turn impact the formation of identities. Undoubtedly, these ‘ideals’ of citizenship education are theoretically framed and articulated by educators outside schools. Schools, in themselves, continue with character education, understood as citizenship education, engendering a culture of obedience and loyalty, focusing on the narrow and known, unable to open up or understand the world of the unknown. At the same time, minority institutions seek to educate children through a kind of citizenship education that focuses on their apparent limitations and seek to overcome them. Stereotypes abound and while minority institutions seek perhaps to deal with their marginalised condition and bring about some change, schools like GBSSS do not hesitate to reproduce stereotypes and fail to address issues that perpetuate such negative images. Identities, we may conclude, remain encapsulated within this culture of the known, which emphasises sameness and eliminates or marks our difference as problematic. Identities in this manner are fixed in a collective self, separated from others, which results in prejudices which get embedded in the minds of children (Piper and Garrat 2004). Building up a culture of willingness to explore the unknown would imply a movement away from the dominant culture and a commitment to recognise and respect other cultures, religions and people. Such an engagement with the unknown is the only way to understanding, sharing and relating to those others who are differentiated from the majority by caste, class, gender, race and religion. As Hasan and Asaduddin ask, ‘Can we expect empathy through identification with each other’s destinies and foregrounding the human over parochial considerations?’ (2002: 13, emphasis added). They are asking for the experience of sameness to be extended across divisions of religion, class, gender and caste. This is possible only when there has been an unlearning of the hurts and memories of the past taught through history textbooks of various times and the development of a completely new perspective that looks afresh at people and relationships. Such a view opens up a vast arena of potentiality, as it seeks to break boundaries and borders, to end closure and look only to openness, or to that which may bring the unknown into close and intimate connection. Societies, and relationships within them, are not closed and bounded systems; the possibilities for change are ever present and the potential for exercising moral choice lies within each individual. The role of ‘moral imagination’, it has been argued, ‘is to keep the choice open, allow various contending potentialities to be tempered so that the possibility of right conduct remains available at all times’ (Suhrud 2013).

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By inculcating the ability to exercise choice, based on a kind of moral rationality, schools pave the way for developing new modes of becoming citizens. The effort to inculcate a culture of questioning, doubt and criticism is no doubt a laudable aim in schooling processes that have numbed the minds of children through decades of rote memorisation, repetition and sheer boredom. While such methods may create a culture of critique and engagement that is important and engenders an understanding, for example, of how power works in everyday life, this in itself is not enough to allow for the movement into the unknown. In an important paper on the loss of the Buddhist conscience in contemporary times in Sri Lanka, Obeyesekere quoting the Buddha, cautions us, ‘Hatred that burns on the fuel of justifications must be quenched with the water of compassion, not fed with the firewood of reasons and causes’ (1991: 232). This indicates the necessity of a completely new approach that works in different ways with teachers and children. It is apparent that this approach undeniably appeals to the psychological dimensions of human behaviour, including emotions, through developing feelings and behaviour in consonance with compassion and ‘imaginative action’. One of the ways in which such emotions are sought to be developed in children is through ‘mindfulness’ practices with students and teachers in schools. Deborah Orr in her discussion of mindfulness practices has argued that learning affects students at all levels: ‘mind, body, emotion and spirit’ (2002). It is therefore important to practise mindfulness in order to develop a consciousness that empathises with, and is in relationship to, those who are viewed as ‘different’ and therefore strange. In itself, mindfulness has increasingly been used as a technique to develop additional life skills among students and teachers and has indicated, through several studies, to ‘increase attention and concentration; develop bodily awareness and coordination; develop emotional and cognitive awareness and understanding; develop interpersonal skills; decrease stress, attention deficit issues, depression, anxiety and hostility; and overall, promote a sense of well-being, confidence and joy’ (Seth 2012:11). In practising mindfulness, there is not only an awareness of emotions and the development of a mind that is alert through a kind of quiet awareness but also the development of conflict resolution skills. Such skills are essential as an antidote to the contemporary emphasis on violence and terror as forms of addressing injustice and inequality. In the same spirit, Yusuf Waghid (2005), writing in the context of education in South Africa, argues for a policy of citizenship education

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that advocates ‘compassionate action’. Compassionate action is based on an understanding and experience of compassion that is not necessarily derived from rational choice and explanation. Compassion, Waghid argues, is necessary for understanding the suffering of others and in this manner ‘pushes the boundaries of the self’ outwards (Nussbaum, as quoted by Waghid 2005: 334). To be in relationship is the central tenet of the work of the Indian philosopher J. Krishnamurti (1895–1986) reflected in his uncompromising assertion, ‘You are the world.’17 It has been suggested that this is a ‘statement of identity’ as Krishnamurti’s view indicates that freedom implies a loss of individual identity to the extent that the individual would always find himself in another (Herzberger 2007). This sense of loss of identity as a self-concerned individual is in fact critical to Krishnamurti’s writings where he repeatedly asserts that ‘relationship’ is the basis of human existence. He points out, for example, ‘There is no life without relationship; and to understand this relationship does not mean isolation. On the contrary, it demands a full recognition or awareness of the total process of relationship’ (2001).18 The potential opened up by such forms of citizenship education is often curtailed by the political, cultural and anthropological contexts in which schools exist. This no doubt limits the capacities of children and youth to develop empathy for others. As Zembylas has argued, ‘a pedagogy of empathy in peace education must consider the limits, failure and 17 See Krishnamurti (2007) for his complete works. I have elsewhere discussed Krishnamurti’s work on education in depth; see for example Thapan (2001, 2006b). 18 At the Rishi Valley School, located in rural Andhra Pradesh (run by the Krishnamurti Foundation, India), there is an effort to develop this sensitivity and awaken intelligence in a variety of ways including a non-authoritarian relationship among teachers and students based on trust and understanding, discussion during ‘culture’ classes, the assembly, and through participation in work and activities relating to the school’s environment regeneration, rural education and health programmes. As a point of contrast, it is of interest to note that the Vancouver School Board (that governs public schools in Vancouver, Canada) has a programme in place for elementary school children. Entitled ‘Roots of Empathy’, this programme is designed to develop ‘emotional literacy’ in young children with the help of a baby and parent who visit the classroom every three weeks in an academic year. It is claimed that the programme has ‘shown dramatic effect in reducing levels of aggression and violence among school children while raising social/emotional competence and increasing empathy’ (Roots of Empathy). While I cannot go into the details of this programme here, my observation of an elementary school classroom using this programme in Vancouver, in December 2007, records, on that particular day, the depth with which young children learn to share experiences of sorrow and suffering in their everyday lives bringing about an awareness amongst themselves of such issues (Thapan n.d.).

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even the impossibility of teaching about/for “reconciliatory empathy” in some circumstances’ (2013: 35). We need to understand and deal with such uncertainties, ambiguities and failures and this opens up new areas and possibilities for ethnographic research in educational studies. At the same time, against all odds, we need to nurture the approach that fosters compassion, empathy and understanding as significant components of citizenship education. To begin with, children and teachers must understand that suffering is serious and is undeserved by anyone. Moreover, it is possible to experience the suffering of another as one’s own and through this process, recognise that it is necessary to alleviate the suffering. The cultivation of compassion, therefore, depends on the elimination of difference and the ability to acknowledge some sort of community between oneself and the other. This understanding of citizenship education needs to prevail in schools to enable the possibilities of a culture based on equality and justice in the complex times we live in.

References Benei, Veronique. 2009. Schooling India: Hindus, Muslims and the Forging of Citizens. New Delhi: Permanent Black. Davies, Ian, Stephen Gorard and Nick McGuinn. 2005. ‘Citizenship Education and Character Education: Similarities and Contrasts’. British Journal of Educational Studies, 53 (3): 341–358. Delanty, Gerard. 2009. The Cosmopolitan Imagination: The Renewal of Critical Social Theory. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Delanty, G. 2012. ‘The Idea of Critical Cosmopolitan’, in Gerard Delanty (ed.), Routledge Handbook of Cosmopolitan Studies, pp. 38–46. London; New York, NY: Routledge and Taylor and Francis. DOE website. Available online at http://edudel.nic.in/welcome_folder/aboutdep. htm (accessed on 30 January 2008). Gupta, Latika. 2008. ‘Growing up Hindu and Muslim: How Early Does it Happen?’ Economic & Political Weekly, 43 (6): 35–41. Hasan, Mushirul and M. Asaduddin. 2002. Introduction, in Mushirul Hasan and M. Asaduddin (eds), Image and Representation: Stories of Muslim Lives in India, pp. 1–16. Delhi: Oxford India Paperbacks. Hennessey, Peter H. 2006. From Student to Citizen: A Community-based Vision for Democracy. Toronto: White Knight Books. Herzberger, Radhika. 2007. Introduction. J. Krishnamurti. The Path and the Pathless, pp. 3–19. KFI Gathering Booklet, Rishi Valley.

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Jain, Manish 2004. ‘Civics, Citizens and Human Rights: Civics Discourse in India’, Contemporary Education Dialogue, 1 (2 (Spring)): 165–198. Jain, M. 2005. ‘Social Studies and Civics: Past and Present in the Curriculum’, Economic and Political Weekly (EPW), 40 (19), 7 May: 1939–1942. Krishnamurti, J. 2001. Freedom from the Known. Chennai: Krishnamurti Foundation (India). ———. 2007. The Krishnamurti Text Collection [CD-ROM] for Windows. England: Krishnamurti Foundation Trust Ltd. Kumar, Krishna. 2001. Prejudice and Pride: School Histories of the Freedom Struggle in India and Pakistan. New Delhi: Viking. Madan, Amman. 2003. ‘Old and New Dilemmas in Indian Civic Education’. Economic and Political Weekly, 1 November, pp. 4655–4660. McLaren, Peter. 1986. Schooling as Ritual Performance: Towards a Political Economy of Educational Symbols and Gestures. Boston, MA; London: Rowman and Littlefield Publishers. National Curriculum Framework (NCF). 2005. ‘National Curriculum Framework’. New Delhi: National Council for Educational Research and Training. Available online at http://www.ncert.nic.in/rightside/links/pdf/framework/ english/nf2005.pdf (accessed on 10 December 2013). Obeyesekere, Gananath. 1991. ‘Buddhism and Conscience: An Exploratory Essay’, Daedalus, 120 (Summer): 219–239. Oomman, Rohini. n.d. Textbook on Civics Prepared for the ICSE Board. Draft available at Rishi Valley School library. Orr, Deborah. 2002. ‘The Uses of Mindfulness in Anti-oppressive Pedagogies: Philosophy and Praxis’, Canadian Journal of Education, 27 (4): 477–490. Piper, Heather and Dean Garrat. 2004. ‘Identity and Citizenship: Some Contradictions in Practice’, British Journal of Educational Studies, 52 (3): 276–292. Roots of Empathy. Available online at http://www.rootsofempathy.org/ProgDesc. html (accessed on 22 February 2008). Sarkar, Tanika. 1996. ‘Educating the Children of the Hindu Rashtra: Notes on RSS Schools’, in P. Bidwai, H. Mukhia and A. Vanaik (eds), Religion, Religiosity and Communalism. New Delhi: Manohar Publishers. Seth, Shantum. 2012. ‘Foreword’, in Thich Nhat Hanh and the Plum Village Community (eds), Planting Seeds: Practising Mindfulness with Children. New Delhi: Full Circle. Seth, Vikram. 2007. ‘On Founder’s Day (1992)’, in Rudrangshu Mukherjee (ed.), Great Speeches of Modern India. New Delhi: Random House. Suhrud, Tridip. 2013. ‘The Crumbling Ground’. The Open Magazine, 9 February. Available online at http://www.openthemagazine.com/article/arts-letters/thecrumbling-ground (accessed on 10 December 2013).

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Sundar, Nandini. 2005. ‘Teaching to Hate: The Hindu Right’s pedagogical program’, in T. Ewing (ed.), Revolution and Pedagogy, pp. 195–218. Palgrave: Macmillan. Thapan, Meenakshi. 2001. ‘Profiles of Famous Educators. J. Krishnamurti (1895–1986)’, in Prospects, Journal of the International Bureau of Education, XXXI (2): 253–265. Geneva: UNESCO. Thapan, M. 2006a. ‘Docile’ Bodies, ‘Good’ Citizens or ‘Agential subjects?: Pedagogy and Citizenship in Contemporary India’. Economic and Political Weekly, 30 September, XLI (39): 4195–4203. ———. 2006b. Life at School: An Ethnographic Study (2nd ed.) New Delhi: Oxford India Paperback. ———. n.d. Field notes on research in Vancouver schools in December 2007. Personal collection. Trivedi, Gyaneshwar and Jyoti Trivedi. 2000. ‘The Constructon of Sarawati: Formation and Transformation of Saffron Identity in Contemporary UP’, Paper presented at the CSH Seminar on Education and Society in India, 29–31 March. van der Veer, Peter. 2001. Imperial Encounters: Religion and Modernity in India and Britain. New Delhi; Princeton, NJ: Permanent Black and Princeton University Press. Waghid, Yusuf. 2005. ‘Action as an Educational Virtue: Toward a Different Understanding of Democratic Citizenship Education’, Educational Theory’, 55 (3): 323–342. Zembylas, Michalinos. 2013. ‘The Emotional Complexities of ‘Our’ and ‘Their’ Loss: The Vicissitudes of Teaching about/for Empathy in a Conflicting Society’, Anthropology and Education Quarterly, 44 (1): 19–37.

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In Quest of Identity: Student Culture in a Religious Minority Institution Parul Bhandari

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his chapter aims to provide an ethnography of an all girls’ school in New Delhi in order to gain an understanding of the pedagogic environment of a school with a strong religious ethos, in particular its influence in shaping ideas of citizenship and peer relations.1 The meaning 1 The fieldwork was conducted in 2007 and 2008. Methods undertaken in conducting the ethnography were non-participant observation in classrooms, focus group discussions with students, interviews with teachers and distribution of questionnaire. The fieldwork was conducted in two parts, the first part was for a period of four months beginning in July 2007 and the second part was an intensive fieldwork for a period of two months beginning July 2008. During the first phase, focus was on class XI Humanities section who were also researched in the second phase as they were promoted to being the class XII Humanities section. During the second phase of fieldwork, the new class XI Humanities section was also observed. Attempts were made to interact with Commerce and Science sections as well; however, the teachers were a bit reluctant and disallowed me to sit in their classes since they had a lot of syllabus to cover and they did not want the students to get distracted as it was a ‘crucial’ year for them since they were to appear for their XII Board exams.

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of ethnography can vary as there are different types of ethnography such as ‘auto ethnography’ or ‘visual ethnography’ (Hammersely and Atkinson 1995/2008). However, there are some basic methods of enquiry that an ethnographic work undertakes, which were used for this research. These include observations in everyday contexts, data through informal conversations, non-participant observation, unstructured questions and focus on few cases or a small group. By utilising these methods, an ethnographic approach was undertaken to understand and unravel the complexities of pedagogy at St. Margaret’s. Hammersley and Woods (1976/1984), Hammersley and Atkinson (2008) and Atkinson, Delamont and Housley (1995/2008) have written about the relevance and benefits of conducting an ethnography especially in schools. Through this ethnography, it is aimed to analyse various aspects of school culture such as, school as an organisation, student’s culture and various ways in which students appropriate and negotiate with the school; ideas of citizenship as espoused by the school and received by its pupils; and finally the role of religious identity. This ethnography also aims to unravel and explore the dynamics between peer relations and identity formation in a secular country such as India. St. Margaret’s was founded in the early 20th century by a Christian congregation that was established in the early 19th century in western Europe. One of the main objectives of the congregation was furthering education and establishing schools in many parts of the world. St. Margaret’s is a non-aided school, i.e., it is not funded by the government; yet, like most other schools in Delhi, it follows the government-approved curriculum laid down by the Central Board of Secondary Education (CBSE).2 Since Christian missionaries established the school, a strong emphasis is laid on reiterating a Christian identity and imparting values through uniquely Christian modes (such as references to the Bible, Saints’ lives and so on). This ethnography aims to explore the dynamics of the Christian identity of the school, its values of citizenship and its distinct peer culture as a result of the interplay of religion and education.

2 Another curriculum under the Government of India is the Indian Certificate for Secondary Education (ICSE).

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The School and Its Organisation The head of the school, the principal, is a nun from the congregation of the Christian order that founded the school.3 The school is divided into junior (KG to class V), middle (classes VI to IX) and senior schools (classes X to XII). Each of these has a headmistress, who is in-charge of the school’s overall administration, well-being and discipline. The headmistress of the junior school had usually been a nun, but in the past 10 years teachers who are not nuns have been appointed as headmistresses. The nuns only teach the value education classes exclusively for Christian pupils and teachers who are not nuns teach all other subjects. The teachers belong to diverse religious and regional backgrounds with a substantial proportion being Christians. The school has about 1,700 pupils (all girls). Each class (e.g., class V) has three sections and from class IX onwards have four sections (A, B, C and D). From class XI onwards, pupils are divided on the basis of subjects they choose: one section for Science, another for Humanities and two for Commerce. Each section has about 40 pupils. The pupils are also divided into four ‘houses’ and this division operates for games and cultural activities. The ‘houses’ are usually named after either Indian personalities or qualities,4 and at St. Margaret’s, the names chosen for the houses are qualities. The school has a student body at every level (junior, middle and senior) and the highest is of the senior school that has 14 ‘council members’ namely, the head girl, Christian leader, sports captain, four house captains (seven are the captains chosen from class XII and the other seven are vice-captains chosen from class XI) who are democratically elected in a secret ballot. This ethnography raises many pertinent issues in the field of sociology of education and poses questions relevant to further research. To unravel the dynamics between the Christian identity of the school and its attempts to impart citizenship education, this ethnography will examine three themes. First, it will focus on the concomitant existence of formal and informal structure of the school, by analysing the ways in which students as well as the administration negotiate with the goals and functioning of the school. Second, it will explore the inextricable link between religious identity and education. It will understand the many ways in which a religious minority school imparts citizenship education 3 4

The principal of the school has always been a nun. See other chapters in this book.

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to its students who espouse various religions. Finally, it focuses on the student culture itself. In doing so, it investigates the role of the school’s values and religious identity, pupils’ class and religious affiliations and the influence of media and consumerism, that affects both peer group dynamics and the development of ‘self’ and the ‘other’. Following these three main analytical themes, this ethnography aims to address two questions: first, what is the role and expectation of a religious minority institution in imparting civic and citizenship ideals in a secular nation? Second, in what ways do its pupils develop their identities? The chapter is divided into three sections. The first section focuses on the organisation of the school and ways in which this is received and negotiated by the students and staff. The second section focuses exclusively on the religious dimension of the school and analyses ways in which this religious orientation is constituted or used to impart values and is challenged and/or negotiated. The third section examines the peer group dynamics within the school, focusing on reiteration of class status and aspirations for ‘mobility’ that monitor group dynamics.

School as an Organisation: Negotiation and Contestation A school, like any other formal organisation, has various bodies, each performing a distinct set of duties such that together they all work towards the successful functioning of the school. Three main functioning units form the body of St. Margaret’s. These are, first, departments (and teachers) wherein each teacher specialises in a particular discipline and conducts lessons. She is also responsible for the general well-being of the pupil and acts as the main mediator between students and school authorities. The second body is the administrative staff that records daily workings of the school and reminds other bodies of the rules and duties. The third body is that of the students. The students are divided according to age, interests in extra-curricular activities (e.g., basketball, throwball) and specialisations in disciplines (arts, science and commerce). Every organisation has a formal structure and concomitant with this rational, bureaucratic structure is an informal one that often challenges the formal organisation. This challenge can be an unintended consequence of the formal structure and can also take the form of an active rebellion. The challenge is often unprepared as human sensibilities of

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trust, friendship and bias can overshadow or be at loggerheads with the rational ethos of an organisation, i.e., based on objectivity, rules and conformity. The challenge can also be deliberately aroused by an active disagreement with the school’s ethos or authority. Discussed in this section are the main formal bodies and organisational practices of the school. Each of the subsections discusses the formal aspects of the organisation as well as the ways in which they are challenged or unfulfilled by either the teachers or students. These analyses will thus demonstrate the interaction and dynamics of the formal and informal aspects of the school.

The School Charter The school’s formal organisation and ethos are based on a charter,5 i.e., informed by a set of four core values and aspirations and every effort is made to inculcate them in the students. To ensure that these are instilled in its pupils from the beginning, the charter is provided in the school diary given to every student at the beginning of each academic year, and is required to be carried to the school.6 However, interaction with the students revealed that many were not even aware that a school charter existed. A typical response among class XII Humanities section, on their views on the school charter, was ‘What is the school charter?’ ‘Where is it?’ This lack of awareness reflects their lack of interest in the goals of the school. Yet, not all were unaware of the charter. A few expressed their deep displeasure and objection to some of its goals such as that of ‘honesty’. They believed that in ‘today’s fast moving world’ one cannot be very successful by being very honest, an ideal to which the charter attached great importance. In class XI Humanities section most students had read the school charter and had discussed with the class-teacher7 5 The charter consists of a list of values such as those of forgiveness, honesty, simplicity and dignity. 6 The diary has a calendar enlisting important dates for the school such as Founder’s Day, Sports Day, festivals and so on. The teachers also use the school diary to write notes and complaints to parents. 7 Each section was appointed with a class-teacher who was in-charge of the overall welfare of the pupils of that particular section, while she also taught one subject to that class. Her duties included taking attendance every morning and being in-charge of discipline, complaints from other teachers were reported to her first. Another important task was for her to maintain regular contact with the parents of the pupils by way of the parents–teacher meeting (PTM), held once every six months. Finally, she also has to write annual report cards for the children that include their grades as achieved throughout the year and general comments on their progress.

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one of its tenets that discouraged students from indulging in ‘idle activities’ and ‘leisure chats and gossiping’. The students considered this to be regressive and unnecessary and believed that these are merely forms of entertainment, and that in fact, gossip forms an important part of ‘catching up’ with friends. One of the other goals and functions of the school which is a part of its missionary character is to impart education to less privileged children. St. Margaret’s hosts a programme after school hours where underprivileged children are taught Math, English and Hindi by the students in class IX and above. Each student is supposed to stay after school for a minimum of 10 days in an academic year, and only when this attendance is fulfilled is she allowed to sit for the annual examination. If she desires she can extend this programme for more than 10 days but no fewer. It was revealing that only a handful of students mentioned the importance and role of this programme while discussing various ways in which the school imparts values of duty and responsibility. This clearly reflects lacunae between the goals of the school, its methods of imparting these goals and their reception by the pupil. In fact, far from viewing it as means of imparting values of social responsibility, the students see it as a compulsory requirement, successful completion of which will permit admittance to the next academic level. The few examples discussed earlier demonstrate that, first, there is a lacuna between the aspirations and objectives of the school and those of its pupils.8 This in turn could be attributed to the lack of rigour in communicating these ideals on the part of the school, and/or the lack of interest and motivation on the part of the students in the schools’ ethos. Second, it reflects the ability of the students to critically appraise the school’s values. This critical perspective is a result of an interaction and influence of the ‘outside world’ and mechanisms of survival in the ‘real world’, perhaps learnt from their family and/or interaction with others outside school. This also highlights that pupils are part of a larger society, which plays an important role in shaping the individual often of greater formative influence than the school.9 8 Thapan (1991/2006) notes a similar interaction of the transcendental and local orders of the school in her ethnographic work. She notes that Krishnamurti’s ideology is constantly being challenged by the students and the larger society, e.g., his ideology of education as a tool of change and art of learning is challenged by the examination system which breeds competition; also many students find his ideology impractical for the outside world. 9 Further discussed in the second section.

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The Spatial and Ritual Dimensions Spatial There are two entrances to the school, at one of which stands an idol of Virgin Mary in the middle of a small garden. As one enters the senior school building, the corridor staircase displays large photos of famous freedom fighters and important political leaders of the country such as Mahatma Gandhi, Bal Gangadhar Tilak, Rabindra Nath Tagore, Jawahar Lal Nehru and Indira Gandhi. Close to Independence Day and Republic Day, charts and posters were put on pin boards throughout the corridors with information on the freedom struggle, ideals of a future India and past laurels of the nation. Each classroom and corridor has either a picture or a statue of Jesus Christ and Mother Mary. The pin boards display charts that convey moral values from biblical passages or saint’s percepts. Thus, nationalistic and religious sentiments are portrayed throughout the school through these pictures, posters and statues. Any pupil entering the school is therefore immediately confronted with two sorts of identities: a Christian identity (with statues and biblical texts) and also a nationalist identity (with pictures of political leaders and freedom fighters). It appears that this insistence on dual identities (of religion and nationalism) is essential and required for St. Margaret’s to ensure that it is accepted as an integral part of a secular nation by a constant stress on values of nationality and citizenship, and also ensures that the Christian ethos that led to the very establishment of the school is also imparted to its pupils. This duality recurs in the ethos and organisation of the school and is reflective of a co-existence of a secular and a religious identity that resonates with the ideals of an Indian nation. Rituals The most important ritual of any school is the routine morning assembly. At St. Margaret’s, the students are asked to assemble in an open area surrounded by four walls and sit in straight rows. Assembly begins with the recital of the morning prayer which makes an explicit mention of the country and its leaders as well as to ‘God’; though God is not defined as ‘Jesus’, only the term ‘God’ is used. For morning assembly a weekly topic is chosen be it qualities or values such as goodness, unselfishness, cleanliness or political issues, or commemoration of a person or event of religious or political significance (such as birthdays of religious leaders, or atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki). The principal usually

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gives a short talk on the topic either from her personal experience or with biblical references.10 The assembly ends with hymn singing that is mostly in English, and twice or thrice a week hymns in Hindi are also sung, followed by the singing of the school song. As assembly ends, the students are asked to leave from the two exit doors, in single files. Stationed on each of these doors are prefects who check the students’ uniform.11 The structure and conduct of morning assembly too emphasises both a Christian ethos and a nationalistic one. The school also observes certain annual rituals such as celebration of Republic Day, Independence Day, Teacher’s Day, Children’s Day, Christmas and Foundress’ Day.12 The Republic Day celebrations at the school replicate the celebrations that are held at Red Fort in Delhi, as the students showcase physical exercise drills and national and regional dances. There is also a march past competition judged by army, air force and navy officers. Independence Day celebrations include plays on social issues and/or specific events in the struggle for independence and/or interclass dance and singing competitions. Teacher’s and Children’s Day celebrations are more interactive as children dance and mimic teachers and the other way round. Christmas celebrations are most eagerly awaited by students and the staff as there is no teaching on the day that the celebrations are held,13 and a Christmas play and carol singing is performed by students followed by big potlatch luncheon to which each student brings a dish prepared at home. Gifts are also exchanged and the school ensures that the gifts do not exceed the minimum amount that is agreed upon by the school. This is because the school acknowledges the differences of class backgrounds and thus wants to ensure that these differences are 10 Personal experiences are usually those that the principal encountered while she was growing up, her dilemmas, her queries, and also refer to when others seek her advice and bring to her their dilemmas and conundrums about life, God and so on. 11 More of this is discussed in the section titled ‘Discipline, Gender and Body’. 12 Republic Day is on 26 January and the celebrations take place on 25 January. Independence Day is on 15 August and its celebrations take place on 16 August. Children’s Day is celebrated on 14 November, which is Jawahar Lal Nehru, the first Indian Prime Minister’s birthday. Pandit Nehru was known for his love for children and worked very hard for their welfare. Teacher’s Day is celebrated on 5 September on account of Dr Sarvapalli Radhakrishnan’s birthday who was the first vice-president and the second president of India and was a great scholar in religion and philosophy. 13 Since the School is closed for winter vacations, Christmas celebrations are usually held in the first week of December before the school closes for the vacations.

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not brought out in the gifts, and so it is ensured that everyone contributes equally. The Founder’s Day is one of the most important events of the school when students enact a play on the struggle-filled life of the foundress and her ‘revelation’, followed by carol singing. These rituals provide an opportunity for the students to celebrate the cultural and religious diversity of the country (celebrations of various festivals and inter-regional culture, such as dance) and also appreciate nationalistic ideals (by re-creating rituals of Independence Day and Republic Day in school). These ritual and spatial settings of the school provide a space for students to relate and imbibe identities both of a religious orientation and of a nationalistic one. This repetition and performance of rituals thus becomes an important space for the transmission of identity.

Organisation of the Students’ Body The students are divided according to their educational level (classes from here on, e.g., classes XI, XII) and in higher classes (XI and XII) they are further divided on the basis of the subjects that they choose (Humanities, Science and Commerce). Apart from these divisions, there is another that cuts class and section boundaries: division into ‘houses’. The students, for purposes of extra-curricular activities, are divided into four houses, each represented by a colour and members of a house are provided with a badge that they are expected to wear every day. This rule seems to concern itself with manifesting the feeling of oneness and belonging. Each house has a captain and vice-captain who are elected by the students in a secret ballot. House activities include sports, dance and debate competitions, and it is in these events that one’s attachment and affiliation to one’s house and feeling of oneness and belonging are experienced, resembling the sentiments of belonging and loyalty to one’s nation. For example, it is in the game of cricket that a national obsession has been most starkly observed. True Indians, it is claimed, forget all their work and watch the match, painting the Indian tricolour on their faces and holding the Indian flag high. Very similar expectations are made of the students by their peers and the school authorities (teachers, prinicpal). During interhouse sports events, students belonging to the same house sit together and wave out their badges and support their house teams. The house system is intended to instil a feeling of oneness, solidarity and affinity

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among the students.14 It is also a source of fission and division especially among a group of friends. A student reported an incident in which two of her close friends fell out as they represented different house teams in an inter-house throw ball competition.15 The final match was between their respective houses, and each wanted her house to win. In due process, many strategies were deployed, highlighting the weak points of each player. So strong was the feeling of competition and loyalty to one’s house that it affected their personal equation as well. The house system reflects the school’s efforts to create more than one form of affiliation among pupils. These multiple allegiances can then be understood as a clever strategy to prepare pupils for the ‘outside’ world by nurturing many aspects of their personality.

Academic Orientation The school does emphasise an all-round development of the student, with a focus on sports, dance, debating activities. Despite this emphasis, it seems that the entire pedagogic structure is indeed orientated towards academic study.16 Education in India is steered towards academics; the importance attached to academic success represents the norm. It is striking, however, that its academic centrality spills even into the non-academic aspects of school. This is reflected in four primary ways. First, the timetable allots little time to non-academic activities. The day is divided into nine periods of 35 minutes with a 15-minute lunch break half-way through the day. Only two periods per week are devoted to 14 Durkheim (1912/2001) writes about collective effervescence, i.e., often evoked by the totem of the group. One sees a similar collective effervescence during these sports events. As the flag of each house is hoisted, the pupils who throng on the galleries around the field rise in adulation and there is an uproar. After a win in a particular sports activity, pupils belonging to that house celebrate with shouts and songs in praise and appreciation of the winner and their house. This collective effervescence is crucial in identity formation among pupils, as has also been observed by Bénéï (2008). In an ethnographic study of schools in western India, Bénéï explores the many ways in which ideals of nationalism are embodied by elementary school children through activities such as sports, competitions, morning assembly and so on. 15 The throwball competition forms a very important part of the sports culture at school. There is rigorous training for it after the school hours. During the finale of one of the throw ball matches, the losing team was shedding tears and so were their supporters. 16 Krishna Kumar (1991) traces this emphasis on examination and academics back to the colonial era where policies were enacted that rejected indigenous traditions of imparting knowledge and emphasised texts and faring well in examinations.

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physical education and three to value education classes. Classes X and XII are the ‘board classes’, i.e., they enter for the All India Senior School Examination for the preparation of which they are exempt from participation in all extra-curricular activities. Thus, only class XI has two periods for ‘work-experience’ or ‘extra-curricular classes’ with options of joining societies and clubs such as the Peace Society, Dance Society, Magazine Society, Sports Society and Home Science Club. Second, classroom teaching rarely goes beyond the textbooks. Teachers are reluctant to conduct discussion out of concern for ‘wasting time’ and being unable to finish the syllabus. A few teachers (of sociology and political science) did talk of current affairs and attempted to promote awareness of the larger world and link current affairs to the syllabus. However, most teachers were discouraged by the lack of interest on the part of pupils in going beyond the course-work. They also blamed the education system for curbing the pupils’ enthusiasm since it was examination-centric and thus compelled pupils to focus on textbook teaching, even if they wished otherwise. There were also other pupils who considered their time at school to have ‘fun’ and postponed worrying about the real world for until completing school. They wanted their school experience to be ‘chilled out’ and wanted to ‘take it easy’. Third, even punishment and issuing reprimands are academic-centric. Reporting late to school, repetition of flouting of rules leads to deduction of marks from the pupil’s final aggregate. Discipline is maintained by bringing academic performance to the foreground. A reprimand issued by a teacher is usually couched in terms of achievement of good marks in the examination. In one instance, when Suhani was talking to the girl sitting next to her, the teacher asked her to stand up and said, You are always disrupting the class. Why can’t you sit down and concentrate in class? If you do that you might be able to get good marks and make something out of your life! And if you can’t do this much the least you can do is not trouble your partner [the girl sitting next to her] and make her get bad marks!

Finally, choice of subjects too is based on academic achievement and ability rather than interest. A pupil has to choose from three fields: Science, Commerce and Humanities. In the same order, a sense of hierarchy attaches to the subjects, so that those who get very high marks are

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expected to opt for Science—for the students this means that those who have scored 90 per cent are expected to take Science, although officially the requirement for those who want to study science is an aggregate of 65 per cent in maths and science. Those who have scored slightly lower marks are expected to choose the field of Commerce. For students this means that if they have an aggregate of 80 per cent or above they should opt for Commerce, while the official requirement is that of 65 per cent in mathematics. The average or below average students are expected to be ‘given’ Humanities as they are not considered intelligent enough to handle the ‘hard’ subjects like science and mathematics. ‘Given’ is used instead of ‘taken’ since the latter may imply choice; and a ‘choice’ of Humanities is rarely expected. Most non-humanities students as well as some of the Humanities students consider the humanities class to be a class of ‘failures’ or ‘low IQ girls’. It is revealing that teachers uphold these attitudes as well. A class IX physics teacher remarked, ‘Math is very important and none of you can survive without this. Only those who take up Humanities do not have Math, and I am sure none of you will take up that option.’ In the same class even the mathematics teacher when returning a test paper said to the class, ‘All those of you who have not scored well in maths will have a tough time in your boards [class X Boards] as you will not get either Science or Commerce stream and will have to be stuck with the Humanities section’ (emphasis added). Thus, not only are the Humanities at the bottom of the hierarchy but it is assumed that one does not select them from choice but compulsion. Furthermore, the teachers’ way of making the students understand the importance of mathematics and physics is not by displaying its practical use in life but as an essential requirement for faring better in examinations. Most importantly, they attribute success to the achievement of an academic ideal. While the school concentrates on academic achievement, the students question this focus through many strategies such as by talking in class and not completing their homework. There were also a few students who ‘chose’ Humanities even though they had scored high enough marks to be eligible for the Science section. So strong, however, is the desire in young pupils for academic performance, ultimately they are all concerned about board examinations and attaining high marks to get into good universities.

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Role of the Teachers Much as the roles and duties of officials are defined in an organisation, a school too very carefully defines the roles of its teachers. The school diary defines a teacher as one who imparts knowledge and stands unbiased towards everyone. The diary also contains a section entitled ‘Expectation[s] from the Teachers’. However, expectations are not always fulfilled and there are situations in which the views of the teacher clash with those of the school. According to the school diary, the two primary expectations from teachers are, ‘to treat the pupils with courtesy and respect’ and treat all students equally, without any bias or favouritism. However, the teachers did not fulfil these expectations as inevitably each teacher had a favourite pupil in class, popularly called the ‘teacher’s pet’. A ‘pet’ is that pupil who is always addressed in class. Other students were often annoyed at this preference, and used this as an excuse to not pay attention in class. One pupil voiced this concern and said, ‘It’s almost like we all are not there in the class and she [the teacher] is just talking to her [the pet].’ Furthermore, it is the ‘pet’ that is never punished for late submission of the homework. It was a rather common occurrence that when most pupils had not completed their homework, they would request the ‘pet’ to persuade the teacher to delay checking their homework. They knew that if the ‘pet’ made a plea then the teacher would find it hard to refuse. So, even though the students were annoyed at the preferential treatment, they used this bias to their advantage. Just as teachers had a ‘pet’, they also had non-favourite girls, whom they always picked on. Once when Sunaina asked the girl sitting next to her for a pencil the teacher who has a bad impression about her (as reported by Sunaina and her friends) told her to stand outside the classroom as punishment. The cause of this bad impression was that the previous year Sunaina’s group was caught ‘bunking’ (missing) school. For this act of non-compliance they were suspended from the school for three months. Since then their entire group had gained the recognition of being the indisciplined group of girls, and at the slightest of indiscipline on their part, they were strictly reprimanded. Another student observed that even when other pupils would make noise or disrupt the class, the teacher would pick on particular girls, irrespective of whether they were responsible for it or not. The role of a teacher goes beyond textbook teaching; however, as has been mentioned before, the teachers find this difficult, given the burden

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of completing the syllabus. Often they blamed it on the lack of interest on the part of the pupils and stated that they would engage them if they were willing to. For example, the political science teacher held discussions in class XI but not as many in class XII. She said, Class XI students are pro-active; they want to know more. I can see it and so I enjoy teaching them and holding discussions with them, whereas this class (class XII Humanities) are couch potatoes. They want to be spoon-fed. They never initiate any discussion or show any enthusiasm. How much can a teacher do in this situation?

At other times, it was the teacher who was herself not motivated to conduct discussions beyond the textbooks. For example, the sociology teacher was asked to explain the distinction between nation and state. When she gave an unconvincing explanation the students demanded further clarification and she responded, ‘We’ll do it next time, right now I have to cover other things also.’ When the same teacher was asked for explanations in class XI Humanities section, she said, ‘I don’t have time for your silly questions. Concentrate on the course first.’ Her style of teaching was also very book-centric as she would give a set of questions to the pupils and expect them to copy answers from the textbook. Thus, the teacher herself was uncertain of the role she should assume in different classes and had to reorient herself according to the interests and calibre of the pupils. She was torn between her duty to complete the syllabus and her responsibility to impart knowledge and generate awareness; often the former took precedence over the latter. There are also times when the teachers might not have been in agreement with the ideals and goals of the school but are obliged not to talk about it and follow the instructions of the school.17 For example, an informal discussion in class XI section was being conducted by me on the generation gap and progressiveness of the current generation. The girls were enthusiastic in participating and expressed their view that their generation is progressive given its openness towards sex, relationships and cohabitation. At this point the teacher requested me to change the topic. She said, ‘It is inappropriate to talk about such topics in a convent school, especially an all girls’ school … I am constrained by certain rules and I have to follow them.’ Even when the puplis pointed out to her the regressive values of the school charter, she did not allow further 17

Meenakshi Thapan (1991/2006) in her ethnography makes a similar observation.

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discussion as she said that could ‘put her job into jeopardy,’ though, she did appreciate the openness and opinions of the pupils. A teacher is often unable to comply by the rules expected of her, at times due to her own inabilities or duties and obligations that constrain her. This mismatch, however, inadvertently creates the space for expression and ‘voice’ for the pupils.

Discipline, Gender and Body Much importance is attached to following rules and discharging duties. For example, the pupils are expected to arrive at school by 7:30 a.m. There is an option of enrolling for school transport (school bus) or organising private transport (mini vans or cars). If the school bus arrives late the pupils are not held responsible. However, those who travel by private conveyance are reprimanded and strictly punished, if they arrive late, more than twice. The punishment takes the form of deduction of marks from their annual grades. There is also regimentation in school uniform and proper dress. After the assembly the council members check the pupils for a proper uniform which includes short nails, no applying of kajal (black eye pencil), calf length socks, no expensive watches or earrings, no short skirts, clean shoes, ankle-length socks and tidy hair. All those who do not follow the rules discussed earlier are asked to step out of the queue and if possible, the mistake is immediately addressed; nails are cut short, hair tied into a plait, hems of skirts unfolded to lengthen them, socks are rolled up and watches and accessories removed. Otherwise pupils are let off with a warning, and if they continue to offend, then their marks are reduced. Thus, there is regimentation of the student body to present itself as one, as an entity that is not ridden by any caste or class markers, and in due process of this regimentation, it is ensured that the students are subjugated to the school’s authority. Even the architecture of the classrooms is such that it allows for constant surveillance: the classroom has two doors, big windows and an elevated desk and chair to allow the teacher for better surveillance. The pupils are, however, not ‘docile bodies’.18 They have their own means of resistance to authority and discipline. For instance, while they dress in the appropriate uniform during morning assembly, they refuse 18 Michael Foucault (1977/1995) argues that discipline leads to formation of docile bodies especially seen in factories, ordered military regiments and even classrooms. The discipline gets rooted in their bodies that are under constant surveillance of the heads of these institutions.

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to follow the dress codes after assembly. So, for example, they pull their skirts up a bit (to shorten its length), roll down their socks to ankle length, change their hairstyle from a plait to a high pony tail, take out their mobile phones and send text messages secretly in class. Challenges to teacher or school authority occur in many ways, some more direct than others. For example, in one of the classes the economics teacher made Nikita stand up as she was constantly talking to the girl sitting next to her. She said, ‘Why are you constantly disrupting the class. Why can’t you sit down and quietly study.’ To this Nikita replied, ‘Coz I don’t feel like!’ and the entire class started laughing. In another similar incident, when the teacher asked a similar question of another girl, Deepti, who was disrupting the class, and said, ‘You should pay attention in class otherwise how will you grow up to become a teacher?’ (Deepti had previously mentioned to the teacher that she wished to be a teacher). However, Deepti stood up and replied condescendingly, ‘Who told you [that] I want to become a teacher? I will be something bigger and better than a teacher!’ One of the most popular ways of challenging the P.T. (physical training) teacher’s authority was by not wearing the P.T. uniform, or faking an injury to avoid playing during the games period. The usual punishment for this was to run five times around a small field. The girls quite enjoyed this since, instead of running, they jogged their way through, chatting with their fellow offenders. There were other ways of indirectly challenging the authority, for example, refusing to complete homework, making faces at the teacher while she is talking; and making fun of the clothes and hairstyle of the teacher. For example, if the colour of the saree (the traditional Indian dress—about 6 yards long) and that of the blouse do not go with each other, it is a big fashion faux pas and becomes the talk of the school. If a teacher’s hair is not arranged well, then jokes are made about her not having had a bath. Attention is also paid to the colour of the petticoat (an ankle length skirt like apparel worn underneath the saree to hold it together). Further, nicknames are allotted to the teachers usually on the basis of looks. For example, one of the teachers according to the class XII Humanities section looks like a transvestite, as she has manly features but wears traditional Indian clothes, so she is nicknamed hijadi (transvestite). Another teacher who always seems to be in an inebriated state is nicknamed ‘the drunk’. Thus, the pupils are challenging the school’s rules such as those of uniform and of respecting teachers, not through an open rebellion or peaceful protest. Rather, they evolve strategies amongst themselves to maintain a peer culture that appears to be anti-teachers.

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As Michel de Certeau, in Practice of Everyday Life (1984), explains, there are tactics aimed at subverting the overarching city plan of the planner, for example, through the way in which the pedestrian resists the plan by finding shortcuts for his ways instead of using the marked-out ways of the planner. Similarly in the school, the pupils have developed tactics to subvert the discipline and authority. While at one level the pupils do internalise discipline and order, at another level they resist it. Subversions to some of these rules, however, are also conformity to larger gender constructs, role expectations and fashion. For example, by wearing shorter skirts, ankle length socks, tying the hair high and up, the girls are inadvertently inculcating and reinforcing gender norms as espoused by the outside world.

Christian Aspects of School Life Since a congregation of the Christian community founded St. Margaret’s, many of its features, structures and rituals are in conformity with those of Christianity. To begin with, there is a cathedral in the school compound that forms the central space for the commencement of important activities of the school. For example, at the beginning of each academic year a special mass is held in the cathedral, attendance to which is compulsory for all Christian pupils, teachers and administrative staff, and optional for non-Christian pupils. An important figure of the congregation (usually a male priest) presides over the mass and afterwards visits every classroom of the school and blesses it and all the students (irrespective of their religion) by sprinkling holy water. Every Friday, mass is held, which is compulsory for Christian students, administrative and teaching staff. The most important mass is Christmas mass, which is held during school hours, when the Church Choir sings. This is compulsory for all Christian students and non-Christians are encouraged to attend. Therefore, for all beginnings, the cathedral is an important space and is strategically located at the entrance to the school. This central and important geographical location reflects the importance that the cathedral holds in the functioning and in maintaining the Christian identity of the school. None of the current headmistresses of the school (junior, middle and senior) is a nun, but in the past the junior headmistress has been a nun, and a few times the middle school headmistress as well. However, no teacher in the school is a nun. The nuns of the congregation (who reside in the school premises) have the responsibility to teach the Christian value education classes that are exclusive to Christian students. Teachers

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of other subjects are usually Hindu or Christian; of the twenty teachers in the senior school, eight are Christians, ten Hindus and two Parsees. The nuns represent the higher echelons of the administration of the congregation. Many of them reside in the school compound (as does the principal, who is also the nun). Even though the nuns might not teach in the school, their role in the functioning of the school is central, as they have the responsibility for the larger decisions made by the congregation that manages these schools all over the country. It is notable that moral education lessons often coalesce with religion. Three value education classes a week are scheduled. Of these, two classes are for Biblical and Christian teaching for the Christian pupils and are compulsory for them. During these classes biblical passages and Christian ethos are discussed. There is considerable freedom given to the students to question biblical tenets and initiate discussions with the Sister and other students. However, there are also limits to the questioning. A few pupils expressed the view that discussion on issues of gender and sexuality is often brief, and not encouraged. The nonChristian pupils are not permitted to attend these classes. This rule might reflect two possible concerns: first, an attempt to build an exclusively Christian identity, to maintain which it is imperative to exclude the non-Christian pupils. Alternatively, it could reflect the apprehension and fear of being accused of ‘brainwashing’ or imposing Christian values on non-Christians. The student’s representative body has a post of a Christian leader who is in-charge of all the Christian activities of the school, for instance organising mass, the Christmas play, choir, reading of Biblical passages and so on. There is careful nomination of this leader by the school authorities, as they opt for those pupils who are most obedient and conscientious. According to a teacher, the nominated pupils are usually those who have shown diligence in following Christian observances such as regular attendance at Church service and activities, and have a clean record (of not challenging school rules), and belong to a religiously inclined family. A few pupils were quick to note that the head girl has always been a Christian. They acknowledged that there was a Muslim head girl but that had been more than a decade ago, and since then only Christian girls have been elected. This observation by the pupils highlights that they are aware of the biases that a Christian school might nurture on the basis of religion and the ways in which the secular ethos of the school might be challenged in its pursuit of upholding its principal religion. Thus, while they enjoy and take pride in many Christian activities in the school, they

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are wary of the religion’s spilling over into roles and functions that are meant to be secular. At times these Christian values were readily accepted and appropriated by the students (irrespective of their own religious identity) and at times there was a reluctance and disappointment in these values overriding the more secular aspects of the school. Nonetheless, yet again, a dichotomy of Christian and secular values is demonstrated. It is this dichotomy that forms the basis of development of an identity and a sphere of negotiation among students, which is further discussed in the next section.

Religious Identity and Moral Education Links between Citizenship and Character Education Debates on links between citizenship education and character education have occupied philosophical thought for centuries, and these debates, in fact, mark the beginning of an idea of a nation and democracy. The dialogues between Plato and Socrates (The Republic), between Devrath and the Minister of Court (The Mahabharat), between Krishna and Arjun (The Bhagvad Gita) have deliberated at length the inter-linkages of duty (dharma), morality, being a ‘good’ citizen, a ‘good’ ruler and the protection of a nation. The sociology of education has focussed on the possible connections between citizenship education and character education, especially in the context of the role of the school and its curriculum. Davies, Gorard and McGuinn (2005) establish that while there is a great deal of overlap between citizenship education and character education, there are also significant differences, which are obfuscated given that only citizenship education is a school subject in England and character education is not. They further argue that there is an urgent need to make clear the differences between these two forms of education. The interaction between character education and citizenship education takes a distinct form at St. Margaret’s. Here, unlike in England, character education, rather than citizenship education, has a more explicit presence in the school ethos and syllabus, as it is taught in ‘moral education’ or ‘value education’ classes. Citizenship education is not a separate subject, and the values of belonging to a nation and the duties of a good

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citizen are imparted through the performance of rituals (celebration of important events) and in teaching the course on ‘civics’—a sub-subject in the discipline of social sciences, which is mandatory until class X. Crucially, the religious ethos of the school based on certain moral percepts plays a crucial role in reiterating citizenship values. It is this interplay of a muted citizenship education and a loud character education that marks the uniqueness of St. Margaret’s, and this section explores their dynamics. One of the most important rituals at the school—the morning assembly—bears a strong connection to character and citizenship education. The morning assemblies usually have topics related to virtues like forgiveness, help, friendship, love, cleanliness, etc. Even the principal’s speeches during assembly and otherwise are often on moral values and she often draws examples from her personal life. The aim is to bring out the humane side of the students, and to make them sensitive human beings. What thus comes across sharply is that there is an explicit effort made by the school to inculcate moral values in the students that would result in their becoming good human beings. Good human beings in turn are in most likelihood to become good citizens. The principal made this connection explicit. She emphasised that values of being a good citizen should not be restricted to one’s nation; rather one should adopt a global approach, and reach out to all humanity. She said, I believe in world citizenship. I want to inculcate values in the students such that no matter which nation they belong to, they will be good citizens. And what is a good citizen? A good human being is a good citizen, that is, one who is helpful, caring, sensitive.

There is in this statement an establishment of a connection between character and citizenship education. It is further held by the principal, that this connection is easily accepted if there is a sound religious orientation as religion provides moral values that form the basis of good citizenship. This view in turn was closely linked to the ideals or message of Christianity. A Christian student, Natasha, also shared this opinion. She said that for her it was her religious faith that makes her a good human being, and ‘By doing what God has commanded you to, like helping people and being aware, one is becoming a better citizen … By being a better citizen, I practice my faith.’ It is not surprising that schooling based on a religious ethos will consider morality to be derived from

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religion and thus it uses religious morals also as bases of citizens’ morals, thus associating citizenship education with religious education. While the school does uphold such an association and in its various ways reiterates it, it also relegates acceptance and reception of these to the family background of its pupils.

Importance of Family and Religious Backgrounds The aim of the school, according to the principal, is to develop a holistic personality that is mentally, physically, morally and socially fit. To do so, the school provides opportunities to pupils in the form of academic examinations, physical training periods, extra-curricular and co-curricular activities. Most importantly, the school attaches importance to the parent–teacher meetings wherein the growth of the child is discussed and a platform for involving the parents in the school’s functioning is provided. Efforts are thus made to develop a strong family spirit and bond among the pupils, their parents and teachers as a St. Margaret’s family. As mentioned before, three periods in a week are dedicated to moral education classes. Two of these are mandatory and exclusive to Christian pupils to attend, since it is during these lessons that Christian teachings take place. In other words, moral lessons are discussed with explicit reference to the Bible and Saints’ lives. The Christian pupils and the nuns informed me that topics of forgiveness, love, chastity, sacrifice, obedience and faith are taught during these lessons. Thus, being a Christian school, there is an explicit emphasis on morality as derived from religious precepts (Biblical passages) and is meant for pupils practising a particular faith. While emphasis is laid on inculcating these Christian ideals of morality in all pupils, it is not equally enforced since not all are socialised in Christianity. This, however, can sow seeds of difference as perceived by pupils and teachers. During these two Christian moral lessons, the non-Christian pupils are also to be imparted moral education; however, it was observed that while the Christian classes were conducted with utter dedication without fail every week, the non-Christian moral lessons were often spent in completing other chores such as homework, or chart-making. The irregularity of holding these classes was said to be a reflection of the pupils’ lack of interest and involvement in moral education. However, it was apparent that the irregularity had more to do with the lack of commitment and interest on part of the teachers and a lackadaisical

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implementation on behalf of the school. This could perhaps be because these moral lessons were not explicitly linked to religious education and therefore, it was not a deep concern for the school, and thus the teachers did not intend to follow their duties of conscientiously conducting these lessons. A few teachers would in fact view it as a ‘free period’, letting students indulge in ‘idle gossip’, an indulgence that goes against the ideal of the school. The principal in fact viewed the apparent lack of interest on part of the students as reflective of their family background. She insisted that the school teaches the same moral values to all students, and their reception depended on students’ ability, which in turn was shaped by their family background and upbringing, i.e., the morals that the family instilled in them. She gave an example to demonstrate her point. She said, You know like when the rain falls, some part of the ground takes the water in and some will not and the water will just be lying there or will flow away. All this is depending on the quality of the soil. So, even here it is the quality of the student’s background—their home environment, that becomes important … there is only this much that we can do … I strongly believe that value cannot be taught, it has to be caught. We give the same values to all the students, and if some are able to imbibe them more than the others it is due to the outside environment …

Thus, the school espouses the view that every student has an individual capacity to imbibe social and moral values, which are in turn shaped by the family background. The school recognises that it does not function in isolation but that family and religious background and ethics derived from families play a central role in development of their personality. While it is important for the school to view the influence of other structures of society, yet it also seemed that the school might have been relegating its duties to the religious and family backgrounds of its pupils. This view, however, was not only of the school authorities but also of some of its pupils. Pupils were often of the opinion that the school was merely reinforcing the values that they receive from their families and it was their family that was primary in shaping their values and faith. Some, such as Michelle, went as far as to say that the family was more important in shaping their values than the school. The non-Christian pupils were also of a similar opinion. A few teachers were of the opinion that a religious inclination in one’s daily life makes pupils more receptive to moral values taught by the

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school. They also believed that an instillation of values of duty, faith and religiosity was a function of the family. For example, an English teacher was of the view that regular participation in Church events such as going for Sunday mass and other such rituals inculcate ‘high morality’ in pupils. Absence of such regular participation in religious activities, she claimed, makes them less disciplined and morally less aware of their actions. She gave an example of a pupil who is considered as one of the most morally conscious and religiously conscientious pupils. She emphasised that these qualities are primarily a result of her home environment, where the family observes all religious practices and is involved in charitable work. So strong is the family’s religious ethic, she cited that not only do they themselves participate in all Church events but also involve their domestic helps. The school holds that to be a good citizen implies being a good human. The purpose then of the school is to provide moral values to all that will aid in their development as good human beings. These moral values in turn have religious undertones; whilst the school does provide space for reception of both religious and secular values, at times these are not very distinct. Further, the school and its pupils believe that reception of these moral values depends on the family and their religious practices. This inter-linkage of religious identity, moral values and citizenship ideas thus runs the risk of creating differences especially among those who practise different religions. This in turn can affect peer interaction in school and nurture students in a way that it may affect their interaction with pupils later in life as well. The following section analyses the interplay between religious identity and peer interaction.

Construction of Identities by Students: Interplay of Region and Religion Students responded to the Christian ethos of the school in such a way that they used a religious identity as a marker of other personality traits as well. The religious identities become the basis for creating a sense of ‘self’ and ‘other’. For instance, according to a Christian girl, the nonChristian girls were not as disciplined as Christian girls. She said, ‘They are the ones who answer back in class … And are involved in bitch fights.’ She felt that Christian value education classes had an impact in disciplining Christian girls, an opportunity that non-Christian girls did not receive. The non-Christian girls had a contradictory viewpoint.

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They felt that Christian girls were less helpful and did not mingle with the others. Inse pencil bhi mango toh ‘nahi dengi’ (Even if you ask for a pencil they will not give it), remarked a girl. They were of the opinion that the Christian girls formed their own cliques and remained to themselves. Even in the classroom they would sit together. As another pupil remarked, ‘The middle row is always occupied by the mallu19 Christians.’ This reveals that peer groups are identified on the basis of their religious affiliations. Most importantly, there is a contradiction in their religious ethos and ways in which they are perceived, e.g., the Christian girls are taught values that make them ‘good’ Christians, by helping others; however, ironically it is the unfulfillment of these very values that marks them as being Christian. Pupils were quick to distinguish between a Christian and a nonChristian person primarily on the basis of physical features, bodily comportment and a strong regional association. For example, Vidya, a non-Christian girl said, ‘Oh they [Christian students] are easily identifiable because they have a dark complexion.’ Natasha mentioned that she is often remarked on not looking like a typical mallu Christian, since she has a short hairstyle and does not use oil to nourish her hair. She has often been asked by others, ‘How come you don’t have long hair, make a plait and put oil!?’ Dietary habits too become markers of distinction and identity among students. A non-Christian student felt that the lunch boxes of the mallu Christian girls were not appealing to her palate. This, she claimed, was another obstacle in her interaction with the Christian girls, other differences being religion and family backgrounds. It is apparent that the focus on the physical characteristics and food habits was based on certain regional rather than religious characteristics. However, the pupils established a connection with religion, instead of region, and thus, developed stereotypes about regional affiliations, which further guided their interaction with each other. These biases, however, were not just to be found among pupils but teachers as well. Some pupils expressed that certain Christian teachers were biased towards the Christian pupils and this was obvious in class. They cited many instances when they would put their hand up to answer a question, but the teacher would never give them an opportunity and favour a Christian girl instead. Also, according to them, all the responsibilities in the class like being in-charge of black board and being class 19 A slang used to refer to Christians from Kerala, with an emphasis on Malyalam, the language spoken in Kerala.

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monitor were generally given to Christian girls. With regard to this kind of preferential treatment, Natasha was of the view that there was indeed a bias towards the Christian girls, but this was not due to their religious affiliation. She explained that many of the Christian girls in the school belonged to a quota20 and to economically weaker backgrounds. By giving them responsibilities, the teachers were merely encouraging them, building their self-confidence and increasing their classroom participation, as they were mostly shy and introverts. This preferential treatment, she claimed, had little to do with their religious affiliation. The attitudes discussed earlier reflect on the divisiveness that religious affiliations can cause in the classroom, even when the reason for preferential treatment might not necessarily arise from religious identity. This furthers the often wrongly held belief of students that they are being viewed on the basis of their religious affiliation by the school, thereby further entrenching their use of religious affiliation as primary markers of interaction. Nonetheless, there are also some pupils who do undertake a nuanced approach to such seemingly biased behaviour. A school with religion as its primary identity is therefore confronted with many dilemmas regarding modes of imparting religious as well as secular and nationalistic education to its pupils. While the school does embrace its religious identity and furthers it amongst Christian girls, it also attempts to equally treat pupils from all religions. However, the pupils often view the religious ethos of the school more than its secular ethos, and in due process begin to assess regional differences and personality traits from the lens of religious affiliation. It is this balance between furthering the school’s religious ethos and its secular ideals that is a major challenge for St. Margaret’s. Its religious ethos inevitably seeps into its attempt at providing citizenship education, often creating further barriers among its pupils, an outcome that takes them farther from attempts at good citizenship.

20 The school being a religious minority school reserves the right to set aside certain seats for students belonging to its religion. This reservation is commonly referred to as quota. According to Article 30(1) of Indian Constitution, minorities in India have the ‘right to establish and administer education institutions of their own’.

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Troublemakers, Geeks and Others: The Student Culture Sociological studies on students’ culture have provided perspectives to understand the main structures that affect and shape student identities. Some analyse student culture and its role in class reproduction (Macleod 1997; Willis 1977); others focus on the role of family in overriding the principles of the school (Coleman Report 1966) and others focus exclusively on the peer group dynamics and their ‘interpretive reproduction’ (Corsaro 1986). This section analyses various aspects of peer relations at St. Margaret’s both within and outside the classroom. The analyses will reveal the role of religious identities, social class and consumerism in governing peer interaction. This analysis will further highlight the various ways in which pupils are able to override the ethos and teachings of their school.

Peer Groups: From ‘Geeks’ to the ‘Bindaas’ Students often form cliques or groups based on similarities in behaviour and interests. Students of class XII Humanities section identified and categorised themselves into primarily five groups. These categories were accepted by most students and formed the primary basis of interaction. These became such integral aspects of peer group dynamics that the seating pattern in the classroom too was organised according to the categories where members of the same group sat together. Underwritten are the basic descriptions of these five groups based on their most significant attributes: 1. The geeks—Those students who completed their homework on time, sat in the front row of the classroom and diligently followed teachers’ instructions were called ‘geeks’, a term given to them by other students and often used in a pejorative way. They were also often characterised by wearing spectacles and not participating in co-curricular activities. However, not all pupils who fared well in examinations or were considered intelligent were a part of this group. 2. The notorious group—To this group belonged those girls who were the troublemakers of the class. Members of this group derived pleasure out of vexing the teacher, by disrupting lectures and

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were usually the ‘entertainers’ of the class. This group was not intimidated by the teacher’s authority and in fact sought pleasure in flouting it at every possible opportunity. They rarely did well in examinations or in the regularly held class tests.21 In fact, not scoring high marks was a norm for the group. This group further had subdivisions with some more mischievous than the others and was most starkly recognised by others students in the class; some feared them, others detested them, yet others liked their pranks since it provided relief to the otherwise monotonous classes. 3. The average—This group referred to those who were ‘average’ in their academic performance and were moderately involved in extra-curricular activities of the school. They indulged in small pranks in the class, attempted to ‘bunk’ (miss), or not pay attention in class by either asking permission from the teacher to go practise a sport or faking a headache or going off to sleep. This nomenclature is mine as many students referred to them as being ‘average’. 4. ‘Looked down’ upon group—Members of this group were not liked by most pupils in the class. They were excluded from most activities by other students and were kept at a distance. Of the group of four, three were Christians and the fourth, a Hindu girl, Kusum, was accused of stealing money from another girl and consequently ostracised by the entire class. They were considered insolent as they answered back to teachers and their classmates. According to some other students, they ‘talked dirty’, i.e., about boyfriends and sex. They would also indulge in ‘bitching’, gossiping and giggle a lot. They scored extremely low in class tests and examinations and rarely completed any class room task or home assignments. 5. Hi-fi group—This nomenclature was provided by the pupils themselves and referred to those girls who belonged to extremely well-off families and wore expensive ‘branded’ clothes such as from Esprit, Sisley, D&G and Gucci. This group was not present in the class XII Humanities section, but its members were in other sections. Yet, they commanded a strong presence in the group interactions of this particular section as they were the group that 21

The class tests were conducted once every two weeks.

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others desired to be a part of or interact with, while certain others actively disassociated and distinguished themselves from them. This group would organise Diwali22 parties at their huge farmhouses or houses in South Delhi.23 They travelled to school by car. Even though many despised them, any sort of association with them (like being invited to their parties) was considered a marker of status elevation. For example, while the notorious group did not particularly like them, yet whenever they were invited to their posh and exclusive parties, they would be very excited, try and attend the party, and most importantly inform the others of their invitation. This group was a means of status mobility primarily due to their higher class status and taste (Bourdieu 1979/2010). These categorisations, however, should not be viewed as water-tight compartments for there were also pupils who did not fall into any of these categories, such as Natasha, who was a member of the student’s council for the past two years. She was often rude and condescending even towards those who helped her, such as Aayushi, who would take down notes for her, update her about homework, while Natasha was busy running school council errands. The pupils had mixed opinions about her; some found her sweet, friendly and helpful while others found her snooty and with a lot of ‘atittude’, as they would comment. Diwali is a Hindu festival falling in the month of October or November, widely referred to as the festival of lights. There are many reasons for celebration of this festival, one of them being celebration of welcome to Lord Rama who returned to his kingdom after 14 years of exile. The other is worship of Goddess Lakshmi (Goddess of Money) and Lord Ganesha (God of Good Fortune) to bring good monetary and other gains to people. Diwali includes lighting of candles and lamps (diyas) and an emerging trend is to gamble, that is, play with money on this auspicious day in hope to win money that then acts as a token of much money that will come for the rest of the year. Interestingly, the Diwali parties organised by these school students involve playing cards which is a clear replication of what their parents probably do with their friends on Diwali. 23 The spatial organisation of Delhi has taken an interesting turn with the affluent class building palatial houses on large farmhouses (up to two acres or even more). Earlier this class would largely reside in South and Central Delhi; while these areas of the city are still considered the most posh, in pursuit of greenery, most of them have built another house in these farmhouses. As is the case with most cities, the very location and address of one’s house indicates one’s social class, and therefore those who reside in South Delhi farmhouses are considered very affluent. None of the students in class XII Humanities resided here, but were quick to recognise that because they did not reside in South Delhi or South Delhi farmhouses, they were different than those who did. 22

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Natasha identified herself with the ‘average’ group and considered her group to be the ‘coolest’ in class. Yet, she also was of the opinion that she did not belong to only that one group and in fact had better friends in other sections. Perhaps this explains her non-chalant and at times arrogant behaviour towards her own classmates. Tania, on the other hand, was able to shift from one type of group to another: she gained acceptance to the notorious group by disrupting the class and bullying other girls. She would call Kusum a chor (thief), a daring act indeed, which instantly made her popular with the notorious group.24 Also, Geetika shifted from the notorious to the ‘average type’ group after a fight with the other girls over their boyfriend. Therefore, these groups did not have strong boundaries and by adopting their respective norms and attitudes, one could gain acceptance into a new group. It is pertinent here to clarify the meaning of ‘status’ as this is a recurring concept in understanding students’ interaction. Max Weber defined status situation as ‘every typical component of the life of men that is determined by a specific, positive or negative, social estimation of honour’ (1921/1968: 932). While class is associated with economic situation, status groups are governed by styles of life. Thus, every particular status group has a certain specific style of life, and to be a part of that group one has to achieve that way of living. The next section discusses and analyses ways in which the status of a group is identified, by accepting certain norms and behaviour as signifiers of that group.

Group Norms Spatial Organisation of the Classroom One of the most striking group norms was the seating arrangement in the classroom. The five groups preferred to sit only with their group members, and in fact, the most obvious way in which a fission in a group was identified was when a group member changed her seat away from other group members. As punishment, teachers would often demand a pupil to sit away from her group members for a certain number of days. Thus, sitting beside each other was one of the main ways of pledging one’s allegiance to a group. 24

Referring to her stealing of money the previous year.

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According to the notorious group they occupied the left most column and front most seat in the class since they were mast and bindaas (cool and carefree) people of the class, and could pull off pranks right under the nose of the teacher. The middle column was occupied by the mallu Christians (South Indian Christians, the ‘Looked down upon’ group and a few from the Geeky group) whom they considered sweet and ‘harmless’. The last column was occupied by the ‘weird’ ones; those who were brand conscious and kept away from others. According to the ‘Average’ group, the column in front of the teacher’s desk was occupied by the notorious group; the middle column by the mallu Christians who they perceived to be ‘stupid’ and ‘dumb’ as they ‘constantly giggle for no apparent reason’; and the last column was where ‘people like us sit’. ‘Us’ referred to those who were not naughty or disrespectful but dutiful and more levelheaded compared to other pupils in the class. These five groups thus had devised many characteristics of identifying each other, and these perceptions of ‘self’ and the ‘other’ were expressed spatially in the classroom. Apart from spatial segregation between the groups, there are certain norms and expectations that defined these groups. They maintained their group boundaries through these norms and included or excluded others based on their willingness to conform to these norms. A few of these important group norms were behaviour during lunch breaks, in classrooms, physical appearance, general demeanour and association with other groups. These are analysed below.

Lunch Breaks During the 15 minutes of lunch break, the groups represent themselves by interacting and spending time with members of their own group. However, many students have friends in other sections, who they catchup with during break time. It was not the case that students would have absolutely no interaction with students from other groups. In fact, lunch breaks were important periods for encouraging inter-group dynamics. Most confrontation or peace-making initiatives between quarrelling friends and groups were made during the lunch break. It was that period of the day that provided a legitimate opportunity to interact with the ‘other’, without disturbing the spatial organisation of the classroom, and thus, without challenging the unity of one’s own group. Inter-group interaction during lunch breaks was not viewed as a betrayal of a group’s solidarity.

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However, even in these interactions there were implicit group norms such as regarding the rules of initiation of contact and hierarchy. The interactions were guided by pride of one’s group, self-esteem and feelings of superiority. For example, the notorious group expressed their view that they were keen on interacting and befriending Natasha and Aayushi (both from the ‘Average’ group). It was asked of them as to why then Natasha and Aayushi, did not want to ‘hang out’ with the notorious group, to which the group took slight offence and quickly retorted, ‘No! We do not hang out with her!’ This incident reflects that emphasis is laid on who approaches whom and a hierarchy is established through the inception of communication. It seems that for the notorious group it is important that they remain exclusive and are the ones who are approached, as that would signify their ‘coolness’ and desire on the part of others to interact with them, thus reinforcing their high status.

Behaviour in the Classroom The ways in which a pupil conducts herself in the classroom is an essential mode of conforming to group norms. For the notorious group this behaviour entails not completing homework or doing well in class tests and examinations, making successful attempts at disrupting the class and bullying other students (by passing rude and condescending comments about them), not reciting passages that the teacher asks them to read, not getting their own stationery and borrowing it from other pupils thus causing a break in their concentration. There is immense pressure to conform to these norms so that even if one wants to be attentive and sincere during class, the other members discourage it. For example, during a class, Anya was asked by the teacher to read out a passage and her recitation was very good, which impressed the teacher. While reading the passage, the members of her group were trying their best to disrupt her by passing comments such as ‘Are you taking grooming classes?’ After the class they confronted her and demanded the reason of her being so obedient. Anya, after being berated by her own group members, decided not to be obedient in the class in fear of her friends’ wrath. In another incident, her group members yet again reprimanded her. This was when she scored well in the first semester examinations (76 per cent). At this, her friends requested her not to tell their parents about her good performance, and lie about her marks by reducing them by 10–15 per cent. They demanded this lie of her for fear of being pressurised by their parents to perform as well as her. The conformity norms in the ‘Average’

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group were essentially to disregard and object to the acts of the notorious group, to complete their homework on time and not disrupt the class. As one of them said, ‘We are not like them (the notorious group). We would never do such a thing’ (referring to an incident where one of the notorious group girls rudely answered back one of the teachers). Likewise, for the ‘Geeks’ it was extremely important to perform academically well. If any of them did not score high, then they would be reprimanded as behaving like the other groups who were insincere and non-performers.

Physical Beauty and ‘Attitude’: ‘Babes’ and ‘Wannabes’ All the four types of groups described the Hi-fi group as those who are ‘pretty and rich’, as they said. At the same time each of the groups considered themselves better than them. The ‘Average’ group said, ‘They all (referring to the Hi-fi group) spend a lot of money on clothes, fashion, beauty parlour. We don’t do all this, we are the decent ones’ (their emphasis). A similar reaction was of the notorious group, who said, ‘We don’t spend as much time and money on ourselves as they do. We don’t have time for all this, and moreover we know that however we are, however we look, we are the best and know how to carry ourselves according to our personality.’ The other groups commented that the girls belonging to the ‘Hi-fi’ group followed particular ‘style mantras’25 to look pretty and ‘hot’ even whilst in the school uniform. These tactics included wearing short skirts, ankle length socks, rolling up sleeves of the kameez (the top) and opening its first button, and secretly carrying expensive watches and mobile phones. All these characteristics were considered to comprise a ‘babeish’ attitudes, since they implied an attitude that sought attention through bodily comportment and adornment. These aspects were associated with models or ‘babes’. A few students, however, did try to emulate these attitudes and were immediately subject to taunts by their group members. For instance when Pallavi, who was of the ‘Average’ group, rolled up the sleeves of her kurta/kameez her friends taunted her and said, ‘Why are you acting like such a wannabe?’ At other times taunts were passed by other group members as well, e.g., when the ‘Looked Down Upon’ group emulated the ‘babeish’ attitude, the others 25 Mantra is a Hindi/Sanskrit term meaning a characteristic formula. Therefore, a style mantra is a formula of style that is in vogue.

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commented ‘They might think they are cool by doing all these things, but they are so not cool!’ Therefore, all four groups actively disassociated themselves from a ‘babeish’ attitude, and if anyone would indulge in it, they would immediately be taunted and reminded of their group norms and warned against following other groups’ norms.

Invites to Parties: Symbol of Envy and Status Elevation Though the Hi-fi group is criticised for many things such as their ‘babeish’ attitude, consumerist behaviour and boyfriends, nevertheless there is a willingness to associate with them and this becomes obvious at the jubilation of being invited to the Hi-fi group’s exclusive parties. The main party of the year is the unofficial farewell party held at a club of a five star hotel. Entry to this party is by invite only and anyone who gets the invitation is considered to have achieved a status good enough for interaction with the Hi-fi group. Of all the groups, the notorious group was the only one to get an invite to this party and was very elated at the invitation. Two girls of the group, Nidhi and Suhani said, ‘You know we got the invite for the farewell party last year, and in fact we got it 200 bucks cheaper than the rest.’ Suhani then added that the reason they got it cheap was because ‘One of the girls in that group is fond of Anya. In fact she gave Anya the invite for free and us `200 cheaper.’ While for the notorious group this was a status marker, the ‘Average’ group held that getting an invite did not depend on the status of the group or the pupil but was all about the economic ability of the pupil. As one girl said, ‘Anyone can go for their farewell party if they are ready to spend the money.’ Apart from this, the Hi-fi group hosted many other private parties especially for Diwali and Christmas and the entry to these too was restricted. The Notorious group was not invited to them and neither was any other group. The Average group justified them not being invited and said, ‘They are not our type, we don’t have much in common and moreover, they all are snobs, who wants to talk to them!! ... They must have invited the others (referring to the notorious group) because they are their biggest chamchaas (sychophants [literal meaning—spoons]).’ Thus, for the Notorious group it was a matter of status elevation to associate with the Hi-fi group, while for the Average group the overt response was that of indifference.

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The group norms discussed earlier strongly indicate four important themes of understanding peer culture. First, they clearly indicate that while on the one hand a consumerist lifestyle, stress on good looks and ‘babeish’ attitude is shunned, on the other hand, these attitudes are also exalted by reinforcing the importance of recognition by the Hi-fi group. Second, hosting extravagant parties by the ‘Hi-fi’ group reflects strongly the ways in which the consumerist life style of pomp and show finds its way to young minds. They further point to the school’s relatively unsuccessful attempts to discourage class and social identities and enforce a uniform code. Third, the group boundary maintenance norms highlight rules of exclusion and inclusion and the importance attached to a sense of ‘oneness’ and at the same time that of distinctness or difference from the others. Fourth, it demonstrates ways in which the economic capital is converted to social and cultural capital as by being able to purchase tickets to these parties or possessing certain types of clothes, a statement is made of having achieved taste and style and acceptance to an elitist group.

The Consumerist Attitude: Louis Vuitton Bag to Flea Market Kurtas The school aims to ensure that all pupils interact with each other without considerations of economic or social status differences. To achieve this, it has enforced certain rules such as a dress code (school uniform) and prohibition of wearing any accessories. Despite these efforts, the group dynamics were to a great extent shaped by the economic and social status of the students. The knowledge of the latest brands and desire of owning them was evident in one of the games that the Average group played, called ‘Celebrity, Car, Movie, Brands’, an adaptation of ‘Name, Place, Animal, Thing’ wherein using one letter, all the four columns entitled ‘Celebrity’, ‘Car’, ‘Movie’ and ‘Brands’ are to be filled and whoever completes it the fastest wins the round. The adaptation of this game to consumer goods signifies their importance in a pupil’s life. The names of products enlisted during the games further revealed the pupil’s desire for and knowledge of high-end fashion, since the columns carried names of premium luxury brands such as Louis Vuitton, Versace, Chanel, Fendi, Jimmy Choo and other brands such as Lacoste, Chabbra Sarees (an Indian shop for traditional Indian wear), Esprit, Reebok, Adidas, Nike. Not only were pupils aware of these brands but some even owned products from

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these brands and this was a topic of keen discussion amongst them. During one of these discussions, a pupil stated that Piya, who wrote the names of all the high-end brands, also wears these brands, to which Piya sheepishly, yet with pride, nodded. Piya responded that she gained this knowledge through TV, magazines and movies especially the movie Sex and the City. Other pupils clarified that while they might not possess these brands, they were aware of them, and this awareness in itself reflected that they were brand-conscious. As one said, We are brand conscious and this does not mean that we wear all the brands but that we are ‘conscious’ or aware of the various brands … however, there are girls like Piya who even wear these brands … They [referring to the ‘Hifi’ group] usually come from extremely rich families and have the money to flaunt their wealth.

Even though the school enforced a uniform dress code, the make of clothes that the Hi-fi group would wear was common knowledge to other pupils. Sunaini clarified this puzzle and stated, You get to know … you know girls talk! When someone goes to their birthday parties they tell the whole school afterwards what everyone was wearing, behaving, etc. Also at the farewell parties they are always flaunting their designer clothes … In fact it is through their designer clothes that they show others that they are rich.

And then in a mocking way a girl said ‘If they don’t wear such clothes, how will they tell us about their richness … eh’ Whilst the ‘Hi-fi’ group reveled in their knowledge and possession of clothes and accessories from premium luxury brands’ other groups proudly accepted that they purchase clothes even from flea markets, or other ‘good’ brands such as Nike, Reebok, Puma, yet they knew how to maintain style and follow fashion. In other words, they did not need expensive clothes to show their fashion sense. Differences between groups were stark not only in ownership and choice of clothes but also with reference to ‘hang out’ spaces. The Notorious group commented that the Hi-fi group would go to expensive places such as Big Chill (an expensive Italian Cafe where each dish is on an average `500), Cafe Mocha and had permission to stay out late at night whereas they would visit less expensive cafes such as Cafe Coffee Day (CCD) or Barista. They further pointed out that the Hi-fi group hung out at the posh South Delhi malls whereas they

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would go to the North or East Delhi shopping malls as these were closer to their homes. The Average group also visited similar cafes as the Notorious group. They referred to their hang out places as ‘common’; they said ‘We go to common joints like CCD, Barista, KFC and sometimes Mcdonald’s.’ The use of the word ‘common’ signifies an identity of being non-elites.26 This was especially seen in opposition to the ‘Hi-fi’ group. This expression is tantamount to a claim of middleclassness as opposed to the upper class status of the ‘Hi-fi’ group. Students possess knowledge about a life of fashion and dining out which is used to hierarchise and guide peer relations and these markers of identity become evident even in strict conditions of imposed uniformity. This very strongly reflects the influence of the outside-world, especially media and family that shape an individual’s identity. These ‘external’ attributes are not only recognised and adopted by the students, but form the rules or norms of boundary maintenance, status markers and group interaction. In this way the class background is also being reproduced in the school by an emphasis on consumerist products, clearly challenging the ethos of the school that aims to conceal such economic and social differences.

Boyfriends as Social Markers Though it is an all girls’ school, interaction and association with boys is central to peer dynamics at St. Margaret’s. The most approved and aspired form of interaction was a romantic one, and it reflected the status of the groups. For example, all pupils held that all members of the Hi-fi group each had a boyfriend. It was almost like a group norm for that group. Not only did all members of this group have a boyfriend but they dated particular kinds of boys, as noted by others. In Suhani’s words, ‘They never date normal guys, the first requirement is that the boys should be filthy rich.’ Such an association added to the girl’s status, so for example, by dating a ‘popular’ guy, his girlfriend too could claim the title of being popular. Such was the case with Ashna, who was a peripheral, or not-soimportant, member of the Hi-fi group; however, since she started dating 26 The word ‘common’ literally translates into aam. India has recently witnessed the rise of a civil movement, called the aam aadmi movement, which was indexical to the middle class of India.

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one of the most popular guys of another school, her status within the group improved. The other girls described her boyfriend as ‘the best guy’ of that school. By this they meant that he was very good-looking, academically sound, excelled in many sports and belonged to a well-off family. They claimed that since she started dating this boy she acquired ‘an extra layer of attitude!’ While it is expected of the Hi-fi group members to date boys of similar social status (‘best’ or ‘popular; boys), likewise, the Looked Down Upon group members are associated with boys who are not popular, nor belong to well-to-do families. This was apparent in the ways that the ‘notorious’ and ‘average’ group described romantic associations of the Looked Down Upon group. They stated that Kusum was dating a ‘cheap guy’. ‘He works at some mobile store, selling mobile phones’, said another girl with a disdainful chuckle. They further were of the view that since she was in a relationship with a poor and unsophisticated man, it was not surprising that she stole money from her classmates the previous year, indicating that she too belonged to a poor family. In fact, rumour had it that she stole to provide for her boyfriend. Another Christian girl of the Looked Down Upon group had a boyfriend who has a dark complexion. The other girls made fun of her by saying, ‘Her boyfriend is as black as coal … he’s a pucca (diehard) mallu (Kerala Christian).’ These examples demonstrate that each group was expected to date boys that would match the social and economic status of the group. In other words, boyfriends symbolised the economic and social status of their girlfriends on the basis of their own economic background, regional identity and colour of skin. Thus, the girls were careful to choose those boys who would enhance or reiterate their status: aspired or acquired. The schools at which the boys studied were also important markers of their status. If the boyfriends were not from a school of high repute, the girlfriends would try and conceal their relationship. For example, a few girls pointed out that Tania had a boyfriend and Tania was visibly uncomfortable with this remark. She said, ‘Listen, he’s nothing great, he’s just normal.’ By ‘normal’ she meant he wasn’t from a popular school nor was he a popular guy. She added, ‘He studies in Vidyarthi School, which is not very popular … I am just doing time pass [with him], I am not serious about him … it’s just that you need someone to talk to at night and meet when you are getting bored.’ Another girl while discussing her fight with her boyfriend said, ‘… then I told him “Excuse me! Look before you speak, I am not some random girl … I come

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from St. Margaret’s school.’ How dare he talk to me like that especially when he comes from such a shady place [referring to his school]!”’ In both the incidents, the boyfriend was evaluated on the basis of the school he attends and since his school was considered inferior to that of St. Margaret’s, the girlfriends established the hierarchy of their relationship on the basis of the hierarchy of school popularity. In other words, since the girls belonged to more reputed schools they considered themselves superior to their boyfriends. Rarely did their conversations on relationships begin with descriptions of emotions and feelings. They were explained in the jargon of ‘popularity’ measured through economic well-being, high-achieving attitudes (in academics and sports) and social status of the boy. These attitudes seem to imply that relationships were entered into, not to experience companionship of any sort, rather, there was peer pressure to reiterate one’s group status by dating boys who were appropriate to the group ethos of the girls. Boyfriends also often caused fall-outs among friends, as was evident from Geetika’s shift from the notorious group to the Average group. She attributed this fall-out to Nidhi’s boyfriend. Later, even Nidhi confirmed the story, according to which their boyfriends are friends and Geetika’s boyfriend found her (Nidhi) attractive which made Geetika uncomfortable. In a fit of jealousy Geetika phoned Nidhi’s mother and told her about her boyfriend, which infuriated Nidhi. Nidhi said, She (Geetika) has a complex … she feels inferior to me because her boyfriend likes me better and he even told my boyfriend that he should consider himself lucky as I am with him, bas (that’s it) she got jealous and created a problem at my place (home) ...

Even in a so-called romantic relationship, the boyfriend becomes a status symbol, a symbol of the social class to which the girl belongs. The boyfriend is symbolic of something other than the romantic, i.e., of social and economic class and status. It is through the boyfriend that a girl could elevate or maintain her status amongst her peers. Thus, relationships with boys are defining markers of another kind of group norms and behaviour. This association and emphasis on a particular kind of interaction with boys demonstrates yet another way in which the outside-world finds its way into the peer dynamics in the school, challenging its ethos or structure. In other words, the school is an AllGirls school that in being so restricts interaction with boys. However,

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even though boys are not a part of the school, they are integral to peer group dynamics. The school eschews conversations about relationships and sex. Teachers are not approachable for talks on troubles in romantic relationships. The school views absence of boys as a legitimate excuse to avoid discussions on relationships with boys.27 However, the girls are talking of relationships amongst themselves, and in fact, guiding their interaction with each other on the basis of relationships. This section analysed peer groups and norms that shape the student’s culture at St. Margaret’s and demonstrated that the peer interaction is a direct challenge to the ethos of the school. The school espouses equality amongst pupils by imposing rules that would conceal the differences in social and economic backgrounds of its pupils. Yet, the peer interaction is strongly guided by concerns of economic backgrounds, social status and taste as determined by consumption of commodities (hang out places, clothes, accessories). Students often use these factors to organise and re-organise their group identities. They are also adept at converting one form of capital to another. For example, economic capital is converted to a social and cultural one by the Hi-fi group by hosting extravagant parties with unique themes and restricted entry to keep them exclusive and therefore desirable and a source of envy. Inter-group dynamics are also important markers of group identity, so for example, by associating with the Hi-fi group, one raises the status of their own group, and conversely, association with certain groups, such as the geeks or ‘looked down upon’ is avoided. Association with boys is in fact an important identity marker for an individual as well as the group. This section, therefore, argued that while the school has its own ethos and functions to achieve its goals its pupils cannot be viewed as passive recipients of the school’s ethos and goals. Pupils are strongly influenced by forces outside the school, and these influences guide their ‘self’ and interaction with others in such ways that might contradict the teachings and goals of the school. Thus, an analysis of peer group dynamics is essential for a holistic understanding of the school since it clearly points to gaps and fissures, and intended and unintended consequences of schooling.

27 In view of changes to curriculum and many teachers’ training programmes organised by the government, the school did realise the importance of having a post of a school counsellor, who they thought would be best to discuss personal issues of the pupils.

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Concluding Remarks The aim of this ethnography was to analyse the workings of a school with a religious affiliation, specifically, the challenges it faces in imparting and reinforcing its identity and ethos in the context of a secular nation and other influences of the society, such as social and economic hierarchies. Being true to ethnographic methodology, the aim of this chapter was not to highlight a single aspect or perspective, rather bring out various actors and their varied methods of appropriating schooling. This heterogeneity and nuanced understanding was undertaken primarily through three perspectives. The first perspective was of the various negotiations and struggles such as those between students and teachers; Christian and non-Christian students, school authorities and teachers; secular and religious values of the school and the influences of the outside world. It was thus observed that the ethos of the school is challenged and at other times it prevails over all discords. The second perspective was a focus on conflict-of-purpose of a religiously affiliated school in imparting citizenship and character education without invoking religion. In doing so, it became evident that the school runs the risk of alienating those students who do not belong to the religious affiliation of the school. The school thus finds itself in a dilemma because it does not want to impose its religious values on non-Christians and an unintended consequence of this is a bias towards Christian pupils. This bias is often recognised by non-Christian pupils, who then use it as a legitimate basis of differentiation amongst each other, thus guiding inter-group dynamics. The final perspective focused exclusively on peer group dynamics and argued that students develop their identities not just on the basis of their religion but other factors such as class and social status, which also guide inter-group dynamics. This in turn also revealed that even though the school intends to iron out religious, economic and social differences through its various rules and regulations, these differences do prevail in peer dynamics. My effort at fieldwork in a school with a religious affiliation is pertinent to address two key questions, namely, the role of the school in imparting civic education; and developing identities of pupils who belong to various religious backgrounds, in a secular and plural nation. This ethnography revealed that a school with a religious affiliation faces many obstacles and struggles in imparting civic and citizenship ideals. While some of these challenges arise expectedly from its interaction

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and negotiation with the ‘outside’ world, such as the different values of the students’ families and influence of mass media, certain other challenges are caused purely by its own organisation and ethos, as it is torn between emphasising its religious identity without overstepping the identity of other religions. This makes it difficult for the school to equitably impart moral and consequently citizenship education, since it derives its basis of morality from its own religion. Furthermore, while the school does intend to treat all students equally, imposing equalitymechanisms, such as school uniforms, restrictions on celebrations of birthdays, equal contribution for Christmas celebrations, differences in social and economic statuses do come out very starkly. Moreover, it is not just the pupils, but also teachers who accentuate differences (based on abilities) by treating pupils differently, an act that goes against the written ethos of the school. Thus, in principle, the school does attempt to shape citizens who would befit a secular nation; however, given the school’s own religious affiliation, of the teachers as well as the pupils, this principle is not easily achieved. In pursuit of deriving a morality based on religion, there might emerge unintended differences among the pupils who accentuate the dichotomies of identities. Perhaps, schools especially with religious orientations should ensure even more carefully that teachings of citizenship education should not have any support or base in any idea of religious morality.28 This research also clearly argued from the point of view of pupils: their little acts of resistance and compliance. It revealed the various ways in which pupils are influenced by their social and economic backgrounds in shaping their interaction with each other. In due process, they challenge the school ethos and thus dampen the efforts of the school to achieve its goal. This demonstrates that even though school is a primary organisation in shaping a pupil’s identity, the pupils continue to reproduce their economic and social status. In answering these two questions, this research has brought out the dynamics between peer group interaction, inculcation of citizenship education and religious ethos of a school, and argued that inculcating ideas of citizenship is far from simple in a school 28 Harris (2010) talks about the disadvantages of values that are based in religion; for example, concepts such as Christian and Muslim morality that are detrimental for the society. Instead he proposes that science is very much capable of talking about values, as facts, and therefore deprived of any religious orientations.

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that has a strong religious ethos. The school is constantly confronted with its own ideals and secular expectations that are often not complementary. This along with the pupils’ backgrounds makes the linkages all the more complicated. This ethnography thus provides an insight into the complexities of education in a secular and class-divided nation such as India.

References Atkinson, P., S. Delamont and W. Housley. 1995/2008. Contours of Culture: Complex Ethnography and the Ethnography of Complexity. Plymouth: Altamira Press. Bénéï, Véronique. 2008. Schooling Passions: Nation, History, and Language in Contemporary Western India. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press. Bourdieu, Pierre. 1979/2010. Distinction: A Social Critique of the Judgement of Taste. London: Routledge. Coleman Report. 1966. Equality of Educational Opportunity. U.S. Department of Health, Education and Welfare. Corsaro, W.A. 1986. ‘Discourse Processes within Peer Culture: From a Constructivist to an Interpretative Approach to Childhood Socialisation’, Sociological Studies of Child Development, 1: 81–101. Davies, Ian, Stephen Gorard and Nick McGuinn. 2005. ‘Citizenship Education and Character Education: Similarities and Contrasts’, British Journal of Educational Studies, 53 (3): 341–358. de Certeau, Michel. 1984. The Practice of Everyday Life. Los Angeles, CA: University of California Press. Durkheim, Emile. 1912/2001. The Elementary Forms of Religious Life. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Foucault, Michel. 1977/ 1995. Discipline and Punish: The Birth of the Prison. New York, NY: Vintage Book Edition. Hammersley, M. and P. Atkinson (eds). 1995/2008. Ethnography: Principles in Practice. London; New York, NY: Routledge. Hammersley, M. and P. Woods (eds). 1976/1984. The Process of Schooling: A Sociological Reader. London: Taylor and Francis. Harris, Sam. 2010. The Moral Landscape. London: Bantam Press. Kumar, Krishna. 1991. Political Agenda of Education: A Study of Colonialist and Nationalist Ideas. Delhi: SAGE Publications. Macleod, Jay. 1997. Ain’t No Making It: Leveled Aspirations in a Low-income Neighbourhood. London: Westview Press.

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Thapan, Meenakshi. 1991/2006. Life at School: An Ethnographic Study. Delhi: Oxford University Press. Weber, Max. 1921/1968. Economy and Society, vol. 3. Totowa, NJ: Bedminster Press. Willis, Paul. 1977. Learning to Labour: How Working Class Kids Get Working Class Jobs. London: Gower.

E-source http://www.indianetzone.com/37/religion_missionary_activities_british_india_ british_india.htm (accessed on 10 December 2013).

6

Being Muslims, Becoming Citizens: A Muslim Girls’ School in Post-riot Ahmedabad Tanya Matthan, Chandana Anusha and Meenakshi Thapan

Introduction

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n a Muslim girls’ school in the state of Gujarat, becoming a citizen— participating in the affairs of, and experiencing a sense of belonging to the city, region and nation—is a fraught process, mediated by religious identity, shaped by a troubled relationship between citizen and state, and marred by a history of violence and discrimination. Models and practices of citizenship can be observed in myriad spheres and processes, from electoral participation to social protest, but here, we focus on the construction of citizenship within the institutional setting of a school, a site wherein formal education in scientific disciplines is interwoven with the inculcation of ethical values and the building of ‘character’. Equally important to educational agendas is the creation of disciplined subjects, equipped with technical proficiency and instilled with moral principles,

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whose training as respectful children, hard workers and patriotic citizens is essential to the nation-building project. The particular school we examine here offers a unique vantage point to explore as well as to complicate our understandings of schooling and citizenship education. It is a school for girls run by an established and well-respected educational society dedicated to the education and upliftment of Muslims in the state of Gujarat, which has witnessed large-scale violence against the minority community over the last 50 years, the most recent of which is the pogrom in 2002 in the wake of the Godhra train burning. The students and teachers at the school belong to the Muslim community but it is not a religious school as in a madrasa, and although it is run by an independent trust, it receives funds from the right-wing state government. In addition, we recognise that the school, affiliated to the state board of Gujarat, is enmeshed within a global neoliberal economy, which eulogises marketable skills, scientific expertise and knowledge of the English language over other capacities and qualities. The school, therefore, occupies a complex position vis-à-vis questions of integration, isolation, modernisation and exclusion. Following Benei (2005: 5), this study is an investigation into the ‘tensions that may arise between taught ideals of citizenship and various political, religious or ethnic affiliations, and the ways in which states and social actors negotiate them’. However, moving away from Benei, we assert that in investigating these dilemmas, our focus is not solely on the production of citizens through the educational process, but on the experiences of citizenship among the students and teachers, and the ways in which these lived realities inform their educational trajectories, and individual and community identities. This chapter examines discourses on citizenship within a minorityrun, grant-in-aid school for girls to understand representations and ideals of the ‘good citizen’ as articulated by a minority community recovering from traumatic events and grappling with continued marginalisation. Since the school caters only to girls, experiences of citizenship, of being and becoming citizens, are also inevitably gendered. In other words, pedagogic practices disseminated, circulated and received in the school are defined and circumscribed within regulations that inscribe their bodies and minds with conventions surrounding being a girl and becoming a woman within the Muslim community and the nationstate at large. Through an exploration of the ways in which teachers and students articulate and absorb ideals of citizenship, we attempt to

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understand how these ideals of citizenship coexist with the ideals of becoming a ‘good Muslim’ and a ‘good Muslim girl’. We observe endeavours at balancing different fragments of citizenship—social, civic, political and cultural—within the school and how these have become pronounced after the 2002 riots. In this chapter, we show that these efforts at balancing various aspects of being and becoming citizens also get elaborated through questions about the language of pedagogic instruction, its significance in coping with a turbulent past in pragmatic ways and also with preserving culture and asserting difference. Languages within the school become a significant theatre demonstrating debates hinged on citizenship. Apart from looking at the underlying motivations and aspirations that frame the policies and formal objectives of the school, we explore how these are received by students through the ways in which they reflect on the events of 2002 and voice their opinions about the city, the state and the nation. While the violence of 2002 figures as a watershed moment in the life of the community and the school and indeed, for the identities and trajectories of the individuals belonging to both, our arguments in this chapter eschew any direct and simplistic cause–effect linkages between the riots and the educational strategies pursued by the school in its aftermath. Rather, we emphasise the centrality of the recent pogrom in shaping the current attitudes and aspirations of Muslims in Gujarat while recognising that educational policies and pedagogical practices are informed by myriad imperatives and produced through complex negotiations. The city of Ahmedabad does not form a mere backdrop to the debates on citizenship and education discussed in our research, but is constitutive of the individual and institutional identities explored in this chapter. Founded by the Sunni ruler, Ahmed Shah in 1411, the city was the capital of the Gujarat sultanate and an important political and administrative city until its occupation by the British East India Company in the 19th century. Quite significantly, no large-scale violence was reported in the city during Partition and there was no mass exodus of Muslims from Gujarat to Pakistan. However, this situation changed rapidly from the 1960s, with the increased scale and frequency of communal clashes. Following the state-sponsored pogrom against Muslims in 2002, Ahmedabad acquired the infamous status of surpassing Mumbai as the most affected Indian city in terms of casualties caused by communal violence (Jaffrelot and Thomas 2012: 45). Between 1971 and 2000, there have been riots in the city nearly every year (Gupta 2011: 24). Even within Gujarat, the city was the worst affected in 2002 as the violence

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spread even to middle class neighbourhoods such as the Gulberg Society. In the last decade, there has been an intensification of processes of marginalisation and ghettoisation as residential areas in Ahmedabad have become more communally homogeneous with migrations of both Hindus and Muslims to ‘safer’ spaces populated by co-religionists (Jaffrelot and Thomas 2012: 59). While communal harmony does not naturally follow from physical proximity in neighbourhoods and schools, it is certainly true that ‘in this new insecure environment, where work was scarce and mobility curtailed, people clung to their neighbourhoods, which, in turn, became segregated niches’ (Jasani 2010: 156). Citizenship—as both status and process—is itself a multidimensional concept, referring to political, social and cultural rights accruing to a person on membership to a national community, as well as duties to be fulfilled for the public good, most importantly loyalty and patriotism (Benei 2005: 13). There is a close relationship, therefore, between citizenship and nationalism, rendered more complicated in the context of communal violence wherein the majority community attempts to impose its religious identity on the very ideas of ‘citizen’ and ‘nation’. Citizenship education in this context is particularly complex and interesting, involving as it does both conformity and negotiation, the assertion of cultural difference and religious identity coupled with a futuristic emphasis on scientific education and academic excellence as well as attempted erasures of histories of violence and marginalisation. Even beyond this particular school, similar negotiations are taking place. As Dipankar Gupta demonstrates, the Islamic relief organisations established in the aftermath of the 2002 violence do not seek to set up madrasas to address the need for education among Muslim riotsurvivors, but secular schools that follow the state educational board, thus reaffirming their desire to be considered legitimate citizens of the nationstate even though the same state has committed gross injustices upon their community (2011: 85). The Jamaat-i-Islami, founders of a school in Naroda Patiya following the riots, asserted that ‘they wanted the children to go to secular institutions where, in addition to the regular curriculum, they would also learn about their traditions’ (Gupta 2011: 94). What emerges through these multiple—and not always contradictory— visions and ideals is the forging of transformed citizenship models, possessing potential for greater inclusion, participation and diversity. With reference to this particular school, Bourdieu’s work on schooling and social reproduction provides a useful analytical entry-point.

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For Bourdieu, the school is a primary site for the transmission of cultural capital. Schooling systems often work to privilege, being oriented to the ‘cultural competence’ of the dominant class (Bourdieu 1977). In so doing, they overlook the varieties of histories and experiences from which its students come. Schooling systems deny the spectrum of particularities, languages, tastes and repertoires, outside the school, that shape students’ schooling experience. By failing to address a range of cultural competencies, they facilitate a reproduction of social inequalities (see Beteille 1991; Bourdieu and Passeron 1990; Willis 1977). As a school for Muslim girls, by definition, it addresses, preserves and is oriented to the cultural competence of the religious minority. In other words, there is no disconnect between the ethos of the school and the orientation of the family to that ethos. In this, it writes against Bourdieu’s definition of a schooling system that does not explicitly consider the pools of knowledge of a community, whose lives are affected, tangentially if not directly, by routine discrimination together with episodes of communal violence. As an educational enterprise, the trust seeks to question, to an extent, a schooling system that caters to the strengths of the religiously dominant class. The cultural capital that the school aims to transmit, however, is complex in that it accepts, embraces and transmits the cultural capital of the economically privileged while simultaneously resisting a subsumption into what is the religious mainstream. Therefore, the school continues to seek its place within the larger schooling system predicated on a cultural capital necessary for a neoliberal nation-state. In this chapter, we explore how the school addresses the cultural competencies of lower income group Muslim girls in Ahmedabad, in the aftermath of the 2002 riots. What concrete practices does the school introduce after the riots, in educating its students? We notice that the recently introduced pedagogic practices help extend and reinforce its stated objectives. Encapsulated in its name, Falah-e-Darain ‘welfare of this-world and the other-world’, the central objective of the school supports an instruction in deeni (other-worldly) as well as dunyayi (thisworldly) taleem (education). For the school’s principal, a simultaneous emphasis on the ‘cultures’ of two different realms—the religious and the worldly—forms the philosophical crux of the institution. The school is in dialogue with the contemporary locations of lower income group Muslim girls through this central objective.

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The Context: The School and the Trust The school we study in this chapter is a high school for girls in the walled city of Ahmedabad, one of more than 30 educational institutions run by an educational society, registered as a public trust in 1967, with ‘the commitment, yakeen (belief) and support of the public’, as stated by one of its founding members. In 1971, a year after Gandhinagar was established as the administrative centre of Gujarat, the first school was set up as a coeducational institution. Branches in other parts of the city opened later. In the 1980s, shifts were introduced, with boys attending morning classes and girls the afternoon sessions. This ‘bifurcation’ was necessitated by the increase in the number of children coming to institution, according to the current principal of the all-girls’ school. The school in which we conducted ethnographic research, a high school for girls, was established as a separate entity in terms of its own building, teachers and infrastructure in 1998. A founding member recalled its formation to us, saying, ‘We begged parents to who were insistent on marrying off their daughters to send their daughters to us.’ The principal of the school claims that the school run by her is the foundation of all the other schools established by the same educational society, since it was actually the first in its inception. The office of the trust management is also located in the same building as the school. The girls’ high school alone comprises more than 1,500 students and over 40 teachers. What seems to set apart this particular school from its other branches is that it is the only all-girls’ school among them. The higher secondary section (classes XI and XII) have two sections for the Urdumedium arts course, a section for Gujarati-medium arts students and a single section each for Gujarati-medium Commerce and Urdu-medium Science. The section strength is highest in the arts classes and lowest for science.1 The school is housed within a three-storey building enclosed by a small compound, used more as a parking facility than as an open space for sports activities. Its geographical location in the heart of Jamalpur, one of the many Muslim-dominated areas in the city, also defines the school’s identity, successes and limitations. For instance, its identity as a premier educational institution that addresses the needs of the Muslim community is 1 Possible reasons behind the differences in numbers in the streams are complex and overlapping. They will be explored in detail later in the chapter, specifically in the section on language and identity.

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complemented by the fact that it is situated in a largely lower and middle class Muslim neighbourhood. It is successful insofar as strives to bring affordable education to children of this neighbourhood. As mentioned earlier, the school’s name itself connotes the integration of this-worldly and other-worldly welfare. It simultaneously draws children from other Muslim-dominated areas in the city, whose parents avoid sending their girls to Hindu-dominated regions, fearful of communal confrontation and transgressions of both religious and gendered norms (a point that shall be explored later). It facilitates a seamless blending into the milieu in which the school is located. Concomitantly, it helps strengthen spatial segregation along religious lines, a phenomenon that further aggravates the community’s insularity and isolation/alienation/estrangement from the resources available to the Hindus in the state.2 This study is based on extensive interviews and discussions with the principal, the trustees of the school and high school–level teachers.3 We also conducted interviews with activists outside the school—individuals engaged in riot-relief work in the city and the state, and others working specifically on improving the community’s access to infrastructural, economic and educational resources. Among the students, our research is focused on teenage girls at the higher secondary level—students in the XI and XII standards—since the age group to which they belonged implied that most girls had studied at this school for several years, having both imbibed and reinterpreted the institution’s core teachings and values. Moreover, they were on the brink of graduating from the school, and were in the process of making important decisions about higher education, careers and marriage. They were actively thinking about their role in and contribution to society, and many voiced strong opinions regarding political activity in Gujarat. Finally, it is critical to note that these teenaged students were young children (between seven and ten years old) when the horrific events of 2002 unfolded, making them some of the few girls at the school who had witnessed the violence and retained vivid 2 See Gayer and Jaffrelot (2012) on unequal rights to Ahmedabad city, and Muslim ghettos in Ahmedabad as blatant illustrations of the role of communal violence in creating enclaves and Sardesai (2008) on spatial divides in Ahmedabad along religious lines. 3 Our ethnographic data was gathered primarily in late 2009, more than seven years after the latest incidents of violence in Ahmedabad. Unfortunately, we were unable to meet the parents of the school students (barring one family) since the school authorities repeatedly expressed their discomfort with us doing so. We recognise the lacunae that arise from our inability to engage with parents, who might have offered us different perspectives on education in the post-riot context (as compared to the teachers and trustees).

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and transformative memories of it. Their schooling trajectories, and their views, beliefs and aspirations offer significant insights into the impact of the violence on education for Muslim girls, as well as the distance and suspicion it has created, and the slivers of hope that remain.

Moral Education New Strategies within Adab The Hadith, or the teachings of the Prophet and his companions, prescribe ilm al adab seeking knowledge of manners, good breeding, social etiquette and cultivating propriety. This frames the ‘embodied capital’ in the school.4 Morality within the Hadith also includes ilm al akhlaq, which means duties and responsibilities, while simultaneously emulating the life and works of the prophet and his companions. The narratives we recorded in the school included all these distinct features of morality encompassed within the moral conception of adab. In other words, adab may be understood as a way of knowing and doing, an art of living in the world that traverses the line between this-world and the other-world, without being subsumed by either. Both student and teacher narratives highlighted respect, tinted with gendered connotations. Tehzeeb (good manners), lihaaz (respect) and izzat (honour) are crucial components of adab. ‘We teach the girls to speak less, speak softly and how to talk to boys’, the supervisor of the school tells us. Hum apne bachho ko pakad ke rakhte hain (We hold our girls in a tight grip), the principal adds. In cognizance of the worries that frame the attitudes of the parents who send their children to the school, protecting izzat (honour) is crucial to value education in the school. ‘Coming to school is a big deal because girls have to constantly assure their parents that they will not deviate from social expectations. The parents are basically anxious about this. Ladkiyon ko izzat ke saath joda jata hai. Family ki izzat. Their love affairs cause badnaami’ (Girls are associated with the honour, and the reputation of the family. Their love affairs cause us a bad name). An important aspect of adab is that girls should know what they ought not ‘to do’, a male English teacher tells us. A trustee of the school confirms 4 Cultural capital that is imbibed and absorbed incrementally, rather than instantaneously. It is therefore predicated on the investment of time (Bourdieu 1986).

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this paternalistic streak towards controlling and restricting the girls’ mobility that structures value education in the school, often viewed as an extension of familial norms and expectations. He tells us, We do not take kids on over-night tours, so that wrong deeds may be avoided. Parents aren’t keen to give their girls liberties because of the bad things in society. They are not allowed to go beyond school; at home, they need permission from parents to go even to the bazaar.

The girls themselves asserted that they must speak with elders deferentially, only after doing salaam (a hand gesture to greet and show respect), and as girls they must be demure and mindful of their postures. Lihaaz aur sharm Musalman ladkiyon ko hona chahiye (Muslim girls should be courteous, modest and graceful). If there isn’t any lihaaz (respect), then you’ll start thinking ‘I am something.’ ‘Girls will become just too free, they will get spoilt, which is why lihaaz is important,’ a student tells us. Another girl referred to the association between women and community honour saying, Izzat ek baar jaati hai to vapas nahin aati (Once you lose honour, you never get it back), another girl adds. In our discussions with the girls, they expressed a curiosity to know what we wore to college and at home, and specifically if we wore jeans at all. Some of the girls did wear jeans, but only at home, and never in front of any of their male relatives. One girl told us, ‘My elder brother beats me if he sees me wearing jeans; he doesn’t like seeing me in jeans.’ Most other girls told us, both happily and unhappily, that they were only allowed to wear ‘Punjabi dress’ and nothing else. Nazima stated vehemently, ‘When your body develops, you shouldn’t wear these kinds of (tight) clothes.’ Some girls, however, say that they would wear jeans if they could. Jeans, then, seemed to be an important symbol for the girls, something to be aspired to as well as shunned. Clothes, as an instrument of regulating the female body, are subject to diverse opinions even within the student community. Students also evaluate clothing as an indicator of defying or accepting religious and cultural norms. Religion and gendered norms are also projected as complementary and interlocking. For instance, while commenting on the ‘free dress’ day at school,5 some of the girls spoke scornfully of the girls who dressed up for the occasion. They mentioned how the principal had to announce on the microphone against this—‘This is an Islamic school, what will people 5

This is a day where the students are exempt from wearing uniforms.

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outside think?’ The girls maintained that ‘skin tight’ clothes were against Islam. Even if they did wear jeans, they said, they always made sure that they were loose fitting. Another group of girls spoke about the same day in a similar fashion. ‘We had a break for Id, after which we were allowed to wear “free dress”, the girls went overboard with their freedom. They wore big earrings, heavy make-up and heavily embroidered dresses. Jeans isn’t allowed even on the free dress day. Not even on picnics.’ One girl even mentioned the physical repercussions of ‘deviancy’— ‘I have to talk softly in the house, otherwise my father beats me.’ In this aspect, they indicate a more-than-partial internalisation of the deeply patriarchal values that underwrite the school’s civilising project, a feature that may not be particular to any one community. Undoubtedly, girls are socialised into accepting and internalising the normative components of their everyday lives at home and in school in an unquestioning and submissive manner. Their acceptance of the patriarchal order appears to go hand in hand with the school goal of bringing up young women who are modest, circumspect and respectful. In this way, the school succeeds in carrying forward familial and social intent in tandem with its own approach to the socialisation of young women. Adab, laden with meanings of respect, shame and deference, entails inscribing the female body with codes of conduct that prevent possible transgressions of sexuality, and maintain the unequal social distinctions between men and women. Disciplining the female body to render it less assertive than the men is often central to any social institution such as the family or the school, irrespective of religion. While there was an explicit reference to Musalman ladkiyan (Muslim girls), their experiences suggest similarities with women across class, caste and religion. Nonetheless, the project of training the female body into subservience gets clothed in an Islamic vocabulary. In other words, the project of regulating female sexuality and creating gendered subjects is also conflated with the project of shaping good Muslims citizens. Reference to their religion can be seen as an attempt to separate the piety and modesty of Muslim women from the women on the other side of the city who, for instance, ‘walk hand in hand with boys’ and ‘wear inappropriate clothes’. Then, the girls did not always see these values as simply restrictive but as a sign of virtue and uprightness because ‘kuch pane keliye, kuch khona bhi padhta hai’ (to gain something, you have to lose something as well). Students, trustees and teachers also emphasise character-building— obedience, regularity, cleanliness, punctuality, generosity and kindness

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through annual zaqat (charity taxes)—as important as aspects of adab. These qualities are incentivised through a procedure of reward and punishment embedded in the star system where the principal herself writes negative remarks in the lesson diary for littering the school, not laying out a cloth before eating lunch and speaking loudly. Such remarks may prevent them from receiving stars for homework which may result in a bronze, silver or gold medal awarded to any student who demonstrates qualities celebrated in the school. In this, the citizenship ideals the school creates for itself are both religious and civic—where being Muslim, articulating therefore one’s cultural rights, dovetails with civic citizenship which comprise conforming to laws, personal responsibility, honesty, integrity, self-discipline and hard work. Realms of cultural and civic citizenship interpenetrate, drawing sustenance from each other. For instance, the school facilitates practices of reading the namaaz as a significant feature of cultivating adab. The school also emphasises textual allusions to qualities like honesty which may resonate with ideals of civic citizenship. At the same time, it projects attributes of civic citizenship like cleanliness and punctuality as instrumental to earning brownie points for the Hereafter. ‘We tell them what they need to do in order to go to the Hereafter,’ a teacher tells us. ‘For instance, we encouraged the students to raise `60,000 for a girl in our school who had cancer ... through examples in the Quran, we tell them about the benefits of speaking the truth.’ Raising money for a girl with cancer is seen as a moral imperative, and is bolstered by the need to do good deeds for Allah and life in the Hereafter. Activists outside the school, working on minority rights and education, tell us that this particular institution is famous among parents for being a girls-only school that cultivates Islamic graces, shielding their children from the male gaze and simultaneously nurturing a morality predicated on religion. Such perspectives of parents resonate with the school’s reflection of itself—indicated in the principal’s statement that they hold their girls within a tight grip, the staff’s articulations of addressing the worries of parents. More explicitly, the school prides itself on fostering an ‘Islamic atmosphere’, listing it as one of its strengths in a 2010 SWOT analysis conducted during an internal review of the school.6 6 A review exercise where an organisation’s qualities get slotted into strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats (SWOT) to provide analyses for further improvement.

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In many ways it resembles any other religiously anchored school. The Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) schools, for instance, also foster character-building through sadachar (good behaviour), emphasising hard work, an upright posture, touching the feet of teachers as a mark of respect and praying to Lord Ram (Froerer 2007; Sarkar 2005; Sundar 2004). Like the RSS schools, value education in this educational institution focuses on industriousness, piety, propriety, prayer and civic sense. And yet, it is different from the RSS schools in two fundamental ways. First, the RSS schools attract students from a range of families (adivasis [tribals] and Dalits) very often disconnected from the ideology of the school, wherein such schools are often the only means to access a formal education in remote areas. In this way, it addresses the cultural competence of the Hindu elite, simultaneously providing a cultural capital that is tinged with religious right-wing world views. This enables the erasure of the varied rituals, customs, beliefs and practices that students from minority groups carry with them. The aim, therefore, is to elevate a casteist Hindu ideology at the expense of recognising the weaknesses and strengths of children from already marginalised social groups. The schools run by the public trust in this study, on the other hand, attract students only from the Muslim community, largely from lower-income group families. Therefore, the question of recognising the anxieties and aspirations of varied social groups does not arise. Another way in which it is obviously different from RSS schools in its ethos and worldviews is that it does not project India as a Hindu or Muslim nation or propagate notions of an un-divided India. The project instead is a more difficult one of preservation and adaptation, rather than an erasure of an entire culture. For the RSS schools, there is little struggle between promoting a culture and negotiating the dominant environment outside the school. Adab in the school, however, must encapsulate efforts at sheltering this community in a region hostile to them, and also aim inculcating values relevant to participating in a nation-state. Adab, therefore, reflects the struggle between isolation and integration, an integration that resists assimilation and dissolution. For instance, in promoting qualities of civic sense, hard work and respect, there is also little difference between this school and any other where disciplining students is central to the civilising project of education. However, the language in which it makes palatable the attributes of a desirable citizen is Islamic, resonating with the milieu from which its students come. Its ‘expressive order’ (Bernstein 2000: 96), a unifying force that helps bind a collective of students and teachers, is distinct

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insofar as it alludes to the Quran and the Hadith. The contents of these texts are deployed to mould them into culturally particular citizens. The texts are simultaneously used to mould the students into subjects suitable to an urban setting in a modern nation-state, nudging them into an obedient self-regulation that is in sync with dominant conventions of the gendered, productive, transparent and meritorious worker. This expressive order is elaborated and strengthened after the 2002 riots through two specific practices. The first is the introduction of the rumali (headscarf) in the uniform. The uniform, the principal tells us, is an attempt to reflect a distinct Islamic identity of the school, an identity which permeates its everyday routine. For a member of the school’s management trust, both the headscarf and covering one’s head with a dupatta (long scarf) are a significant marker of adab. The students wear full-sleeved, red-checked salwar kameez, a navy blue dupatta and a headscarf. According to the principal, ‘The idea is that not an inch of skin, not a strand of hair shows. It can be seen as a substitute for the burqa (full-body garment).’ Many students complained that the headscarf was a source of annoyance and discomfort. We noticed that they fiddled with it, taking it off whenever they found an opportunity. And yet, the rationale behind why it was adopted remained largely uncontested. Students of the Commerce stream explained, ‘If any man apart from our husband, father or brother sees even a strand of our hair, it would be gunnah (a sin) wherein we would be held guilty by God.’ Another girl pipes in, stating matter-offactly, ‘We’re mature (menstruating girls), there are ‘sirs’ (male teachers) in our school. The rumali is hence a necessity because the girls don’t wear their dupatta properly. The dupatta too must cover the chest.’ ‘We need the scarf in school even though we don’t like wearing it. Otherwise how will we stand before our male teachers and talk to them?’ another girl continued. Thus, the students also stress the importance of wearing the headscarf in school, accepting it, at least formally, as a legitimate sartorial component. It is true that for many girls the introduction of the headscarf in the school serves as a smooth continuation of the culture within the domestic setting where they wear headscarves. However, this is not entirely the case. It is important to note that not all girls wear the rumali at home even if they did cover their head with a dupatta. In reinforcing the significance of the headscarf within school settings, the students demonstrate a formal internalisation of school perspectives in shaping and making good Muslim girls. Admittedly then,

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the school strengthens and intensifies, not merely extends, the expressive orders of the family and the larger milieu from which its students come. Within the school setting, the headscarf is the subject of incessant scrutiny. As the girls enter the school campus, and move up towards the assembly hall, at the bottom stairs stands a male supervisor who surveys the crowd to pick out girls who are not wearing their rumali. These girls are set aside and asked to provide explanations. A remark is written in their school diaries and they meet the principal after the assembly. In an assembly, the principal announces: ‘The rumali is compulsory, without which the teacher must not allow students in class, they should be sent to me.’ In another assembly, she proffers a warning speech, conferring gravity to the uniform’s meanings, stating to the gathering of girls, The rumali has been introduced in our uniform. I want to know why you do not like it. If you give me your reasons, I will convey it to the management and if the management thinks it is valid, we can think about changing it. This uniform has been chosen and decided with much thought, for all our [trust-run] schools. If the schools in other areas have no issues, what is your problem? We cannot constantly keep checking if you’re wearing it. There is no formal police station here for enforcing the rumali. You treat it like a big joke. All of you know why the management introduced the rumali in your uniform. If you’re not just wasting our energies, tell us why you resist wearing it.

Evidenced in her speech are the endeavours at creating sanctity around the uniform and cultivating its significance in strengthening and emblematising an identity that is particularly Islamic. Again, it is important to point out that the headscarf was introduced in the uniform after the 2002 riots. Such a shift in the school’s uniform policy hints at several concerns emergent in the aftermath of communal violence. The anecdotes above illustrate how the headscarf, for the staff, is an emblem of religious identity. The students’ perspectives also reflect its use as a tool that moulds them into gendered subjects. It guards them against committing sin and is illustrative of their conformity to prescriptions of adab in deflecting the male gaze. The significance of introducing the headscarf post-2002, then, lies in all that it reflects. It is a concrete mechanism that indicates a community’s recourse to religion in the face of intolerance. It also indicates an intensification of protectionist paternalistic patriarchal values, expressing anxieties of shielding Muslim girls from both violence and sexual and cultural transgression. Most importantly, the introduction of the headscarf after the riots points to an explicit articulation of

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cultural rights by a minority community in confrontation with a majoritarian environment which, in all likelihood, is uncomfortable with visible and vehement demonstrations of difference. The other concrete way the school strengthens its character-building efforts after the riots, is through the ‘Rabia’ stories. Rabia, a character conceptualised by the principal herself, exemplifies the qualities, tastes and talents of an ‘ideal school-going girl’. A ‘day in the life of Rabia’ describes how she wakes up early in the morning and ‘bows to her parents and elders’, prays after washing herself, helps her mother with chores and finishes her homework. At school, where she is an honest, consistent, diligent student, she wears a ‘tidy uniform’, ‘carrying a nutritious tiffin box from home’. She respects her teachers and speaks softly. Pointing to the school’s focus on cleanliness and civic sensibility, the story elaborates how ‘she does not throw rubbish here and there. She uses the dustbin to throw rubbish. She switches off lights and fans, where nobody is present. She uses water that is sufficient for her purpose. She immediately closes the tap if it remains open.’ If the headscarves hint at the assertion of citizenship particular to collective entitlements predicated on religious identity, the Rabia stories reveal efforts at embracing a civic citizenship based on personal responsibility, and training into a competent worker of an economy at large. These practices, initiated after the communal riots, suggest the school’s attempts at asserting both the cultural and civic, the particular and the universal, the distinctive and the integrative dimensions of citizenship. They show how the school nurtures and reinforces the community’s religious anchorage and vehemently claims its place in the visible cultural sphere of the city. It simultaneously strengthens the community’s duties towards the nation-state, duties that also enable those subjected to them to participate in the economic and social activities of the nation-state.

The Assembly as an Ensemble of the School’s Varied Objectives The school assembly is a noteworthy site that evokes the significance of education within the existing parameters of rule. The assembly also makes for a prism that illustrates the tensions, overlaps, and interconnections between the school’s institutionalised and embodied capital. It

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articulates an Islamic idiom alongside a focus on scientific progress, an assertion of cultural rights together with expressions of a civic citizenship. The assembly begins the day at 11 a.m. where individual students narrate sections from the Hadith. These students are chosen according to their oratorical skills. ‘The class teacher selects those who speak well, those with a good alfaaz and andaaz,’ the Science students corroborate. The students narrate the tilavat (verses from the Quran or the Hadith). ‘This tilavat, or the worship of God, is an Islamic tradition that we have nurtured and carried forward,’ the principal tells us. The student first recites the Arabic version, and then provides an interpretation in Urdu. Some examples include: 1. Sabse bada gunah allah talah ke saath shirk karna aur ma baap ke saath ladai karna hai—The gravest sin of all is being disrespectful to God, disobeying and battling against both God and ones’ parents. 2. Dosti Allah ke liye hoti hai, dushmani bhi—Any kind of friendship or enmity must be determined by God’s will. 3. Insaan Ilm haasil karta hai taaki dusron ko phaydaa ho, nahin to Ilm hota hai lekin amal nahin hota—A human being receives knowledge so that others may benefit from it. The songs sung in the assembly are either prayers to Allah or patriotic. These are followed by allegorical stories, which end with morals like: A clever enemy is better than a foolish friend. Conclusions such as these are drawn from stories centred on a Muslim protagonist. Biographies of important figures may also be narrated. While we were there, we heard a short biography of the pioneer of medicine, a doctor who founded Jamia Hamdard. The assembly, therefore, illustrates how religious morality is disseminated alongside values and instructions for good behaviour that may be non-religious. It expresses the ideals of education, to what end it must serve, while simultaneously providing inspiring stories for emulation. A student reads out the news in Gujarati, which is followed by the national anthem. The period of our fieldwork also coincided with the season of Hajj, which is why information about the Hajj was given in Gujarati during one assembly. It is important to point out that on any given day, the assembly is multilingual—it is a composite mix of the Hadith in Arabic, its translation in Urdu, prayer songs in Urdu–Hindi, the daily news in Gujarati,

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and memorised English narrations. The assembly, then, is a theatre for all that the school proclaims to be, a neat blend of this-world and the other-world. The students, we observed, embrace the form and content of the assembly, showing little resistance. We noticed no disengagement that one would expect with a routine and everyday activity. Speaking before a large audience is treated as a matter of prestige. The days of practice and planning involved prior to every assembly, is perhaps, an indicator of the seriousness with which the activity is taken. However, their relative unfamiliarity with the English language gets reflected in the cadence with which the learnt-by-rote, English narratives are spoken. The girls almost always sound over-rehearsed, their intonations emulating those of Urdu verses. Even as they traverse this mix of different languages and narratives not always understanding the contents of what is being said, the students accept its significance, and hold themselves in pride if chosen to speak before the rest of the school. The school’s aspirations of developing English-speaking competencies, the values embedded in the Hadith and Quran, alongside a scientific temperament, get reflected in the assembly. Also, reflected in the peculiar renderings of English narratives, is the struggle through which these aspirations get realised.

Language Language, Identity and Modernity As with religion, caste, race and gender, language constitutes a site wherein individual and group identities—always fluid, mutable and dynamic—are formed within particular social, economic and political contexts. Although there is no clear and direct relationship between language and ethnic or religious identities, the language used in the home and in the school is an important marker of identity just as cultural and political identities are moulded by language. This mutually constitutive relationship between identity and language is the subject of this section, an exploration of the tensions between the status of Urdu, Gujarati and English languages within the school and the relationships between these languages as manifested in conversations about ‘mother tongues’, linguistic identities and career prospects. Some history of the fate of the Urdu language is necessary to assess its significance within the school and the quandaries that pervade any

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discussion of the language among the teachers. While Urdu is not the ‘mother tongue’ of a majority of Indian Muslims, it has come to be associated with the Muslim community over time. In the context of education, the ghettoisation of Urdu was the product of this association, as well as its simultaneous removal from government offices, courts and schools (Vaugier-Chatterjee 2005). The lack of government support for the language despite constitutional rights to study in one’s mother tongue has been combined with broader market forces to shape the real and imagined status of Urdu today as a marginal, Muslim language, unsuited to the demands of modern India. While the discussion below examines language use and learning within the school against the background of a polarised region and a globalised world, it is centred primarily on the question of language mediums, i.e., the language of pedagogical instruction in the school (in this case, Urdu and Gujarati with the majority of girls studying in the former medium). English also figures prominently in the language debate within the school in the context of a market economy that values linguistic resources as an aspect of cultural capital associated with ‘global’ citizenship. The ‘mother tongue’ evokes a world of familiarity, kinship and rootedness, and in the school, it is a phrase used repeatedly whilst referring to the Urdu medium of teaching. The administration and faculty take pride in their status as a well-known and respected Urdu-language school for girls in Ahmedabad. They note that girls from distant corners of the city come to the school only because it provides them with the option of Urdu instruction. Quite crucially, it must be noted that the language education question is deeply gendered, since girls in particular are often expected to learn their language—in this case, Urdu, the ‘Muslim language’—in order to teach their families and pass on scriptural knowledge to future generations of Muslim children (Benei 2008: 181). Indeed, as Dipankar Gupta has observed, in the Anjuman Islamic High School also run by a Muslim trust in Ahmedabad, the medium of instruction is Gujarati but in the middle school, the girls—and not the boys—are allowed to switch to the Urdu medium, following which the girls would shift back to the Gujarati medium in high school. The principal of the school noted that the ‘girls can afford the indulgence of Urdu for two years for they can teach their children the scriptures’ (2011: 97). Many teachers emphasise the right of students to learn in ‘their own language’, highlighting the example of former President A.P.J. Abdul Kalam who, according to one teacher, stated, ‘I am a scientist today

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because I could study in my mother tongue.’ ‘The Constitution gives everyone the right to study in their mother-tongue,’ she continues to tell us. These statements are based on the assumption that Urdu is in fact the mother tongue of Muslims living in Gujarat. One of the trustees of the school explicitly made this point, saying, Urdu is the language of the jamaat (community).The mother tongue is easy to grasp. Our parents speak Urdu and so, it is easy for us to learn. It is difficult to shift to Gujarati in higher classes. Also, many parents are originally from Uttar Pradesh, which is why they speak Urdu at home.

These conversations within the school reveal markedly different assertions regarding language mediums when compared with Dipankar Gupta’s (2011) observations within the same context—post-riot Ahmedabad. He argues that there is a strong urge among Muslims in Ahmedabad to send their children to Gujarati-medium schools in order that they may gain the same technical and linguistic skills as the majority community and also because knowing Gujarati is ‘a way of merging with the mainstream’, an identification of the need to speak Gujarati so fluently that their Muslim traits will no longer be evident (Gupta 2011: 94). What prevents the fulfilment of this desire is the lack of feasible access to Gujarati-medium schools which are often expensive and located in Hindu-dominated parts of the city. In the school under discussion here, however, the perceived necessity of knowledge of Gujarati was expressed by some teachers and students, but the defence of the Urdu medium was considerably stronger. Practical issues are emphasised in teachers’ justifications for the Urdu medium—the difficulty of switching mediums, the regional backgrounds of pupils—but alongside, the use of a particular language in the school and the home is equated with ‘being Muslim’. Thus, while discussing the advantages and disadvantages of Urdu instruction, the crafts teacher explains, ‘Most girls don’t speak Gujarati at home, except for some because of their caste,’ referring to the Mansuris.7 Interestingly, she continues, ‘All girls in the school are Muslim, there are no Gujaratis.’ Although her statement might be variously interpreted, it is critical to note the quick movement from her statement regarding the language

7 The Mansuris are a Sunni Muslim community, who speak Gujarati. There are a number of endogamous Muslim communities in Gujarat—Memons, Bohras, Chhipas, Khojas, Pathans—some of whom treat Gujarati as their mother tongue.

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spoken within the familial sphere to the assertion that students were Muslim and not Gujarati. As with the early 20th century association of Hindi with Hindu and Urdu with Muslim in North India, similar connections are being forged in 21st century Gujarat. During the colonial period, Hindi and Urdu were concertedly ‘purified’ of shared elements from the Persian, Arabic and Sanskrit languages. This close, almost inseparable, association between language and religious affiliation is but one indicator of the levels of polarisation in contemporary Gujarat. Lacking any intrinsic or fixed connection, the forging of such an association in people’s minds seems to hint at a growing inability to imagine these identities as anything but distinct and mutually exclusive. The process through which the Urdu language became synonymous with Islam has deep historical roots that extend far beyond the state of Gujarat. Since Independence, Urdu language education has been marginalised within education policy precisely because of its equation with Islamic education by successive governments (Abdullah 2002). Thus, this equation is the product of state policy over the decades, resulting in the decline of the Urdu language in general and more particularly, the near complete removal of the language from secular education. The issue of the protection of constitutionally guaranteed linguistic and cultural rights of a minority adds another dimension to the language debate. That is, the politics of Urdu must be understood in terms of cultural rights as well as historical discrimination and more recent incidents of communal violence. However, those who established linkages between language and religious belief simultaneously recognised the limitations of the Urdu language in the context of this-worldly matters such as university education and employment. Therefore, there exists an almost defiant insistence on the necessity and validity of Urdu medium education, but concomitantly, this medium of instruction is viewed as providing Urdu-speaking Muslim girls with (hitherto unavailable and culturally/linguistically alienating) educational opportunities within an Islamic milieu. Teaching students in Urdu becomes a means of constructing, preserving and negotiating identity, and difference in a hostile urban and regional environment. Several teachers reiterate the right to learn in Urdu but their assertions are accompanied by efforts to create avenues for advanced learning in the ‘community language’ and thereby, to alter the status of Urdu as an economically viable language. They articulate the critical importance of aligning academic pursuits more coherently with student identities,

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to forge, through schooling, a new educated, scientifically minded, culturally rooted and morally righteous citizenship ideal. Language, then, becomes more than a question of ethnic identity—it is transformed into a stage upon which debates about religion and belonging, education and empowerment, integration and segregation, the past and the future play out. One of the more articulate and educated young teachers at the school exemplified the efforts of the school to facilitate transformations within the community through the provision of quality education in the Urdu ‘mother tongue’. She teaches science in Urdu to students at the high school, and tells us that she joined the school because of an emotional jasbah (yearning) to contribute to ‘(her) community’. ‘Being a Muslim, I came here, especially because this school is Urdu-medium. My Urdu is good because my family speaks Urdu at home. The girls are intelligent but they have no guidance.’ She outlines the particular difficulties associated with teaching science subjects in Urdu, as well as the notable endeavours of the staff to overcome these hurdles. These include efforts to translate science textbooks into Urdu, encourage more Urdumedium students to enrol in the science stream at higher levels and create new pedagogical strategies to explain scientific concepts that lack corresponding words in Urdu. Importantly, the educational opportunities in Urdu within the state of Gujarat are somewhat different from the same possibilities in states such as Andhra Pradesh and Uttar Pradesh where Urdu-medium schools are more widespread and textbooks easily available, as mentioned by the same teacher. She notes, There are very few Urdu-medium students studying science in this school [as compared to those in the Humanities stream]. The textbooks we have helped translate have not yet been approved by the government. But the faculty is the only Urdu-medium science faculty in Gujarat. The management encourage us so that people who don’t take up science because of the medium now get the opportunity. It is our duty to provide this facility. The girls have tremendous potential and they shouldn’t be disadvantaged because of their language.

However, several problems remain, most critically, the absence of Urdu-medium colleges in the city which serves to severely restrict possibilities for higher education for the girls. Even the women’s college run by the same educational society is a Gujarati-medium institution. According to some Gujarat-based social activists whom we interviewed, the number of Urdu-medium schools declines as the level of education

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gets higher—that is, there are several Urdu-medium primary schools, few middle schools and even fewer high schools thus ensuring that dropout rates are fairly high. Even the science teacher quoted extensively above cited the restrictions posed by the language at another meeting, stating, ‘In this global world, English is the language. Therefore, maybe, personally, I feel that Urdu should be taught only as a language, not as a medium.’ These debates within the institution and beyond point to a strong dialectic between integration into a neoliberal nation-state and isolation, a withdrawal into the safe space of communitarian ties. The administration is pleased with the school’s prestige and achievements, the most widely discussed of which is the introduction of the science stream at the higher secondary level with instruction in Urdu. On the other hand, as mentioned earlier, there are students and teachers who recognise the need to achieve proficiency in both Gujarati and English, in a state where government jobs require knowledge of the official regional language, and in a country where, increasingly, the English language stratifies society, enables mobility and impedes access to white-collar credentials and careers. For the school, this paradox is central to its dilemma of claiming to be a premier educational institution for Muslim girls in a society struggling to recover from religious intolerance and hostility, and at the same time, aspiring to address the demands of a liberalising India. Not surprisingly then, the idea of ‘scope’—variously connoting choice, opportunity and range—permeates discussions around language. By ‘scope’, the teachers were referring to the range of opportunities for further education and jobs that may or may not be constrained by the language the girls are instructed in. With respect to career prospects, the conventional hierarchy of languages is English, Gujarati and finally, Urdu—not in terms of number of speakers—but the employment potential they are seen to possess. Language, class and religion seem to map onto each other—albeit only partially—within this language ladder. Nonetheless, teachers have vastly different opinions about the value of each of the languages taught at the school, possibly influenced by their own schooling backgrounds. Nafisa Patel, who teaches the Gujarati language, explains, Living in Gujarat, it is very important to know Gujarati. Gujarati has been made a compulsory language in the state and that’s a good thing. With Urdu medium, they can’t do anything more than a B.A. However, now with the recently introduced science stream in Urdu, they can at least try their hand at medicine.

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The science in Urdu initiative is, therefore, central to the school’s post-2002 educational strategy, a concerted effort at creating new opportunities and avenues for mobility within the parameters of a particular linguistic identity. Another teacher tells us that there are very few Urdu-language schools in Gujarat and that the ‘scope’ with Urdu as one’s primary language is low, although she adds, ‘But if they work hard, the students can be very successful.’ From our conversations with teachers, the principal and the trustees, it appears that most Urdu-medium graduates of the school who chose to work outside the home pursue the teaching profession, with the majority aiming to be primary school teachers, leading to a surplus of teachers without gainful employment owing to the limited number of Urdu-medium schools in the state. In light of this, the introduction of the science stream can be interpreted as a far-reaching project in that it potentially widens the career options for Urdu-speaking girl students beyond the ‘acceptable’ (feminine) occupation of the teacher—marked by flexible working hours as well as widespread perceptions of the school as an extension of the home and the teacher as secondary caregiver. One could wonder whether Hindi, the official ‘national’ language, figures within the dilemmatic subject of the pedagogical medium. It is taught as a language in the school, and most students speak an Urdu– Hindi combination in daily conversation. The school’s Hindi teacher elucidated her decision to study Hindi as her primary subject several years ago, Us zamaane mein Hindi bahuth lucrative tha. (In those days, Hindi was a very lucrative subject). There was a lot of scope if you knew the language. Now, Gujarati is more important and has been made compulsory in schools. Hindi is only the national language now.

Even a school trustee explained the value of Hindi language in terms of nationhood and hence adhering to a patriotic ideal: Hindi rasthrabhasha hain, isiliye sikhna chahiye (Hindi is the national language, that is why it must be learned). In this Ahmedabad school, it is Urdu, Gujarati and English that vie (unequally) for space within the classroom, each bringing its own utility and value to the lives of these students. Here, it is specifically Urdu that is located at the heart of tensions between linguistic and cultural assertion in the context of traumatic events and pressures from more powerful social and linguistic groups (Vaugier-Chatterjee 2005). The faculty was clearly not impervious to these pressures, and made concerted efforts

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to achieve a balance between cultural heritage and economic necessity, between educating students in their ‘community’ language and equipping them with knowledge and skills more suited to market compulsions and modernising impulses.

Introducing Science in Urdu Value education, imparted primarily through rituals and practices of the expressive order of the school, is not the only sphere where postriot transformations are visible. Significant developments are evident within the instrumental order as well, that is, the realm of practical skillbuilding comprising ‘differentiating rituals’ like examinations and disciplinary training (Bernstein 2000: 96). These shifts, evidenced in the introduction of science in Urdu in a school where previously no science was taught at all, illustrates the school’s desire to equip its students, and therefore the children of the community at large, with the tools that expand their career options. The introduction of pure science in the school represents the community’s movement towards ensuring an economically stable and secure future. The introduction of science teaching in Urdu specifically points to the desire of the institution to address this need in what it considers the ‘mother tongue’ of the Muslim community, thereby acknowledging and working with the cultural competencies that students previously trained in the Urdu language come with. Introducing science subjects in the XI and XII standards makes the school the only all girls’ school in Ahmedabad with Urdu-medium courses in science. This emphasis on science is also part of an important futuristic vision of the institution. The Five Year Plan as laid out in the school’s 2010 SWOT analysis repeatedly stresses the need to improve and expand ‘education technology’ whereby teachers become computerliterate in programming languages like CCC and C++. The plans also advocate the use of e-books, emphasising the ‘lack of modern technology’ in the school as a weakness which must be addressed. More significantly, the SWOT analysis advocates that at least a quarter of the girls finishing the class ten board examinations must get admission into the science stream. By launching the science stream in Urdu, the management of the school seeks to provide a window of opportunity for students who receive over 70 per cent marks and wish to pursue the study of disciplines previously closed to them. According to a

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science teacher, the introduction of the science stream in Urdu intends to overcome any disadvantages the girls may face due to unfamiliarity with Gujarati. Girls not comfortable with Gujarati but interested in taking up science in order to widen their job prospects need no longer opt for the Gujarati medium. However, there is no easy way in which this school policy gets implemented. The same science teacher argues that the dearth of available literature in Gujarat suited to teaching in Urdu limits its appeal and potential. In the absence of an adequate number of trained teachers and curriculum-centred resources, teaching science in Urdu continues to be a struggle. It is evident then that the introduction of science is an attempt to expand the ‘institutionalised capital’ (Bourdieu 1986) of the school.8 It helps provide material proofs and credentials that certify a person’s scientific training. It helps reduce the language barriers that often determine the disciplinary and occupational categories that people get slotted into. And yet, it continues to reverberate with the school’s embodied capital by mediating through Urdu and alluding to adab. This interplay between provisions for institutionalised and embodied capital addresses the gaps and strengths that comprise the students’ cultural competence. At one level, the school articulates and asserts its cultural rights via its Islamic tenor, at another, it is contained within the larger system of board certification that bears the stamp of the state. To realise this objective of seeking state legitimacy in every way and to make possible the assurance of a lucrative future, the school offers science. The principal tells us that she wanted to equip the girls with better futures through the inculcation of science, better, ‘modern’ mindsets so that they progress into the next century and are not left behind. To fulfil its ambitions in expanding the career opportunities of its students, the school uses Islamic allusions when teaching science. In other words, Islam continues to be deployed even in the school’s formal curriculum so that these subjects are rendered academically and experientially to the students. An exploration of the interface between science and religion in the school helps elaborate this point. The science teacher and her students reconcile their dilemma between science and religion by focusing on the overlaps and the parallels rather than the disjunctions. The emphasis on experience, they argue, provides 8 Cultural capital in its institutionalised form provides academic qualifications which create a ‘certificate of cultural competence, which confers on its holder a conventional, constant, legally guaranteed value with respect to power’ (Bourdieu 1986: 248).

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a common ground between the two. The scientific nazar (perspective), the teacher asserts, attempts at arriving at a rationale behind the way things work. In this, it resonates with the concerns of Islam. The students and teachers share with us analogies which foreground the interconnections between science and Islam, where they are viewed as extensions of each other: ‘In Islam too there is a reason behind everything. For instance, basic culinary rules within Islam forbid us to blow into food. And yet, there is a scientific explanation for this—one emits carbon dioxide when one blows out,’ the science teacher tells us. A group discussion with some science students reveals creative analogies that link science with Islam in different ways: 1. ‘The Quran talks about the apocalypse, qayamat, much like the recent scientific debates on the Big Bang theory and the end of the world.’ 2. ‘According to science, man was preceded by apes. The Quran too speaks of this ... Adam was the first man, and his footprints are still visible.’ 3. ‘What the Prophet proclaimed years ago is happening now. He had declared that men will be able to fly without wings.’ 4. ‘It is necessary to clean oneself before reading the namaaz. Scientifically, this is hygienic. Reading the namaaz also makes the bones strong. Sazde mein ruhani sukoon milta hai (the act of bending before God gives adequate rest and exercise to the body).’ Notwithstanding the factual credibility of the examples deployed to elucidate the possible linkages between science and Islam, a yawning desire to make sense of their religious beliefs and practices alongside their academic pursuits is palpable. These persistent endeavours of relating the two spheres illustrate how embodied and institutionalised capital gets deeply imbricated (resulting in a view that valourises science without casting religion away). Nonetheless, when we ask the students to tell us which of the two fields they prioritise, religion holds unequivocal precedence. ‘Allah disapproves of those who do not believe in God, including scientists who do not believe in God. Before being scientists, we’re Muslims.’ Possible contradictions between religion, premised on faith, and science, premised on empiricism and experiment, get elided. When the potential for irreconcilable differences does arise, the students abandon science to embrace a morality predicated on Islam.

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These explorations reveal that the transformations in the instrumental order of the school are undergirded by a desire to create technically proficient subjects suitable to the economy of a modern nation-state, from which the community may seek its entitlements to jobs and higher education once its students are certified. We notice, however, that these changes in the instrumental order are received in unanticipated ways; creative tensions between science and religion arise where students negotiate the possible incompatibilities between the two. In the last instance, nonetheless, the students reaffirm their religious identity as Muslim girls.

Language Stratifications and Peer Group Divisions In a mixed-medium school linguistic divisions manifest themselves not simply in discussions among educationists but as fixed separations and stratifications of student peer groups, and as delimitations on their aspirations. Language, for instance, often plays a defining factor in shaping their educational trajectories. As detailed earlier, the school offers the Commerce stream only in Gujarati and science solely in Urdu while Humanities subjects are taught in both languages. Here, the constraints operate for both Urdu- and Gujarati-medium students, although to a greater degree for the former as compared to the latter. Many students in the Commerce stream opt for it because science is not available in the Gujarati medium, and the opportunity to go to another school is unavailable for some girls because, in the words of Fatima, a Commerce student, ‘it could be a co-ed school, in a different part of the city, and my father would not allow that.’ Similarly, the numerous Urdu-medium arts stream students enrolled in the stream because there was no commerce in that medium, and since arts is seen as the ‘general stream’, which requires no expensive tuitions. Moreover, peer groups are organised based on language, since the division of students into sections is also not arbitrary, and is based only partly on academic choice and aptitude. At the high school level, the Urdu- and Gujarati-medium students did not actively intermingle outside the classroom, and the girls in the Urdu arts and Gujarati Commerce classes exhibited their rivalries openly. A section of friends in the Urdu arts class told us they had no friends in the Commerce class, that Gujarati medium ki ladkiya khas nahin hain, achhi nahin hain (The Gujarati-medium

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girls are not particularly nice). The Commerce students spoke to us about a competition between the two mediums, They want to outsmart us, get ahead by putting us down. We know the students from Gujarati arts since we have studied with them till the X standard, so they’re friendly, but the Urdu medium girls behave in a strange exhibitionist way. We are smarter because commerce students are those who have generally done better in the exams.

Such comments, however, cannot be viewed exclusively in relation to linguistic differences in that they also reflect broader hierarchies among academic disciplines and their perceived relationship to intellectual capacities, especially at the school level—a feature common to many schools across the country. Another social demarcation between language groups plays out in their relationships with peers outside school. Some students have neighbours who study in English-medium schools but they don’t interact with them much because ‘those girls think they are so smart, that they are “something”. Munh chidathe hain (they mock us).’ Some of the Urdu-medium arts students are particularly hostile towards a new arrival in the Gujarati-medium arts class who has recently joined the school, shifting from an English-medium convent school. At the same time, they yearn to learn English because, as Farah puts it, it is ‘useful “outside” and is an international language.’ We notice that, in particular, girls in the Urdu-medium arts class have no Gujarati-speaking friends and see themselves as Muslim rather than Gujarati. One student, Mehrunissa, says, Summaiya is my only Gujarati-speaking friend. She is a Mansuri. They have a different type of wedding. They are allowed to court each other after their engagement, they roam around alone, talk on the phone with each other. Mansuris do not marry outside their jamaat (community).

Thus, the differences in language also feed into perceived variations in cultural practices, traditions and standards of propriety among different caste-like groups within the same religious fold. It is true that student rivalries are common in educational institutions, and are a product of peer pressures, cultures of competition and academic stratification within the school, as well as individual personality traits and so on. What is significant about these rivalries in this school is both the ways in which they overlap with linguistic divisions,

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and thereby often with class and caste, as well as degrees of regional and religious identification. Not only does this point to the non-existence of a homogeneous Muslim community in Gujarat, but also to the contentiousness of the term ‘Gujarati Muslim’—a regional-linguistic-religious category that is often eschewed as a marker of self-identity by teachers and students at the school. The term’s fraught character is embedded in the historical emergence of a Gujarati identity that carries deep overtones of Hindu nationalism. At the same time, this does not imply that these young girls uniformly neglect or reject their geographical, genealogical and cultural rootedness in the region of Gujarat, as elaborated in our exploration of the students’ appropriations and interpretations of their city—Ahmedabad—and its Islamic heritage. Language—as educational medium, as cultural capital, as identity— functions as a terrain upon which complex questions central to citizenship debates are discussed and variously answered. From educational policies to peer rivalries, language as form becomes a lens through which both tradition and change are envisaged and actualised. In the school— for Muslim girls in the state of Gujarat—language represents a number of things—the preservation of culture, amalgamation into the larger polity, the assertion of difference, aspirations of mobility, an index of progress.

Citizenship, Education, Riots Citizenship and Belonging: Region, Religion and Nation This section attempts to anchor the question of citizenship and belonging through an analysis of student voices on national ‘problems’ and sources of pride, on political processes within their state, and how their experiences of being citizens are mediated by their status as members of the minority community in a communally polarised state. There is no singularity or coherence to their opinions and experiences—in fact, we encountered divergent positions on the nature of Gujarat politics and its controversial chief minister. While a number of factors could explain these differences, the focus here is not on why this might be so but rather to point out that these young women had strong views about some of these subjects, and did not hesitate to articulate them or to express their disagreement with the opinions of their peers.

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As discussed in the preceding sections, a range of values are sought to be inculcated by the school—from the religious and moral to the civic— to mould students into ideal Muslims and ideal citizens, imagined as complementary, overlapping ideals. The students’ understanding of civic citizenship, therefore, centres on values and codes of conduct such as cleanliness, good neighbourliness, protection of nature and public service, as can be seen in their assessments of the ‘problems’ faced by their city, state and country. The most frequent subjects raised in this context are those of pollution and overpopulation. Girls talk about air and noise pollution as well as the lack of cleanliness, particularly in the areas where they lived (as against the middle class neighbourhoods populated by Hindus).9 While talking about what they liked about the city and state, the girls refer to some of the places in the city that they liked to visit— Science City, Law Garden and Kakadiya Lake among others. The girls speak about the regional culture with a sense of pride—such as the garba (a Gujarati dance), dhokla (a famous dish), patola (a sari fabric from Ahmedabad) and the Kutch region in the state, a popular tourist destination. Significantly, many point to the beautiful dargahs (Sufi shrines) in the city, emphasising in particular the history and heritage of the city associated with Muslim rulers, saying Islamic sheher hain (It is an Islamic city), and also, Muslim badshah ne apna ghar yahan pe banaya (Muslim kings made this city their home). They even explain the original name of the Kakadiya Lake, stressing that its initial name was an Islamic one that had transformed over the years. This emphasis suggests an attempt to reclaim the city as theirs, as that which their Muslim ancestors have built, and into whose glorious heritage their community is inscribed. Even as the students highlight the distinctively Muslim history of Ahmedabad, they also cite the role of Gujarat in the nationalist struggle, saying, Rashtrapitha ka janmabhoomi hain (It is the birth place of the father of the nation, Mahatma Gandhi). If he hadn’t broken the salt laws here, we would not have been free. Dandi March yahan se shuru hua tha (The Dandi March [to break colonial salt monopolies] started in the state). 9 The Sabarmati River divides the city of Ahmedabad, geographically and socially, into eastern and western sections. The west is largely populated by Hindus and is marked by wide roads, tall buildings and large shopping complexes. The eastern part of the city comprises the erstwhile walled city and industrial areas, and is inhabited by low-income groups, mostly Muslims and Dalits (Jasani 2008: 432).

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Their reappropriation of the cultural and architectural heritage of their city is accompanied, albeit somewhat more mutedly, by claims on Hindu-Gujarati culture and on the special place of the region in the independence movement. The students’ specific claims to the city are especially interesting given that Hindu nationalists hold that the ‘authentic’ name of Ahmedabad is Karnavati, given to the place during its founding in the 11th century, thus clearly disputing the creation of the city by Ahmed Shah in the 15th century (Jasani 2010).While they express a sense of cultural pride in the state of Gujarat, the students point to the ‘politics’ of the state as one of its ‘problems’: Gujarat mein politics bekaar hain (In Gujarat, the politics is worthless). The girls display an acute awareness of their own marginality and the discrimination the community has encountered at the hands of the Indian state. One student recounts this incident to us, through it, relating a more common experience of profiling and marginalisation in the city, and a recognition of their shared minority status. At Akshardham Temple, there is so much checking after the terrorist attacks. The guards keep asking us questions at the entrance. We have to keep identification to show that we are from Ahmedabad. We become outsiders in our own city. They look at our ID (identification) cards, ask us our names and whether we are Pathans.10 They hear our names and know we are Muslim. Once a friend didn’t bring his ID card and he wasn’t allowed in.

Another girl pipes in, saying, ‘Gujarat is a beautiful state but the netas (politicians) are only after money. Toofan karthe hain (They cause riots). Every time there is a bomb blast, innocent people get caught.’ One group of girls says, ‘We don’t like Modi. Dushman rakta hain’ (He keeps enemies). They joke, ‘People say that Modi’s wife left him for a Muslim which is why he doesn’t like us!’ One girl states that Modi is what she most disliked about the city of Ahmedabad—Usse dar lagta hain (I am scared of him). They recount his role in the 2002 riots, a view probably received from their family and neighbourhood since they themselves were fairly young at the time. At the same time, the students do not hold a uniformly negative view of the leader, instead making statements that seem to dilute the blame on the government, fix the spotlight on the failures of the Muslim community and also shift the focus to a corrupt and unprincipled politics pervading the electoral system. 10 The Pathans are an ethnic group with large populations in Afghanistan and Pakistan, and are a smaller group in India.

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‘We can’t call him entirely bad because there are more Hindus than Muslims and he helps them a lot. He does help poor people also. The media also exaggerates the news. They make a mountain out of a molehill.’ A debate ensues between girls in the group following this assertion— Par Musalman ko aage badne nahi deta. Hindu aage, Muslim peechhe’ (But he does not allow Muslims to progress. Hindus ahead, Muslims behind). Some others reply, ‘But this is because of our own effort. How is it Modi’s fault? Musalman vote nahi detein. (Muslims do not vote). That’s why Modi is elected. Our parents vote. Most people vote for those who give them five hundred rupees. Modi buys everyone’s votes.’ Again recognising the importance of the vote, they state, Even with voting, everyone is bought. Modi buys his voters. According to the news, he was behind everything in 2002. He bought everyone oil and gave them a five hundred rupee note, to be assured of his voters. A lot of Muslims don’t vote. But many don’t vote because they are poor.

Statements that made explicit mention of the grave injustices to the community and of the government’s complicity in these acts were, therefore, accompanied by narratives that emphasised the community’s own failings and the need for internal reform in the post-riot context. National identities are much less visible in the girls’ articulations. Even though pictures of nationalist leaders hung on the corridor walls, and the national anthem was sung every day during assembly, their knowledge about the nationalist movement is limited and the students primarily refer to school programmes when asked about occasions such as Independence or Republic Day. With regard to the former, the girls talk about a singing competition held at the school during which they sang desh ke geet (nationalist songs), ranging from Saare Jahan se achcha to patriotic film songs. They knew that Republic Day was important because it is the day when ‘our nation got a new constitution,’ although a few did not know its significance. They said it was mostly the class monitors and the NCC students who came to school on Republic Day, jhande ko salaami karne (to salute the national flag). Beyond religious and regional identities, there also appears to be a shift towards the creation of a more global identity among the students. The principal notes that competition, technology and globalisation are extremely important, making proficiency in English and computer literacy central to the school’s goals in the 21st century. An articulate and

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well-educated science teacher notes that her motivation was to create new citizens in a globalised world. She said, A world citizen, a global citizen must let go of all these deep resentments, in order to move forward and embrace a larger global agenda, which is what I’m trying to do. My work is for everyone. What I want to do will benefit everyone. I work with several non-Muslims, and see myself as contributing to the world at large.

This is an important statement made by her towards the end of our fieldwork, marking a shift from her earlier position, wherein she had maintained that she saw her work in the school as specifically contributing to the uplift of the Muslim community. This was possibly a consequence of her understanding of our research, and her desire to project her own identity as a highly qualified, articulate teacher with experience working with professionals from other communities. What this points to, however, is her internal negotiation with her multiple identities, and an attempt to reconcile the ‘particular’ and the ‘universal’. The ‘universal’, as we know, is particular, and her articulations about identity reflect the manifold, contradictory and overlapping identifications central to self-making, and the creation of new syntheses through this process— modern, global, Muslim, Gujarati, Urdu-speaking, scientific. Each of these identities themselves is variously interpreted and enacted by different people in the school, and by individual persons depending on the specific context. In many ways, this teacher’s ‘dialectic’ mirrors that of the school’s own institutional identity.

Reinforcing Education Activists outside the school and the staff in the school proclaim that post-riots changes within the instrumental and expressive orders of the school are pragmatic mechanisms channelising the community’s anxieties in a direction that allows it to cope with its troubled past through a novel orientation towards the future. The attempt, we notice, is to foster an atmosphere that negates memories of injustice by creating definitive educational goals like ensuring that at least a quarter of its students are enrolled in science and are well versed in English over the next five years. As one activist points out, ‘The 2002 pogrom has shifted people’s attention to education. Muslim families now realise that education is the

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way out. It is seen as the only means to gain confidence and a sense of security.’ Another social worker, the founder of the Ahmedabad Muslim Women’s Association makes a similar point, telling us, ‘People were scared to send their kids to schools. But now there is jagriti (awareness) in the Muslim community. There is a heightened sense of solidarity to enhance the glory and the pride of the community.’ Highlighting the significance of education in uplifting the lives of young Muslim children, an English teacher at the school passionately states, ‘If you want to make someone’s line smaller, you have to draw a bigger line.’ In this, he implicitly positions Muslims as a community, embattled in opposition to the violence perpetuated in the name of the majority. The school also wishes to deal with its ‘weaknesses’ such as ‘illiterate and uninterested parents’, and ‘the lack of teaching aids’, while listing its proclaimed strengths like an ‘Islamic culture’ and ‘education for social change’. In doing so, we notice its attempts to bolster the cultural capital offered to its students. This cultural capital is both an institutionalised capital and an embodied capital. The school’s institutionalised capital is reflected through its programmes on English-speaking and science. These programmes are fostered within the framework of the embodied capital comprising adab and morality. In this context, it is important to point out that the trust began as a response to the communal riots in the 1960s. It finds its beginnings in a spurt of communal violence in 1966, which led to a heightened disturbance in the Jamalpur area for a period of two to three months. One of the trustees recalls holding night classes during the riots so that students could successfully take their exams. Tuitions were conducted in a chawl (small tenement) inside Jamalpur, for those whose schools had been destroyed or whose classes were suspended. Recent demonstration of the school’s involvement in promoting education within the community includes the school’s active persuasion of parents to send their children to school. For example, the parents of a class topper were reluctant to continue their daughter’s education beyond the X standard but the school authorities spoke to her parents to convince them to keep her in school. The turn to education in the face of violence, therefore, is not a new phenomenon. And yet, the trustee is also reluctant to discuss the possible political forces that might have shaped, if not directly caused the existing communal fractures and fissions. This reluctance to criticise the state government is especially significant since the school is a Grantin-Aid school, receiving a large proportion of its funds from the state

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government. It is possible, therefore, that its spokespersons are wary of speaking against its government, in the fear of jeopardising their chances of receiving funds. In reference to the communal tensions in Gujarat, the trustee says, We have to stay in Hindustan and we have to deal with this. We reinforce education to get rid of these problems. Education is what is missing in the community and we have decided to change it, for both girls and boys. Now Muslim girls are progressing, they’re not behind girls from any other community.

Revealed in these statements, therefore, is a quiet resignation to the enduring structures of discrimination, but equally, a strong resolve to come to terms with an unstable past by foregrounding the community’s own agency in negotiating the prevalent arrangements within the state. By and large, the trustees and the teachers in the school articulate a need for collective amnesia, an abandonment of the past, so that they may successfully focus on the present, as an investment instrumental to safeguarding and fortifying future needs. The principal too emphasises the necessity to focus on the future, What happened in 2002 affected our strength. The XII standard exams were delayed. Only a few girls cleared the tenth exams. There were also fewer admissions in the VIII standard. But with time, we have forgotten everything, all the damages done to us. Bhool gaye (we have forgotten) [smiles]. We have to forget in order to move on and get by.

It is this persistent need to erase the past that frames and influences the school’s strategies at inculcating both adab and a modern technical proficiency. An erasure, it seems, is necessary, if only to build a better, stronger, more secure future for the girl students in particular and the Muslim community in general. A focus on the present does not transgress the scaffold of the state government. Instead, particularly because the school depends on funds by the state government, its agenda is shaped, and constrained by the syllabus, and the formal academic structure laid down by the state board of education. Even as it ‘works within the system’, so to speak, the school does not fail to emphasise the religious significance of education. A focus on the present and future of the community is created by stressing the pertinence of education within Islam. The need for learning is itself expressed in the language of Islam with one English teacher insisting

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that it is an ‘Islamic duty’ for girls to study—‘reading and writing is as important as namaaz (prayer) and roza (fasting).’ For instance, the school diary begins with a quote from the Quran ‘Let’s pray, O God! Let my knowledge multiply.’ This quote is also exhibited on the walls of the main corridor. The principal and activists in Gujarat tell us, in several independent conversations, that education is given a very high priority in Islam. ‘The opening paragraph of the Quran is Iqra which means to recite. The Quran states, Waqur Rabbi Zidni Ilma (pray that God may increase your knowledge)’, an activist explains. It was the Prophet’s command to seek knowledge. He said that one must go to China if necessary in order to learn. China was considered the end of the world at that time when travelling even from Mecca to Medina was extremely difficult. He meant that one should incur whatever troubles necessary to learn. And his words are applicable not only for men.

Emphasising the religious significance of learning, several students, trustees and teachers mention the idea of iqra and the anecdote referring to China. ‘Learning is compulsory for all human beings. Ilm haasil karna hamara farz hain (It is our religious duty to seek knowledge),’ the school’s English teacher states. Drawing attention to prominent Muslim personalities is another way in which the school and activists working on Muslim education reinforce the role of education in improving the prospects of the children. Highlighting the achievements of these public figures also works to create models of emulation. For instance, the founder of the Ahmedabad Muslim Women’s Association speaks of the successes of A.P.J. Abdul Kalam and Sania Mirza. ‘We don’t want just these exemplars, but want to take forward an entire community,’ she adds, however. The surge towards the enterprise of formal education, then, becomes a powerful way in which traumatic memories are eschewed, and re-channelises the community’s energies to an inward fortification, depoliticising their battles by skirting the possibilities of externalising blame.

Of Remembrance and Forgetting: Education in the Wake of Godhra Since the students we spoke to were between the ages of 15 and 17, most of them were fairly young during the communal violence of 2002

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in Gujarat. None of the girls we met had been directly affected in terms of losing their homes or members of their family but they did have recollections of the rioting and the deep fear they felt at the time. Most of the girls at the school live in the locality where the school is located which was less affected by the riots since outsiders were largely prevented from entering this part of the city during the violence. However, as activist and scholar Dr J.S. Bandukwala tells us, The school was bound to have been affected by what happened in 2002, even if obliquely. In every school, there would be some students who would have lost their homes. Many parents would have shifted their children to schools like this one [the school described in this chapter] for safety reasons. Ahmedabad has very poor Muslims and anyone going to work outside the Muslim areas would have been affected.

This point is important since some of the girls we spoke with cite the riots as the main reason that they joined this school—their earlier schools no longer wanted to be accountable for their safety and their parents wanted them to attend schools within the neighbourhood or in ‘safe’ areas. Indeed, there has been a near-paralysis of education for Muslim youth following 2002 when people’s homes and livelihoods were destroyed. Many students were scared of going back to their old schools and not enough new schools were set up in the rehabilitation camps. In the 81 resettlement colonies set up following the riots, 68 of them had no schools at all (Gupta 2011: 65). As with the early beginnings of the school discussed here, in the aftermath of the violence, it was Islamic relief organisations and Muslim-run trusts who made efforts to set up schools and coaching classes for riot-affected children. While the girls we met had not been displaced from their homes, their education was far from unaffected by the violence. Afreen, a class XI student of arts explains how the violence of 2002 influenced her schooling trajectory. I used to study in a Gujarati-medium school but then there were the Hindu–Muslim fights and I had to leave that school. At that time, many people came to the school and threw stones at it, saying that Muslims studied there. But there were also many Hindus studying there.

Mehjabeen, from the same class, narrates similar incidents from the history of her school life. She tells us that she studied at a convent school when the toofan (storm) took place.

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I studied at a convent school in my IV and V standards, but if we remained in these schools, then they would be responsible for us and they would have to answer to people who ask about us. That is why we had to shift to a municipal school.

While these are only two instances, they point to the importance of Muslim-run institutions in post-2002 Ahmedabad when parental concerns about the safety of their children, particularly girls, pushed them to enrol their children in Urdu-medium schools closer to home. While safety is a central issue, the renewed significance of community solidarity following the trauma of the riots is possibly of equal significance in the minds of parents. At the same time, the issue of safety and solidarity in community-run schools is not a novel one since, as Barbara Metcalf (2007) has pointed out, in the post-partition period, a central concern within the Muslim community has been to mould children in their identity as observant Muslims owing to the fear that state schools would favour Hindu myths and symbols. The girls recount what they could remember of the events of 2002, stressing their sense of fear, their confinement to their homes and the faith they placed in Allah during that time of distress. Most of the girls were between the ages of eight and ten during the pogrom, and their recollection of those weeks was blurred, but it is interesting in that it offers a brief but important perspective of a child on the events—their distinctive memories of terror mixed with the small pleasure of holidays from school, as well as the uncertainty of examinations and the transformed neighbourhood demography following the violence. While all of the older girls at the school remember the events, only a few— primarily those who resided in mixed neighbourhoods—personally witnessed the violence. Afreen narrates her recollections of the episode. I used to feel very scared in the night, all the men used to sit outside (standing guard). Hindus used to live opposite us; we weren’t allowed to go there. Now they don’t live there anymore ... But we had fun during the day, because we didn’t have school and all the kids would play together.

Razia describes the experiences of her family in some detail. She says, I remember that many Hindus came with talwars (a type of sword) in their hands. We went into an empty building and prayed. I was with my parents and Dada (paternal grandfather). There are no Hindus in my area. Even the

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few who did live there left after 2002. Earlier we used to meet them and go to their houses. Now, they have all left.

One student, who earlier studied at a Hindu trust-run school and later shifted to this school, speaks candidly about what she had heard and experienced. ‘There was curfew, schools were shut, people were dying and many were burnt alive. We had to do our exams at home. At the school I attended at the time, my uncle had to bring the exam paper to my home.’ Fatima adds to her friend’s narration with an anecdote that reveals the fear and panic among Muslim families at the time, saying, ‘There was a rumour that people had put poison in our milk. But we first gave it to the cat and then drank it because we had to.’ Sana recounts a similar story, I remember that there was police firing in my neighbourhood. I opened the window, looked out and saw this. My mother yelled at me for doing this. People were putting kerosene in bottles. We would just pray and ask Allah to forgive our sins and save us. Now, the situation is not like this. It is much better.

Rashida also points to the changes since then, telling us that There are many bomb-blasts but people come back together a day after it happens. No one feels ‘Hindu’ or ‘Muslim’. Now everyone lives together. Vichaar ek hothe hain. (Our outlooks are the same.) Some people think they are different but our blood is the same.

Importantly, when discussing whether any of them had friends from different communities, the girls from the Commerce class mention that they had many Hindu friends before they came to their present school since all of them had been at Gujarati-medium schools, many of which were run by Hindu trusts. The Commerce students also tell us that while they did not have too many Hindu friends anymore, their brothers and fathers did, either through school or work. On the other hand, the girls from the Urdu section have less interaction with non-Muslim youth since they had almost always studied at Urdu-medium schools, lived in Muslim neighbourhoods and hence, never had the opportunity to develop friendships with children from other communities. The girls from the Gujarati medium have relationships with people outside the community and also appear to belong to a higher income group as

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compared to the girls in the Urdu-medium sections, as discussed in our earlier analysis of language and class divisions. While many girls say that the situation had returned to relative peace once again, some teachers at the school were more wary, stressing that the splits created by the riots ran deep. One teacher tells us, We prefer Muslim schools now. There is a surface milna-jhulna (intermingling) [between religious communities]. But there is a kauf (fear) due to the riots. The lines have been drawn. If my Hindu friends hear that I teach in this [Muslim dominated] area, they would get scared. And I can never think of going to areas like Maninagar [Narendra Modi’s legislative constituency].

Another teacher is more positive—even as she describes the effects of the riots, she emphasises the transformations it engenders. Her words express hope for a more peaceful future but at the same time, they represent an attempt at setting aside the past, an urge for ‘integration’ and an insistence on self-help within the Muslim community. I joined the school in 2003. Before that, I was doing some work in the rehabilitation camps and realised what effects the riots had. Children couldn’t give their exams. Small children were very scared, even with loud noises. It has had big psychological effects. All their books were burnt but we insisted that they give their exams. A police van would pick them up and they would go to other schools to give their board exams with their teachers. Teachers were concerned about their families and their students. There was no help from anywhere and the police were unresponsive. Girls want to study more now. The riots may be one reason. Parental thinking has also changed. They have realised the need to go beyond the home. People are more emotional now and more attached to the community. Some families lost everything and now, all hurdles seem small. Once, we took a trip to Delhi for a Red Cross event. There were schools from 16 states. Everyone interacted—they learnt about our language and culture. There was national integration.

One of the English teachers at the school too envisages the productive role of education in fostering engagement, however minute, between religious groups. He emphatically states, ‘The children know that they have to study, that is the role that they must play. When they travel by city buses, across the city, to get to school or for inter-school events, they see that Hindus aren’t all prejudiced.’ From such statements we gather that inter-community interaction is extremely low in the city and

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it is only through encounters in public spaces that the girls meet people from the majority community. Even though these brief interactions are important, there remains a certain underlying distance and disconnect between people across the two religions. As Afreen, another student, tells us, ‘I made some Hindu friends when I was going in a train and I like them very much. Par sanskar alag hain. (But their culture and ethos are different.) I can’t explain how.’ As Dipankar Gupta (2011: 3) notes, ‘the enormity of a religious clash is such that social relations do not return to an untheorised lifeworld of the status quo ante, or establish a tension-free new one either. There is always a remainder of doubt and misrecognition in all interactions, howsoever repetitive they might be.’ A sense of both difference and sameness characterises their encounters with and perceptions of people from the Hindu community. However, in our interactions with them, the girls are forthcoming, eager to know more about our lives and interests, as well as our religious beliefs. They ask questions about the basic teachings of the religions we belonged to and our religious practices. Our conversations with the students are an evidence of their willingness to interact with people from different religious communities without (ostensible) feelings of fear or suspicion, even in the aftermath of horrific violence and structural discrimination.11 The principal, however, is more cautious, but deeply committed to reflection and pedagogic action on the issue of communal polarisation and its possible effects on the youth. There have been so many riots here over the years—in 1969, 1984, 1990 and 1992. But 2002 was one that caused the biggest damage. We’ll realise the intensity of this damage only 10 years from now. The next generation will believe whatever they hear because they would not have experienced relationships with people with different religious beliefs. In the generations to come, no Muslim youth in this city will have Hindu friends and vice versa. The children will learn what they read or hear from others, not having actually seen or experienced inter-religious unity. They will believe that all Muslims or all Hindus are bad people. The next riots will start from the inside, from the gut, because of such extreme polarisation. The previous ones [riots] were politically staged and sponsored, upar se (from the top) but the next will come andar se (from the inside). 11 We were not anonymous strangers—abstractly ‘Hindu’ or ‘Christian’—but fleshand-blood women with whom they spoke freely, about whom they were incredibly curious and with whom everyone wanted to be friends. Undoubtedly, our position of power as educated, outsider ethnographers was a significant factor in shaping the interface.

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Her grave but important statements signal the extent to which communal divisions appear to have penetrated the hearts and minds of Hindus and Muslims, most evident in spatial segregations—of homes, shops, recreational areas and schools. While, in one sense, her statements are indicative of the nostalgia for an imagined past of communal harmony that is not entirely supported by evidence from the historical record (Jasani 2010), it is impossible to deny that distinct boundaries have been marked into the physical geography of Ahmedabad, accompanied by social and educational segregations. Indeed, these processes of exclusion and ghettoisation are in evidence within this particular school as well, as can be gleaned from student and teacher statements. The principal recounts a recent incident which demonstrates the complete absence of Hindu–Muslim interaction, particularly among school-going children of the city: ‘At a recent event, the principal of another school told us this story. He said, “I told my grandson that I have a few extra Eid greeting cards and asked him, why don’t you send some greetings to your friends? My grandson replied saying, I have no Muslim friends, who will I send these to?” He said that this was his greatest fear—that his grandson would now believe everything that he heard about Muslims without knowing any personally.’ She adds her own experience, stating, ‘Now, no one will believe that I have Hindu friends, or that I studied in a place which had only Hindus, or that Hindus visited me when the curfew was lifted following the riots. Or that they would constantly telephone me out of concern.’ She recognises the need to address this alarming situation of extreme polarisation through new pedagogical practices, saying, ‘I don’t know how to go about it concretely, or how to formulate a plan for this. But it must begin somehow.’ A school such as the one under discussion is implicated in these processes of isolation and marginalisation. The school and its constituents have been forced into a corner by violence and concerns for safety, and within this communitarian niche, have asserted a negotiated agency, expressing their religious and linguistic identities whilst adapting to the demands of modernity and globalisation. The present situation is such that the students rarely have opportunities for inter-religious peer interactions, either through the family or the school. The principal’s ominous utterances nonetheless seem to exhibit traces of hope, particularly in her recognition of the critical role of the school and education in general in fostering ties among young people and dialogue about faith and community, even in an atmosphere of distrust and divisiveness.

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The diverse and often divergent narratives of teachers and students are, in many ways, a positive signal—of difference and flux; that divisions run deep but are not yet permanent, fixed, total or universal. The possibility of the construction of plural, diverse, inclusive and just citizenship models and practices through the school remains, as does that of a convergence between citizenship norms, ideals and standards and the lived realities of citizenship within a gendered, classed and communalised society. In the words of Veronique Benei (2005: 9), ‘rather than a nation-state project aimed at producing a culturally and nationally homogeneous labour force, education may also be seen as a means for promoting active democracy premised on the building of autonomous, critical citizens’.

Concluding Remarks We have tried to examine in this chapter how citizenship is imagined, articulated and practised through schooling processes in a Muslim girls’ school in post-riot Ahmedabad. We have tried to understand how citizenship, as an abstract idea, is translated into concrete pedagogic practices and through this, demonstrated the school’s multiple endeavours to render compatible an articulation of cultural rights alongside the adoption of civic, political and social rights and duties. We argue that following the riots in 2002, the school introduced new strategies, pointing to a desire to bolster their objectives of cultivating both the universally civic and culturally particular citizen. Embedded in this desire is also a yearning to certify a future for their students wherein they may be integrated into a modernising India, without abandoning a central pedagogical project of the school, namely ‘the cultural reproduction of an imperilled identity’ (Hefner 2007: 23), even as they reside in a regional environment that is hostile to this very assertion. Language, we argue, becomes an important site where the possible fractures and fissions between the community and the state play out. The question relates not to an instrumental understanding of language, but the recognition that language is certainly not neutral and moreover, is saturated with social meaning both in content and in form. Multiple overlapping and sometimes contradictory issues and considerations saturate the language debate in the school—employment and expanding career possibilities in a market economy, the linguistic and cultural

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prerequisites of the ‘global’ worker-citizen, the desire for cultural refuge in a city marred by communal violence and finally, the impulse to negotiate each of these potentially divergent interests, aspirations and coercions through measures such as the science in Urdu project which began in 2003. For a fuller picture on whether the school’s visions of citizenship reverberate with the student’s reflections on the past, present and the future, we record student voices—their memories associated with the riots, their opinions about the city and the state. While there is no single consensus that frames a collective memory, they have strong positions about the state machinery, its alleged role in instigating and sustaining the riots and the predicament of Muslims in its aftermath. We also note how the students imbibe aspects of civic, political and cultural citizenship. Moreover, we have attempted to highlight the concrete ways in which the school, and its current constitution, has been shaped by the 2002 communal riots (even though it has a longer history and has witnessed numerous conflagrations) in that several girls were moved out of coeducational, Gujarati-medium, non-minority institutions to this school which has provided them with a sanctuary from intolerance and hostility, an education that has directly addressed the strengths and weaknesses of children from the Muslim community, and an ambience imbued with an Islamic tenor. Through an exploration of these aspects, we have attempted to highlight the unstable nature of being and becoming both citizen and Muslim in Gujarat. It is a project that continues to be worked and reworked by a range of actors within and outside the school—students, teachers, scholars, activists and educationists who continuously grapple with multiple educational, cultural and social objectives, attempting to reconcile, through the site of the school, the seemingly conflicting and incongruous goals of grooming young women to become ‘good Muslims’ and ‘model citizens’.

References Abdullah, H. 2002. ‘Minorities, Education and Language: The Case of Urdu’, Economic and Political Weekly, 37 (24): 2288–2292. Benei, Veronique. 2005. ‘Introduction: Manufacturing Citizenship: Confronting Public Spheres and Education in Contemporary Worlds’, in V. Benei (ed.),

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Manufacturing Citizenship: Education and Nationalism in Europe, South Asia and China, pp. 1–34. Oxon, MA: Routledge. Benei, Veronique. 2008. Schooling India: Hindus, Muslims and the Forging of Citizens. Ranikhet: Permanent Black. Bernstein, Basil B. 2000. Pedagogy, Symbolic Control, and Identity: Theory, Research, Critique. Boston, MA: Royman and Littlefield Publishers, Inc. Beteille, Andre. 1991. ‘The Reproduction of Inequality: Occupation, Caste and Family’, Contributions to Indian Sociology, 25: 3–28. Bourdieu, Pierre. 1977. ‘Cultural Reproduction and Social Reproduction’, in J. Karabel and A.H. Halsey (eds), Power and Ideology in Education, pp. 487– 511. New York, NY: Oxford University Press. ———. 1986. ‘The Forms of Capital’, in J.G. Richardson (ed.), Handbook of Theory and Research for the Sociology of Education, pp. 241–258. New York, NY: Greenwood Press. Bourdieu, Pierre and J. Passeron. 1990. Reproduction in Education, Society and Culture. London: SAGE Publications. Froerer, Peggy. 2007. ‘Disciplining the Saffron Way: Moral Education and the Hindu Rashtra’, Modern Asian Studies, 41 (5): 1033–1071. Gayer, Laurent and Christophe Jaffrelot. 2012. Muslims in Indian Cities: Trajectories of Marginalisation. London: C. Hurst & Co . Ltd. Gupta, Dipankar. 2011. Justice before Reconciliation: Negotiating a ‘New Normal’ in Post-riot Mumbai and Ahmedabad. New Delhi: Routledge. Hefner, Robert. 2007. ‘Introduction: The Culture, Politics, and Future of Muslim Education’, in R. Hefner and M.Q. Zaman (eds), Schooling Islam: The Culture and Politics of Modern Muslim Education, pp. 1–39. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press. Jaffrelot, Christophe and Charlotte Thomas. 2012. ‘Facing Ghettoisation in “Riot-city”: Old Ahmedabad and Juhapura between Victimisation and Selfhelp’, in L. Gayer, and C. Jaffrelot (eds), Muslims in Indian Cities: Trajectories of Marginalisation, pp. 43–80. London: C. Hurst & Co . Ltd. Jasani, R. 2008. ‘Violence, Reconstruction and Islamic Reform—Stories from the Muslim “Ghetto”’, Modern Asian Studies, 42 (23): 431–456. Jasani, Rubina. 2010. ‘A Potted History of Neighbours and Neighbourliness in Ahmedabad’, in E. Simpson and A. Kapadia (eds), The Idea of Gujarat: History, Ethnography and Text, pp. 153–167. New Delhi: Orient Blackswan. Metcalf, Barbara. 2007. ‘Madrasas and Minorities in Secular India’, in R. Hefner and M.Q. Zaman (eds), Schooling Islam: The Culture and Politics of Modern Muslim Education, pp. 87–106. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press. Sardesai, Rajdeep. 2008. ‘Ghetto Blasters’, The Hindustan Times, New Delhi, 7 August. Sarkar, Tanika. 2005. ‘Educating the Children of Hindu Rashtra: A Note on RSS Schools’, in C. Jaffrelot (ed.), The Sangh Parivar: A Reader, pp. 197–206. Delhi: Oxford University Press.

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Sundar, Nandini. 2004. ‘Teaching to Hate: RSS’ Pedagogical Programme’, Economic and Political Weekly, 39 (16): 1605–1612. Vaugier-Chatterjee, Anne. 2005. ‘Plural Society and Schooling: Urdu-medium Schools in Delhi’, in R. Chopra and P. Jeffery (eds), Educational Regimes in Contemporary India, pp. 99–118. New Delhi: SAGE Publications. Willis, Paul. 1977. Learning to Labor: How Working-class Kids Get Working Class Jobs. Aldershot: Coger.

7

Living in the Bubble: Rishi Valley School and the Sense of Community* Bhavya Dore

Introduction: The Bubble Effect

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boarding school nestled in the middle of a valley, Rishi Valley School in Andhra Pradesh’s Chittoor District, is hermetically sealed off in many ways. Located 15 km from the nearest small town and 90 km from the nearest metropolitan city, the school’s physical and ideological separation is created and maintained at several levels. *Fieldwork was conducted in two stages in 2007 and 2008. I studied for two years in this school and finished from here in 2003. The fieldwork was done largely in the older classes—X, XI and XII by attending classes with students, eating and playing with them. There were also some lengthy interactions with teachers, visitors, ex-students who visited and other staff. I am very grateful to the school and students for allowing me to live among them, for their disinhibited conversations, time and interest. Thanks to Professors Thapan and Milner for their time and efforts and I am also thankful for the thoughtprovoking discussions at the time of writing with Maitri Dore, Kabir Ramola, Aryaman Jal and Sayoji Goli.

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This idea of difference is generated both through a series of institutional schooling practices informed by the school’s authority structure and stated purpose and through the experience of living at a boarding school distant from an urban centre. This sense of sealed-offness—built through a smorgasbord of rituals, practices and strictures which I will describe in some detail—is what I will develop as the ‘Bubble Effect’. Life at Rishi Valley School (RV) is marked by a considerable slowness. This is a slowness experienced in different dimensions: in terms of movements between spaces, in terms of following events, technology and cultural imports from the outside world, and crucially, in a more metaphoric slowness in the pace of growing up. The last idea is something I heard from some students. Students at RV are considerably protected and separated, in the physical terms I will describe. It is almost as if a separate bubble is created and sustained during the time of the students’ years at RV. They are shielded from a notion of competition; there are no exams until class IX and competitive debates, elocution and suchlike are discouraged. Houses, a major axis around which competition, loyalties and friendships are based and which constitute a major factor in other schools, as the teachers pointed out and I have also experienced, are not an aspect of RV life. Inter-class competitions, though held, are muted and sporting rivalry is constantly sought to be downplayed by teachers.1 Students at RV are not allowed to handle money, except on occasion during the term.2 Consumerism is decried openly, through the rules governing what can and cannot be brought to school, and in large part the battles are waged on this turf. The bubble succeeds through cordoning off the pressures of consumer culture even as this becomes a weapon for students to wield in covert ways. It makes faint appearances but later loses its appeal as something to be celebrated. The school’s physical and ideological island-ness breeds, in an exaggerated form in the students’ mind, a notion of RV versus the larger world. It is also perhaps linked, if not in real terms then at least in the imagination, to when a student joins RV. 1 At the time of doing fieldwork, a newly inaugurated quiz competition did not have prizes even though a winner was declared and cheering for teams during matches had recently been disallowed. 2 Some students I interacted with felt that they should be allowed to handle money as this would give them a feel of the real world.

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One student delineated his theory to me: there are people who join in class IV or V and they are totally ‘RV-ised’ and have a hard time adjusting outside. Then there are those who join in class VII or VIII, they take more time to adjust, but they also largely become RV-ised. The ones who join later, in class IX or XI, they never fully fit in. Many of the students felt apprehensive about leaving school, many wanted to know what the transition would be like and some felt that coming back after class X was inevitable.3 Without labouring the point of difference, I would like to clarify that this perception of difference exists as students are largely from urban, middle class backgrounds, and have access to a consumer culture at home but RV provides some kind of insulation to this. Students’ selfperception then is of themselves as set apart despite sharing the same backgrounds and privileges as others from middle class elitist institutions. They also see the people they might have become, but didn’t.4 This is not to say that the students exude an air of elitism or privilege, one outcome of a self-perception of difference. There is not necessarily any value connotation to this perception in terms of superiority, albeit an unstated strain of difference as redemptive. The bubble also creates forms of socialising that often stand in contrast to what happens in other urban, Indian, co-educational schools. It creates a language, a student culture and a unique kind of community. The bubble limits students’ access to technology and communication means, popular culture and associated consumerist possibilities, as well,5 resulting in popular culture being absorbed and received in a distorted form. Student culture develops and is fostered in a cordoned off space, one that ultimately extends to the larger sense of the RV community, encompassing not just present students but also teachers, parents and former students. This is achieved through rituals and ritual-like practices. 3 Class X marks the first major board exam for most Indian students, and many choose to go to other schools/junior colleges for a variety of reasons. 4 Two girls told me how they were once talking about what would have happened if they hadn’t joined RV: ‘we would have become one of those typical snobby type of city girls.’ Another student said that RV teaches you values, how to think differently, several of the students felt a highlight of RV was the nature of the student–teacher relationship as also the manner in which students related to their surroundings. 5 On first returning for my second field visit a group of girls pounced on me and wanted to know whether I had seen the latest Hindi film released Jaane Tu Ya Jaane Na, did I like it, what the story was. One of them said, ‘Can’t you see, we are dying for news from the outside, we are totally entertainment deprived.’

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The bubble is sustained through a cultural system deeply encoded into everyday life by school authorities, and through practices generated and upheld by students and their understanding of school culture: thus the students are not mere subjects in the production of a cultural system but participants in it. The bubble effect is crucially linked to two distinct, contradictory but ultimately complementary impulses. For this we need to get into the school’s structure and functioning as well as the micro level at which schooling operates before getting into a negotiation of pedagogic practices and the thesis on the real and imagined community.

Background Education serves the function of socialising individuals into a society that is governed by norms and social controls (Durkheim 1956). The school is the site at which a moral education is sought to be imparted. When looking at a boarding school a few additional factors need to be accounted for: the fact that there is little or no socialising at a primary school level (students are admitted from class IV onwards) and the chief socialising agent is the school since students spend most of their time away from home and family. Boarding schools in general and RV in particular have a freer hand in shaping and socialising the child given the secluded nature of the environment. This sense of insulation arises through geography and cultural practices that determine the kinds of attitudes and lifestyles students develop in this cocooned space. But before dwelling on the nature of student life and student–teacher interaction in school itself, I would like to describe some general paradigms. As an educational enterprise, Rishi Valley School was founded in 1930 by the world teacher and philosopher J. Krishnamurti. ‘The purpose …’ he declared, ‘is to create the right kind of climate so that the child may develop fully as a human being. I would like my children to have a view of the world as a whole.’ Children educated in this way may be in a better position to create ‘a different kind of society … without violence, without the contradictions of various beliefs, dogmas, rituals, gods, without economic divisions’. Krishnamurti saw traditional education as a system serving national interests and churning out efficient workers, whereas

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his view of education held that it should ‘help people understand the ways of society, not get caught in its net’ (Dalal n.d.). Further, he espoused the principle of seeing ‘life as a whole’ rather than ‘through the part—which is what governments, organized religions and authoritarian parties are attempting to do’ (Krishnamurti 1981). The school, thus, has very clear ideological underpinnings (but no explicit school diary or laying out of Krishnamurti’s teachings), it claims to provide an ‘alternative’ education, removed from so-called mainstream values in which non-competitiveness, a love for nature, harmony with fellow human beings, spiritual understanding of the self are all sought to be inculcated. The stated programme is therefore explicitly linked to nurturing individuals as different from perceived mainstream education methods and beliefs. In that sense then, RV is a rogue in an educational set-up that caters to urban middle classes, enforcing discipline, teaching instrumental practices, goading students into securing high marks, preparing them for the so-called real world. But RV’s alternative educational philosophy is problematic because on one level the school is a part of the established educational system by virtue of being affiliated to the Indian School Certificate Examination Council and because students of RV too have to lead their lives in the mainstream world. By operating within the established system the rebellion would appear to be muted but at the micro level RV adopts tactics (de Certeau 1984) of resistance that consistently repudiate mainstream standards. In this sense then, RV as a socialising agency (Durkheim 1956) appears to undercut the normative standards of socialising agencies in general by virtue of the fact that the school is less of a bridge into society as it is an island away from it. The ostensibly stated goals are therefore explicitly linked to nurturing individuals as different from perceived mainstream education methods and beliefs. The tactics of resistance can be concretely analysed in the ways in which space and time are organised. The location of the school is of crucial importance (90 km from Bangalore by road), the ideological distance the school occupies from the mainstream is paralleled in the corporeality of its physical distance. The school’s centre of gravity is a big banyan tree that Krishnamurti identified as special, and around which the school’s 350-acre property developed. Within this space is contained not just RV but also health centres, rural education centres, a dairy, maintenance department and other such facilities. The mapping of space within the delineated space is significant. Buildings are scattered in seemingly random fashion, with no structure

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higher than of two stories and expanses of greenery interrupting even the shortest distance between two points. Urban values are upturned by attempting to marry harmoniously nature and human construction and different designs for every hostel, with the emphasis on large open spaces and gardens and the possibility for free circulation. As one teacher remarked, ‘If you see the buildings you will find that they are not just simple, they are bare.’ All these spaces are negotiated by foot (though occasionally some teachers use cycles) thus slowing down considerably the manner in which space is traversed. Beyond the way space is organised lies the transformative potential in the way that it is used. The way terrain is mapped in the students’ dayto-day life follows an almost ritual pattern: hostel, games field, dining hall (DH), assembly, class, dining hall, hostel, class, games field, class, dining hall and hostel. Certainly there is room for manoeuvre but this is the broad pattern of movement. And some spaces come to be invested with a ritualistic, quasi-religious sanctity that transcends the ordinariness of appearance. The auditorium or ‘audi’ is the best example of this: it functions as the space for the morning assembly, sometimes for music lessons, classes, play and other performance practices, evening performances, folk dancing and Saturday night movies. Despite its changing character during all these events, the audi remains a site to be observed as a sacred space; for all the above activities all entrants into the audi must remove their footwear outside. This no footwear policy—almost temple like in its manifestation is also observed in certain other spaces— before entering a teacher’s room (at home or school), the music rooms, the library, the staff room, the computer room, the dance cottage, common rooms and the Audio Visual room. Spaces— particularly those of learning, those where elders must be respected or those who are repositories of cultural tradition—are treated with appropriate awe. Beyond the corporeality of space is the dimension spaces in RV occupy in the realm of the imagined. As an ‘imagined community’6 (Anderson 1983), RV draws heavily on a spatial topography that is as much experienced through the empirical senses as it is through the mind and heart. The BBT (Big Banyan Tree), Veg. garden, Cave Rock, Astha Hill, Lost Lake, Perco Tank are all signposts in to a particular way of life that everyone in the community identifies with. These become spiritual pilgrimage 6 Originally referenced by Benedict Anderson in 1983 in his conception of nationhood. Anderson described it as a sense arising out of the advent of print capitalism thanks to the mass production of newspapers and books, creating a sense of parallel community-hood in others reading the same thing at the same time.

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spots beyond the daily traversed spaces for members of the community past and present alike. The organisation of time is also in contradistinction to the time of the so-called real world outside. The pace of life here is considerably slowed down given that walking is the only means of transport. Religious holidays go unmarked, the only term time that students get holidays is on Sundays and the two national holidays. Time here, therefore, comes to be marked by its own rhythms and obeys its own calendar, and includes such events as the fresher programme to plays and other performances, sports day, excursions outside school, musical evening, October holidays (for a month and a half until 1st December), Carol singing, New Year’s Eve, Series (exams, depending on which class you are in), to summer holidays again. Of course there could be variations within this format but this is the broad cycle the school follows in terms of annually observed ritual events. On a daily basis, home and school occupy equally important locations as opposed to in a day school and there is a constant emphasis on how to spend time usefully rather than wasting it doing nothing. On account of administrative expediency too, perhaps, students here more so than anywhere else become equal participants in the same kind of schedule rather than having a post-school independent routine of their own. What I have shown so far is the way the school repudiates a perceived norm in which urban day scholars attend school, go for tuitions, attend other classes, watch movies, socialise. Now I will demonstrate how in setting up alternative values the school or socialising agency itself becomes a form of authority to be rebelled against for the students. Resistance is a large-scale enterprise enacted by the school within a certain kind of system, but the school is also an enforcer of discipline that is resisted against. The school can be both a disciplinary body and a body that submits to a power above it. By this I mean that the school is per force located in a broader educational system as it is affiliated to a national board (ICSE, ISC), its students appear for exams that are common across the country and it has a permit to run from the government. In that sense Rishi Valley submits to a broader power structure that dictates the syllabus (especially in the higher classes), determines the success of its students (at the class X and XII levels) and mandates who is or is not qualified to be a teacher. In order to function on a day-to-day basis, the school must submit to the larger structure and conform to the practices of what it means to be a school.

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But the school resists, through the time–space coordinates I described above as well as through the deeper ways: the alternative vision, practices and life styles it posits, which this chapter will deal with in detail. As an enforcer of discipline, the school lays down rules, a timetable and sets of practices for its students to follow. Whilst the school emphasises freedom, making it less disciplinarian than other boarding schools presumably, this is upended in various ways. This mixture of submission and resistance is enacted by the students themselves in the pattern of their ‘careers’ at RV. The developmental trajectory enacted involves first a direct rejection of the school’s values by the younger students, fresh from the cities usually, and unaccustomed to RV and its mores. A mixed phase follows, in which the school’s values are both inculcated and railed against on account of various factors and finally an arrival at a notion of RV as a way of life in opposition to an ‘Othered’ way of life. As we shall see, this is not hard and fast and to some extent is also determined by what age students join the school. Because the student culture at RV involves a simultaneous negotiation of city values and RV values, students exhibit contradictory responses in all spheres. Consumerism is celebrated as a rebellion against school rules but decried as a feature associated with city values. Coolness, which might operate as a function of consumer possessions, is celebrated in the early classes, later rejected. Popular culture then leaks through in some ways but becomes less pronounced on account of other factors in play. Thus at RV, rebellion is a function of context, but in the ultimate analysis, the fissures between student and teacher communities are dissolved in the celebration of a self-fashioned RV community identity, posited against a perceived mainstream.

Formal Structure of the School The student’s average day reads as follows: physical training (PT), breakfast, assembly, class, lunch, rest hour, class, tea, games, astha,7 prep (a mandatory study period), dinner. The school does not prescribe a uniform but there are certain rules regarding dressing—shirts and kurtas The practice of watching the sunset quietly for 15 minutes atop a particular hill in the evening. 7

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must be worn to class and sleeveless clothes, short skirts are completely disallowed as is flashy jewellery and excessive accessories, with watches allowed only after class VIII. Boys may not grow their hair. Largely the student population is urban, upper middle class, upper caste and Hindu. There is a Christian minority, but very few Muslims, Parsis or Sikhs. Though regional groups are widely represented, the Telegu-speaking population is the biggest; given the location of the school, this does not come as a surprise. Students up to class X are divided into two divisions, with hostels being common for boys and girls of classes IV and V. In classes XI and XII students form one class of 30-odd students who constitute a single unit and subjects can be freely picked without there being so-called ‘tracks’ or ‘streams’.8 This once again gestures towards freedom within the contours of an established set-up, even as knowledge is liberated from the self-fashioned bounds of separate disciplines and offered as something less formal and structured. Students stay in one hostel for a year at least, under one house parent, and have to do several duties on their own—washing, cleaning, gardening, etc. Normally the senior and junior schools follow slightly different routines with the senior school being from classes IX to XII. Saturday is half day at school and a movie is screened at night, whereas Sunday is entirely free though the school doesn’t remain open in the afternoon. Students generally check their email on Sunday mornings (they have otherwise a single half an hour a week slot to do this) or hang around senior school, chatting, studying or reading in the library. In the evening, the senior students can go for folk dancing9 if they wish. After dinner on Sundays students usually go for a class walk or amble on the football field. In real lived terms the school, despite its ideological commitment to an alternative form of education, is experienced by the students as an official, imposed authority system. The aim is to mould students along particular lines where ideological control is harnessed through positive and negative injunctions. Ostensibly the school privileges freedom in personal responsibility but in practical terms it constantly seeks to shape student life.

8 In most other schools or colleges with classes XI and XII, students are straitjacketed into ‘science’ ‘commerce’ or ‘arts’ combinations. RV allows greater freedom of choosing subjects across these disciplinary bounds. 9 Folkie refers to the western folk dances that are usually learned when students are in class IX. There is a folkie slot for an hour on Sunday evenings.

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Thus, the formal structure of the school comprises a mixture of regular schooling practices (classes, tests, homework), as well us unusual ones, which this chapter will touch on. The school is thus rebelling as well as yielding. Students follow the same pattern: rebelling against the rebellion and then yielding, resulting in a mixed culture. In the end, by yielding to the conceptual framework of an RV way of life, students are in turn rebelling against the idea of the outside.

Injunctions Foucauldian (Rabinow 1984) conceptions of power suggest that it operates in the interstices and is harnessed via bodily controls. Power in this thesis exists in the minutiae of everyday life, with the body submitting in unwitting ways, e.g., through the concept of a uniform, through the idea of a timetable or a routine. Violence is not overt, but impinges through day-to-day apparatuses without marking itself out as force. There are thus the overt forms of control, as well as covert ones. In terms of negative injunctions there are clear don’ts inscribed in the prospectus, periodic letters to parents, notices on boards and pedagogic encounters. But take a look at the things that are disallowed—those that violate harmony with nature (non-vegetarian food, plastic items, food wastage), those that promote individuality over community participation (walkmans/Discmans), those that deny equality of status or promote consumerism (ostentatious/branded clothing/accessories, money, food brought from home). In addition there are the unwritten don’ts—fast forwarding sex scenes in a movie being screened, deciding which classes get to watch what movies, clamping down on couples (talking to them, giving them warnings, writing to their parents) and suspiciously regarding boy–girl interaction all of which gestures to a certain conservatism seeking to slow down the process of adolescence, a conservatism that those in authority firmly believe in. School authorities indicate that they need to take especially paternalistic care since students don’t have families to go home to. The school as socialising agency thus becomes paramount, having constant access to students and the power to shape them in far greater ways than in a traditional school set-up. Positive injunctions are equally rampant and incipiently built into the curriculum to foster development along a certain pattern. Thus the

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assembly slot becomes a pedagogic platform, or the specially designed pedagogic platforms like ‘culture class’ or class teacher period10 explicitly created for the discussion of general issues. During my stay, these included ‘the purposes of silence’, ragging, water conservation, why competition is discouraged, Krishnamurti videos. In a slot like general studies hands on work like weeding, digging, litter picking is carried out. Internet timings are limited and students may not keep cell phones; a few times a term they can apply for a ‘phone chit’ to call home from the school landline. Silences are routinely observed, whether in astha or just before lunch in the dining hall or just after assembly in the morning. Silences are constantly exhorted as moments to be spent in quiet contemplation to encourage personal growth and as moments for aesthetic appreciation. Silences too, then become means by which to control the narrative of the daily routine. They both enforce the idea of an othered way of life to look away from, thus reemphasising the bubble as also to push students towards looking inwards rather than outwards. In the process silences become opportunities for rebellion: the minute the silence bell is put down for instance, activity picks up in the same boisterous, noisy fashion. One wonders how much introspection was possible. Additionally, students are required to clean and maintain their personal spaces and effects, wash dishes in the dining hall once a term, encouraged to participate in the rural health and education programmes, read certain types of literature (circulation of book lists, subscription to certain types of magazines and newspapers—The Economist, Scientific American, Down to Earth; suppression of glamour and gossip supplements, an excellent library with strong social sciences, arts, history and science sections). Once again we see how these positive and negative injunctions become functions of time and space. Space insofar as the rules determines school boundaries (students are not supposed to venture outside the prescribed bounds), time insofar as the rigid schedule is concerned with defined time slots for all activities.

10 The class teacher period is a weekly slot allocated in the timetable for the class teacher to interact with his or her class in a semi-formal fashion. A range of topics could be discussed.

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Student Culture: Resistance, Discipline and Repudiations This part of the chapter maps out the contradictions and complexities involved in the adolescent negotiation of the pedagogic process. We have seen how the creation of the school and its pedagogy is an attempt at rebellion against established forms of education, and how that rebellion then becomes the form of normative authority. The student negotiation of the processes at work thus becomes on the one hand an acceptance of these alternative norms but it is an acceptance problematised by virtue of the alternative being a temporary way of life because (a) students spend four out of eight months of the year at home and (b) only a small portion of their lives constitute their school years. Therefore, the acceptance is one tempered by values initially learnt from the mainstream and constantly fed by it on trips to home and in the holidays. What happens when students leave the bubble, either for the holidays or permanently? Student responses as to what they missed about home or the city invariably tended towards food. Almost every student I asked said that one of, if not the major, the highlights of the holidays was getting good food—this included both home food and junk food. Students attested to eating out every now and then, which they found a pleasant diversion. Some of the other things some people missed were TV, the Internet, their other friends, cell phones, parents, pets, siblings. Despite making a beeline for the Internet and valuing their ‘net timings’ none of the students I asked felt they needed much more time than they were allotted for e-mailing during the week. The RV experience thus becomes contradictory insofar as standards and values of the outside world are constantly up against those of RV. By and large, this begins with an inclination towards mainstream standards and ends at the opposite end of the spectrum with a celebration of the RV alternative as the redemptive choice. Even though students are excited, at some level, about leaving RV, that departure itself and the anticipated nostalgia affirm the idea of RV. In her book on RV, Thapan explicitly deals in separate chapters with teacher culture and student culture (2006). Since the focus of this chapter has been on student relations, I was unable to do adequate fieldwork among teachers. Even so, I would like to suggest something more composite that is also at work in the form of a pan-RV culture, which I will come to later.

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Let us first look at the strands that go into making the student culture, a culture permeated by potential divisions of terms of gender, hostel, class, age. After understanding what it is that divides the students, we can see what it is that unites them first as a whole against a larger official body, and then erases that distinction to understand the two together as a composite RV culture.

Explaining Student Culture In understanding the school as an organisation, we find that students compete against teachers as also between each other (Bidwell 1965). Bidwell speaks of student motivation towards gaining approval from the teacher as well as student desire to shine among one’s own peers. These seemingly contradictory impulses play themselves out here as well: on the one hand students are divided amongst themselves, on the other they are united against forms of authority. The social actor thus participates in parallel cultures: in attempts at gaining teacher approval, student approval (popularity among students) and rebellion (along with other students against teachers and with the rest of the community against the external other). Students are potentially divisible along different identities: age (and the associated idea of a ‘class’ cohort), gender, home town, religion, mother tongue, like in any other school setting. But these divisions are often fluid, with hostel assignments and sections liable to change and different groups for different activities. In a superficial sense, the divisive factors can thus be rendered less permanent. More subtle social divisions around skills, intellectual abilities new/old also exist and can also fall away depending on the age group, other external environmental parameters and the growing up process itself. But when it comes to a composite student body against a superior authority structure, these divisions lose their potency to an extent. This happens both because of time as students grow up and because the bubble enforces a sense of community. Further, rebellion becomes less urgent and more muted. As the growing up process reaches its climax in the final years, the idea of an RV community has taken shape, with the ‘real world’ beckoning, the sense of RV-ness acquires greater urgency because its power hinges on the fuel of potential nostalgia and not a reality to be lived daily. In the final analysis all members of the same community participate in the same rituals, speak the same language and hold aloft the same bubble.

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Some of the rituals are authority-generated (asthachal, morning assembly), others are student-generated (going uphill, walking to the gate). The idea of communityhood has been achieved with the repetition of rituals over time as a means of cultural production (McLaren 1999). ‘Rituals may be perceived as carriers of cultural codes (cognitive and gestural information) that shape students’ perception and ways of understanding; they inscribe both the surface structure and deep grammar of school culture,’ writes McLaren. At a very local level, in localised interactions between students, differences and fissures exist, but their power is reduced as the platform for interacting expands. A certain sentimentality and subscription to the idea of living in the same circumscribed real and imagined locale also permeates. In that sense then, the school’s rebellion against the perceived mainstream system is achieved. It is also imperative to note the longitudinal dimension: student culture delicately transforms through the years, with an initially rebellious phase that becomes more muted both as the disciplinary strategies of the school get tempered, the students get subsumed into the wider culture and as the students grow up. Later on we shall see how this sense of an imagined community is fostered and operates in contradistinction to a perceived and othered outside world.

Student Culture: What Are the Axes and Fissures Involved? Student interaction and friendships are governed by various features— gender, class, (i.e., class VIII or IX, etc., not class as a concept), section, hostel, new/old and administrative measures that determine hostel and class allocations. Religion and caste categories have no place. By virtue of occupying the same space and the fact of having to see the same people on a daily basis, groupings tended to be amorphous. Moreover, these change over the years, with divisions and hostel allotments changing. The strongest grouping is the ‘class’, which teachers consistently seek to discourage because of the unhealthy competition that they think it promotes. Meals are class-wise (on account of administrative convenience I was told) but other activities like games, music and dance and yoga lessons, hikes and folkie did not necessarily happen that way.

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The category of the class was a frequent identity marker in terms of having a class t-shirt or a class relay team or a class play, and though this identity was repeatedly sought to be downplayed by the teachers it was clung on to by the students. The class identity is an easy one to cling to because it is more stable (divisions might change, but the same group gets promoted over time, creating a semi-permanent sense of togetherness). Further, since it is an administrative, recognisable unit it carries a sense of legitimacy. The school’s intention of downplaying it means that upholding the category becomes a form of rebellion. Seniors and juniors were no doubt friendly but class-ness preceded cross-class friendships. It is in class X too, that the class’ identity as a batch11 sets in, particularly in the post-ICSE exam revelry at the ‘Bangalore Bash’.12 Class solidarity also becomes visible in moments during assemblies. Hostel-wise groupings might have been a factor more so than sections but these were on account of administrative decisions to put students together or apart, carefully calibrated and much discussed procedure by the teachers at the end of every year. Seniors and juniors live together at most points of their stay in RV, so close friendships across class were attested to by several students. Among the girls, exam going batches housed together therefore alternating classes tended to get close. Whilst students didn’t necessarily become closer to those who did the same subjects as themselves in classes XI and XII they claimed ‘a sense of kinship’, a kinship that found expression through discussing a particular teacher’s idiosyncrasies at the dining table or studying for a test together. Seating arrangements are generally up to the students, and occur on a first-come-first-served basis at the start of the term. These occur in single columnar formations, thus making seating-wise groupism a non-option. Living together also fostered intensity in relationships. I am not sure how students in other boarding schools or other residential arrangements behave, but in RV I noticed there was a distinct lack of shamelessness about bodily functions within the same gender group. In girls’ 11 A batch is the class in the same year, who will graduate together; thus what in other contexts might be the ‘class of 2006’ would be here spoken of as the ‘Batch of 2006’. 12 Not necessarily a term used universally by students, but the phrase had currency at the time. It was used to describe the post class X board exams break generally undertaken by a large majority of the class X bunch. Seen as a kind of no-holds-barred time of fun, the class perceived it as a golden time of unity before returning as a diminished lot in class XI.

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hostel people freely commented on the person with the ‘deadliest farts’ whilst another girl told me, she thought, ‘it was cool in a weird way that people know that I shit in the morning, just after PT; when you live with people, relationships are more intense, people here know things about me that my other friends don’t know. I find that kind of cool.’ Waxing too, happened on a hostel-wide scale where just before Sports Day students of girl’s hostel collectively gather in the backyard to wax their legs or arms and help each other wax. I am not sure of the dynamics in boys’ hostel, but I suspect the same thing must happen, in fact to a greater degree, from what I gathered. In some ways this connects to bringing people to the same common denominator. Strategies of coolness and exclusivity cannot be sustained indefinitely in an environment where students are forced in close proximity. This is why overt attitudes of coolness and outright groupism are hard to locate. As I will describe in the following sections, outside world behavioural patterns might become upturned insofar as coolness is a real paradigm but in its denial accrues its greatest silent power.

Brand Consciousness in the Younger Classes In the early years (classes VI, VII and even VIII sometimes) students tend to be conscious of ‘coolness’, who to be friends with, who owns what, attitudes they readily admit to in their older years, and observations teachers also make about them. When I spoke to the older students about groups they would often tell me, ‘Why are you asking us, you should really go to the juniors, they are the ones who have gang wars and class politics,’ or ‘earlier we used to have lots of politics in classes VII and VIII, the class was divided into two groups.’ Teachers testified similarly, ‘outside prejudices tend to seep in the junior classes, issues like fair skin and friendships based on foreign goods’ or the principal pointed out that groups may form around a boy who plays football for instance or around personalities and sometimes even around temperaments where people who make fun of other people stick together. There was one case where a boy was idolised in the junior classes and then as they grew up the rest realised there was nothing to him so the group dispersed but the boy felt quite left out.

In the early stages then students are heavily influenced by mainstream values since the majority of the student population comes from the

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metros, upper middle class English-speaking homes where a consumer culture is prevalent. It is also a culture within easy reach every time students go back home for the holidays. There was no doubt on the issue when I asked students whether they felt they had double standards in RV and at home (see the section titled ‘The Excursion and Holidays’). Consumer culture at RV is a subterranean process that is affected largely by the fact that school rules have certain dressing guidelines that I have already delineated as well as dictate that money cannot be kept, thus shopping sprees are clearly out of the question. By virtue of the fact that RV does not have a uniform one may think there would be ample room for cloth-specific casteism13 to emerge. However, this is not entirely true. Through the process of ‘enfleshment’, the body becomes the site through which the rituals of schooling are enacted and processes of reproduction and resistance in schools takes place (McLaren 1999). Here the body becomes the tabula rasa for the school to write its philosophy of minimalism. Whilst there is no uniform, allowing students some degree of sartorial self-expression, there is a certain dress code to be followed. Though relatively freed from ideological controls, the incipient emphasis is on simplicity; thus the body is sought to be uniformly denuded rather than uniformly apparelled. Furthermore, without badges, belts, blazers or anything that may mark identities of school, house or class, the student’s body is defined by what not to wear rather than what to wear, as far as practices of authority dictate. Further, the ‘dressing simply’ rhetoric is also adhered to by teachers. The student’s body for the school, thus, becomes a site for opposing the accepted norm (of uniforms) while tacitly adopting another accepted norm (the principle of uniformity). This again is the classic rebellion-conformity paradigm being enacted. The school’s worldview abjures the idea of a single piece of clothing as the uniform since that implies an idea of control and freedom not in consonance with its founding beliefs, but at the same time, the lack of a uniform obeying certain common principles retains the idea of a uniform or notional uniformity. Though the school is rebelling against 13 Milner discusses American high school groupings in terms of a hierarchical system (2006).

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ideas of schooling which dictate that a student’s body bears inscribing through uniformity, that rebellion is subverted through the insistence on similarity (though not sameness). Consumerism or its markers could be factors in the early classes but they became subtler and practically non-existent for older students. This happens because students buy into the cultural system that disdains it, even as the growing up process inculcates in them a feeling towards consumerist attitudes as outmoded obsessions of the young. From the questionnaire I handed out on what shoes/sandals students bought; of a class of 24 students, 12 said they owned at least one pair of either Reebok, Nike or Adidas footwear, 12 said, ‘anything’, ‘whatever is comfortable’, ‘I don’t really care’ and ‘whatever looks decent’, but even among these numbers I suspect there would be those who had foot apparel from branded outlets. One boy remarked, we are ‘quality conscious, not brand conscious,’ people buy brands ‘because they last longer.’ Several of the senior girls told me how they would ‘yap’14 to each other over who had been able to bargain more and shop for less. I think this also indicates what the former principal referred to as a ‘greater homogenisation of the student body over the years’. In a lengthy chat he told me how in the early 1990s with the advent of liberalisation, students suddenly became consumer-conscious and branding and buying the latest things were the rage. This would often lead to fissures in the student community. More than 15 years after the economy was opened, he felt there was a marked shift in attitudes, with students relatively less preoccupied with such things. He wondered whether this might had to do with student attitudes changing or the composition of the student body itself getting transformed.

Clothes and Apparel In a survey conducted with a 24-member strong class X, not one person said RV should have a uniform when I asked the question. Clothes as status markers also become tenuous on account of the large-scale borrowing that goes on in RV, among the girls mainly. Several girls share clothes among each other on account of ‘getting bored’ of their own ‘Yapping’ is a term that covers the connotations of acting too smart, trying to verbally show off or trying to be superior. It is a pejorative term. 14

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wardrobes. Further, several had complaints against the RV dhobi who is notorious for damaging and staining clothes, thus levelling again, the extent to which clothes can be proudly flashed. Another preoccupation among the girls was not being seen to wear the same thing as someone else on the same day, a particular pitfall since several students shopped from the same chain of stores—Fabindia. Students didn’t follow the latest trends, again because their access to popular culture was limited and money was not at their disposal. And whilst students may have been less fashion-conscious as compared to their contemporaries elsewhere, a majority of the students I asked felt that people were concerned about how they looked. People who were concerned about their presentation and made an effort with personal style in whatever capacity possible were noticed, could be secretly considered cool, but would not cause a massive splash. This was particularly evident at the beginning of the term, someone remarked, when students came back to school with new clothes, but by the middle of the term people’s clothes had gotten borrowed and lent, damaged by the dhobi and were generally worse for the wash. The equalising power of the hostel then erases to a certain extent the hierarchical power of apparel.

‘Fabindia Is Practically the Uniform Here’ The contradiction is best expressed by the girl who remarked, ‘There is no such thing as a caste system in India like there is in American schools. You can wear what you want and no one will judge you. In fact, in RV Fabindia is practically a uniform.’ My thesis on the conformity/rebellion paradigm finds it most apt expression in this example. Fabindia is a chain that markets very ‘Indian’ clothes and designs to largely urban middle class consumers. A kind of return to Indianness ethos is emphasised even though its very merchandising is predicated on a capitalist set-up with chains of stores in all the major metros. In stating that Fabindia is some sort of school uniform the overt suggestion belies the unstated—Indianness is cool but its coolness rides on its brand value. Even in aiming for a posture of reverse coolness the consumerist norm ironically gets strengthened. Having said that, it also remains to be said that no one thought of Fabindia as a brand, to them it represented something un-urbane and a style appropriated by RV. One girl said, ‘I think Fabindia manages to do sales only thanks to

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RV-ites.’ This also gestures towards a student body that has the purchasing power to access Fabindia.

Looking at Two Types When I spoke to two girls at length, two class XI girls, who were best friends, I got very contradictory answers—they almost represented ‘ideal types’ (Weber 1997) of the RV girl. Girl 1. In RV from class IV, had a brother here, lived in Bombay but had lived in Calcutta, Delhi and Madras earlier. She could speak four languages. She said she owned a pair of Sparx sandals and shoes, bought most of her clothes off the road or at Fabindia, didn’t have a different wardrobe at home, had been learning dance the past eight years, also did yoga and music and played badminton. I do not think she counted as one of the popular girls but she was no doubt well liked. She didn’t think she was very consumerist, but when I asked her, she said she spent around `1,000 a week on things like ‘books, clothes, movies, coffee’ when she was at home. Again I think we see a clash between what students perceive as indulgence—I sensed that the standards against which students measure themselves were against those of urban teenagers in day schools, and in such a comparison they found themselves far less materialistic, though `1,000 a week is in itself no small amount. She had never had a boyfriend in RV, and found the no pair policy ridiculous, but at the same time felt that ‘pairs’ shouldn’t indulge in kissing or physical contact. She was doing an arts combination. She followed the news on TV, and also watched animal planet and discovery channel. Girl 2. Lived in Hyderabad, her mother tongue was Telegu, had been here since class VII. She was doing a commerce combination. She did a lot of shopping at Fabindia but had a different wardrobe at home, a lot of sleeveless clothes and fewer kurtas. She had a boyfriend in RV. She said she was quite ‘into how [she] looked’ and also referred to herself as a ‘big bimbo’. These two types suggest very different girls: one is well liked, the other is a cool type. Both consider each other friends, however. The first appears to be more ‘RV-ised’ than the second, perhaps because she joined the school earlier. The fact that they are friends also suggests that notions of coolness hold less value in the hostel, as compared to in the remaining spheres (smaller group to show off among) and the proximity means it is harder to keep up appearances at all times.

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Popularity versus Coolness Unpopularity might arise because of a few people determining this. I was both told and observed that exclusion occurred as a group phenomenon, when a few of the boys deemed that someone was not worth talking to, they made this obvious, and the others followed suit. One of the girls also remarked to me how F was friendly with H only when it was just the two of them but ‘it’s surprising how different people can behave in a group.’ The people who were allegedly calling the shots had other views on the issue, pointing out that what is considered cool elsewhere doesn’t necessarily hold true at RV. L pointed out that a particular boy from Bombay who wore all right clothes, smoked and drank outside of school and was friendly with the girls had not been properly assimilated here because ‘in RV things are different,’ whereas he is the ‘Bombay type’. Here again we see the perception of the city type as exemplified by another kind of rule breaking—underage intoxication. This idea of a city-bred notion of coolness does not hold true at RV because of the subliminal sense of the outsider perception of coolness. While some of these trappings might work in some situations, in entirety they do not hold because the bubble waters down the external markers of coolness. Inside the bubble they become less acceptable. Popularity was never a word I heard being used unless I floated it, but it had a definite presence in all the classes I observed. Many people felt that being popular was a function of personality, determined by ‘niceness’, ability to talk and mix with everyone. One girl mentioned that there were some boys who were considered good looking and on account of that acted ‘hep’.15 At RV we can see a distinction between being well-liked and being cool. Coolness is an attitude that is overtly recoiled from whereas popularity comes of some other nebulous quality. The two might intersect, but we can also see them operating separately. This again shows up student negotiation of the discipline-resistance paradigm: coolness is incipient, secretly admired, but is perceived as a city value and hence verbally disdained. Again, coolness manifests in other ways (detailed in the next section), repudiating the city connotations of coolness and generating other axes for it to be measured.

15 To act hep carries with it connotations of showing off either in speech or actions. Often used in jest.

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Let us take two separate cases. P is well liked by his classmates and juniors, jokes around with everyone, has a girlfriend, plays a sport, disapproves of smoking and drinking, joined in class VII, is a Telegu speaker from Hyderabad, has been seen to sport a few branded clothes, is dark-skinned and has a moustache. Everyone readily attested to his being well-liked. Let us also take two boys from class X. Both from Bombay, one plays cricket and basketball, the other plays cricket, both said by classmates to consider themselves ‘cool’, both fast and glib talkers, have had girlfriends in the past, wear branded apparel and shoes. Their classmates were mixed in their reactions to these two: they thought themselves cool, hung out with each other and a few others, had good relations with seniors and were much talked about in anecdotes and stories. But simultaneously there were reservations about them because of their alleged ‘lewdness and the way they spoke about girls’, said one junior, their ‘slyness’, said someone else, and their proclivity to act very silly at times, said some seniors. Whereas coolness is certainly linked to a fluency in English and the ability to speak well, popularity may or may not be tied to this. Bourdieu speaks of types of capital and their inter convertibility (1990). In this case linguistic capital is transferable into social capital in the form of a coolness quotient. Finesse with English is naturally born of a certain class and there appears to be a direct link between that and coolness (not popularity). Coolness then is desirable, without aspiring to it or being seen to aspire to it. Others might think you are cool if you are good at sports, dress well or play an instrument (for boys and girls), but if you thought yourself cooler than they did, then that undermined that coolness. Popularity, on the other hand, is something that is less strived for, and not actively sought but a classification people would be happy to be identified under. If people thought they were cool and made it obvious, it implied a sense of studied aloofness, which was not acceptable. People who were popular, on the other hand, were those who gelled well with the group. Further, coolness is likely to have greater currency in the younger classes where students are still using some categories from their previous city value based lives and where consumer goods still hold an appeal. The sense of coolness as an othered category is yet to set in as a concrete form. Perhaps in other school set-ups too, coolness also depends on the ability to undercut that coolness and to distance oneself from it as a

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category. This presumes a certain self-consciousness that one cannot argue is necessarily unique to coolness in RV. But since parameters of reverse coolness also hold sway at RV social capital is not just about English language abilities but also about comfort in one’s mother tongue. Other languages are often ‘used for joking’, said one student, the girl who doesn’t know her mother tongue is good naturedly mocked, the boy with the American accent is imitated. Social capital at RV thus becomes a delicate balance where linguistic abilities are measured on two scales: one’s familiarity with languages and one’s self-consciousness about that. Then how does this alleged ‘coolness’ show itself? Students were divided on whether groups formed on the basis of a certain notion of coolness, but several admitted that there were incipient rules at work. Playing games, playing instruments, having a boyfriend/girlfriend were some of the categories that carried favourable connotations but all of this functioned on a level invisible to the naked eye and one had to probe to see if these were real categories. While it came to judging girls, coolness factors tended to develop from clothes and looks rather than achievements and talents. Sometimes girls indicated who they thought considered themselves cool, but this was often done with a sneer. Categories for coolness included going out, dressing up a bit and hanging around with other ostensibly cool people. The transformation that the category of coolness undergoes is gradual—where coolness goes from being a tag to be flashed to a label to be shrunk from. G laughingly waved aside the notion of himself as cool when I asked him what he thought of it since some people thought he was. ‘No, no, I’m not cool, these things don’t exist,’ he hastily said, laughing. Up front admittance of coolness was absent but the suggestions of it occurred at a subterranean level. S told me, ‘There’s a girl who actually said, I have such a cute boyfriend, I’m so cool.’ In the older classes coolness becomes overtly ‘uncool’ and its traditional trappings are sought to be disassociated from. One student told me when I was referring to students in my class who had been perceived as cool, ‘Those guys were cool?! But they were so nice,’ thus making explicit the perceived contradiction between niceness and coolness. The conundrum is this: it is cool to be cool but it’s not cool to say or agree that you are cool. There are a couple of things at work in working out the coolness conundrum—on the one hand there is the self-perception, on the other hand there is others’ perception of one’s coolness quotient. Not a single

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person up front admitted to being cool, though others may point out people who were thought to be cool. Coolness increasingly becomes a fraught concept because it isn’t about whether people think you are cool but also whether people think you think you are cool. Being cool also contains the implicit assumption, perhaps not just unique to RV, that you will not speak of it. Speaking of it would automatically be uncool. Teachers felt students might have a subtle swagger about the brands they flashed or the clothes they wore but boasting about this would invite mockery. Coolness is something to be noticed whilst simultaneously not to be announced. However, the cool people invariably are not referred to as cool but people who think they are cool. In the younger classes they are followed and I have heard of gangs forming around them, but as the students grow up, coolness becomes increasingly meaningless. Coolness loses its currency in several ways—brands are not flashed or boasting is more subtle. This is, thanks to increased self-awareness as students grow up, a more nuanced understanding of what it means to be cool as well as the ultimate bottom line—in the end it is cool to the rest of the world to be different. The understanding of the outside world becomes more pressing in later years, which in turn means that an alternative kind of coolness is more rewarding.

Redefining Coolness—Other Manifestations RV-specific coolness is also easily discernible in the student culture. The credo of redefining what is cool gets a fillip. There are thus two kinds of coolness always in tension with each other—the regular kind and the reverse kind. Regionalism is jokingly exalted, and mother tongues are often resorted to. One boy joked to me, ‘Oh you are Tamilian huh. I am Tamilian too. I often speak to some of my friends in Tamil; I can be quite parochial that way.’ One hostel claimed to have a group of girls who were called ‘the diggas’ as short form for Kannadigas or people whose mother tongue is Kannada. When I was asking one boy about what music people listen to, he said (as I had reason to observe as well), ‘mostly rock, some Hindi music … and in between if people sing Telegu songs on musical evening they become really popular for a while’. When I asked students if they

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used their mother tongues to communicate with each other much someone said, ‘Yah, we only know all the abuses in other languages’, whereas someone else remarked, ‘We speak in Hindi when we are joking around with each other.’16 Another manner in which coolness as a category becomes diluted is through joking. Thus, the rich girl tries to play down her wealth, for one. In another scenario I overheard two boys jestingly arguing in which one was saying, ‘Stop calling me city boy’ whereas the other was arguing that Cuddapah could in fact be considered a town, not a village. Whereupon the first asked, ‘does it have a McDonald’s?’ In this exchange, one can see a simultaneous rejection of one’s identity while maintaining what marks that identity.

‘Yes We Are Consumerist. We Always Think about Food’ More than consumerist fantasies it was food-related fantasies that were most obviously at work in RV. Since students did not have the option of eating out, eating junk food or accessing food whenever they wished, hunger becomes the lowest common denominator. On some level then, existence at RV was a series of elaborate strategies consciously motivated around grub17 and means of acquiring it. The base instinct prevails. With the denial of what is perceived as good food uniting students, other fissures become less relevant. The external trappings of student life become secondary to the need to be well fed. One student told me that consumerism to him meant ‘consumption of food’. Grub was the biggest issue at all times on everyone’s mind. From the girl who remembered the day of the week according to the breakfast served, to the informal record kept of bread slices consumed per table, to running after the extras to cursing the grub banning policy, it was food that united and even divided students in significant ways. Food by virtue of the fact that DH timings were limited and grub from home had been disallowed there were no snacking options or even alternative options for meals. Thus, students were forever preoccupied with sneaking in food items illegally on visits to home, cajoling the DH 16 This was unusual though, for the most part students in RV are weak at Hindi, since many are from South India. 17 ‘Grub’ means food generally; in RV it is more specifically used to describe food from home, usually junk food and forbidden items. It could also refer to food gotten from the tuck shop. Thus you have ‘grub tuck’, a fortnightly allowance.

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workers into giving them extras and striking deals with other students for certain items. Therefore, by an unwritten law if someone asked ‘first for’18 say, your paneer or extra egg then you gave it, even if you didn’t really like the person. Another boy told me that he calculated who didn’t like what item and always made sure to ask fast enough for it. A bunch of girls explained to me that invites to an illegal Maggi making session depended on the girl who had brought it—everyone wasn’t invited—just some of her classmates and none of the new students. Food once again establishes the set apartness of these students from students elsewhere. In its centrality in student life, it isn’t just about satisfaction or taste but about issues of access and the building up of a myth. Additionally, it embodies the underworld of student life—it becomes a weapon against authorities—by accessing food items illegally it forms a part of the rebellion structure. Moreover, it creates in the mind of students a further sense of difference in that their base instincts prevail over other concerns that students elsewhere might have. Concentrating on food provides a sense of a shared denial—it unites students by pitting them against authorities. It also divides students by virtue of competing for the same portions or determining who gets access to what.

‘Illes’ Grub is commonly referred to as an ‘ille’, a category that denotes illegal or contraband items. The most commonly brought illegal item is food, and though the students aren’t supposed to bring food, often the teachers know but don’t pull them up for it. So one boy told me how a teacher had said, ‘You trust me and I will trust you.’ He asked them to deposit their grub with him and he wouldn’t check their lockers. Students said they showed him half their grub and he allowed them to keep it and didn’t check their lockers either. In girls’ hostel I found girls now locking their clothes’ cupboards.19 I asked why, and I was told that ‘large scale grub flicking’ had been happening. One girl left her locker open for just 15 minutes and found all her grub had disappeared.

18 Verbally booking something. The person who says first for first, it is understood will gain first access to that thing. 19 In that particular hostel, girls had a single room—the box room—where they kept their clothes in individual lockers. These have traditionally never been locked.

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Food can be both a unifying factor (sharing, giving away extras) and a dividing factor (invites to illegal consumption). It fills the hunger void as well as the desire to strike out against rules and helps solidify relations through group practices. Grub wasn’t the only ille though. Since the new Airtel tower was put up, students have started bringing phones into the valley. Nearly every one of them whom I asked said that they had a phone at home, and several of them confessed to missing it, though there were others who said they didn’t really miss it because they only used it to call their RV friends. Anyone caught with a phone would be suspended, and at the time there had been a tightening of the rules, so I didn’t come across any students who had a phone that term. The bigger outcry was about digital cameras or ‘digicams’ not being allowed in school. Shunning technological props and items that represent consumer society again emphasise isolation. In boys’ hostel I came across stray instances of people keeping cigarettes and pot. Only some of the boys knew about this and were careful lest it get leaked out to the teachers by an indiscreet student. Pornographic material was more readily shared, I discovered, and freely exchanged in the house. The boys claimed there was no selfishness in this regard. When one of the boys was caught out with a Maxim he ‘popped back’20 the guy whose magazine it was since the magazine got confiscated. None of the boys had morality issues with this though there was a strong contingent that socially disapproved of smoking and drinking. Conversely, everyone also claimed they would like to try these things at some point. Thus, as long as the sense of cocooned-ness operates, students see themselves inhabiting some sort of zone of relative innocence. Intoxication within the RV precincts is abjured, and those who did it are not hero-worshipped, but once the power of the bubble eases, students can imagine a future time of trying these things outside the valley. As long as they are in it though, the sense of being different and the power of conservative values have a strong hold in terms of public approval. Though the rule book doesn’t explicitly forbid romantic relations, these are frowned upon, but in the senior classes the teachers tend to look away even though they know students may be romantically involved. A form of illegality that seemed to be rampant when I visited was using teachers’ passwords to access sites off limits on student accounts— Gmail, Facebook and Orkut. Most students had accounts with a social 20

When you return something to someone.

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networking site and some claimed to miss having access to these. One of the teachers’ passwords was known by almost everyone in senior school and was routinely used to surf these and other sites, they claimed.

The Excursion and Holidays During my stay I got occasion to view consumerism occupying a faint presence in the students’ lives. Its most obvious appearance at term time could be during the week long excursion that students of classes IX and XI were taken on (separately, not on the same excursion). The excursion first gave the students a degree of freedom they hadn’t enjoyed in school in terms of releasing them from the binds of work and a routine. Once again in this moment, the bubble comes to be ruptured. There is a break, and students become different versions of themselves. It is in that moment of rupture that consumerism finds some expression. Students are given some money by the school with which they are allowed to do whatever they want. Whether they have some of their own stashed away is another story. The excursion seems to function as a carnivalesque space21 (Bakhtin 1993), on several different levels. First, it enables access to the world in general and students can access this world after weeks of seclusion. Almost every single student I spoke to first responded to my question with what did you spend your money on, by replying ‘food’. Some others said they bought small presents for their parents or other odds and ends, but food was the major theme. Second, it frees up interaction between boys and girls so invariably that one or more couples are formed during the excursion. Clearly, the excursion is a space outside of the normal to indulge in activities disallowed or difficult on campus, because of breaking away, no routine, fewer teachers and fewer rules. What happens when students have such prolonged periods of time away from school during the holidays? More often than not students whilst claiming to miss home and its comforts didn’t say they missed the city much. One boy told me he couldn’t relate to the kind of things his friends in Delhi did—hanging out at malls, drinking at bars. One 21 Bakhtin (1993) expands on this at some length in the context of literature. High culture is upended through moments of humour and rituals and the seriousness of the everyday is briefly turned inside out.

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said, ‘Our idea of fun here is different, we say something like “let’s go for a walk.”’ He says he felt disconnected from his older friends. Quite a few students said the only thing they did when they were at home was play on the computer (but none said they thought about that in RV) and several said they got rather bored at home. They kept in touch with their RV friends during the holidays by meeting them if they lived in the same city or via phone. A significant number claimed that they weren’t able to relate to their old friends, some had lost touch; others claimed they found their former friends materialistic. One girl said her friends got bored of her because all she spoke of was RV. No one admitted to following the same standards at home as they did in school with responses that guiltily included spending five hours a day in air conditioned rooms, watching TV all the time, rampant usage of plastics and cosmetics and the consumption of non-vegetarian food. Another bunch of students spoke of a shopping expedition to Flying Machine, Levi’s, Pantaloons and Fabindia where a single boy spent `15,000 in one day. In these moments the bubble ceases to exist, because scattered across places outside the school, RV’s ideology and a sense of shared community holds less power over the students. Further, in the carnivalesque moments outside of school, a different set of rules begins to operate. The ‘bubble effect’, thus, has its strongest potency in the physical time– space dimensions of being in RV. However, the residue of this effect is seen when students leave the school but continue to identify themselves with the school and its values. In this moment the rebellion against the school as an authority structure has ceased to exercise a day-to-day hold, and instead the emotional residue that remains is one of strong positive associations and a strong positive identity wherein the sense of RV-ness prevails above all else. This is not to say that students will be spouting Krishnamurti or toeing the alternative standards, but it has subtle effects. Nostalgia and the anticipation of nostalgia have a powerful force, and looking ahead to life outside RV retrenches the belief of RV as some sort of an innocent, carefree utopia. When I spoke to the teachers about student double standards, they felt this was inevitable but they still hoped that by the time students left RV they would take something from their experiences here back with them. How did they measure success in inculcating RV values?

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Teachers felt this was connected with the way students chose to lead their lives outside and the kind of professions they took up later on, ‘for instance not working for a multinational corporation that mass produces potato chips and thus uses so much plastic’, the principal remarked.

Local Changes, Topical Importance Since the world of the RV student is limited and slowed in the ways I have shown, what is happening in the local context matters most in the day-today life of students. There is no strict home/school demarcation, so what happens in the valley is of concern to all its inhabitants. The local context and the changes in it become magnified in the bubble wrapped world of RV. The major tectonic shift in the actual physical landscape whilst I was there was the newly constructed dining hall. It was a temporarily built dining hall, adjacent to the usual DH that would be functional while the older one was being renovated. The major change meant that students had to now wash their own plates since there was no washing area. A different kind of topical focus I noticed was with the Rubic’s Cube after a couple of boys did assembly on it. Everyone was utterly caught up in trying to solve this puzzle after it was popularised. Whilst I was there the second time, students could be often heard discussing the sandalwood thefts in the area, the measures being taken to combat these and teacher idiosyncrasies related to trying to protect the trees. The major topical changes of the previous term that had drawn so much ire seemed to be things of the distant past—certain rule changes. In the absence of phones, TV, regular Internet access and with mainly newspapers to rely on, events of the outside world dimmed in comparison to the super-charged relevance of localised events. One student remarked how as a result, students ended up having some of the same conversations again and again.

Ragging, Bullying, Senior–Junior Relations There is no doubt a pecking order based on seniority, but this is something more acutely felt among the boys. Though the boys said there was some mild ragging in the boys’ hostels and they mentioned occasional ‘physicals’22 several of the long standing teachers said that ragging, which 22

Physical fights.

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used to be a major concern in the early nineties, had been practically wiped out thanks to various administrative measures. These included, weeding out problem students, bullies after class X and only calling back select numbers for the remaining two years. Another important measure was structurally changing boys’ hostel and also building separate hostels away from the junior hostels for the more senior boys. In the two storied boys’ hostel complex the juniors were housed upstairs, rather than downstairs where the seniors are now housed, so as to ‘destroy the inherent hierarchy of up and down’, said one teacher, which has also met with success. All that remains of the ragging and bullying scourge is in attitudes and small exchanges. Thus in the DH, juniors may be made to get something from this table or the next, may be poached on for pickle (‘it doesn’t matter if you don’t know them, the juniors will give you’) and scolding the juniors for behaving childishly or ordering them around on the games field. The juniors felt seniors sometimes tried to assert their coolness and superiority via these subtle means and that the ragging that did occur was mostly good natured and malice-free. Too much ‘yapping’ invited ragging and some mild violence, but by and large yapping was restricted to verbal parleys. Ragging and bullying were not issues among the girls. However, more than the ragging was the overwhelming teasing that boys inflicted on each other in matters relating to girls. A good example of this was the ranking system.23 I saw developing during my own two week stay. In the discussion on student culture, it is crucial to look at an important fissure: gender.

Gender Dynamics at RV Gender dynamics at the school level are complex enough thanks to the adolescent process, but at RV they acquire especially peculiar dimensions,

23 In this, each girl was considered a race track and every ‘driver’ was given a first, second or third position on that track depending on how much he spoke to that girl. Points were thus tallied and the winner was labelled the biggest flirt. I think this was a temporary diversion, however, and lasted barely a week. When I reminded the students of this when I went back the following year they laughed at their own ‘immaturity’ and said that the levels of teasing had drastically decreased.

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informed by school rules, conceptions of coolness, co-habitation and the heterogeneous student body. It is socially desirable to have a girlfriend/boyfriend (it’s cool) but it is equally desirable to not flaunt it. For the boys, the norm dictated a cultivated aloofness from the girls and several boys and girls both attested to the fact that boys held an incipient attitude of condescension towards the girls. ‘They can’t really be friends,’ said one, another described his girlfriend as the only girl he was really friendly with. The subtle superiority is built on different levels—the class that I observed invariably had a few dominant male voices always speaking up, girls were explicitly denigrated (‘you know the girls are dumb because none of them are in the chess club’, said one), raiding the junior girls for food and never being turned down, and most explicitly in seating arrangements in the dining hall. The group I observed had a core of around five or six alpha males, you could say. They moved in a herd, largely associated with each other and tended to always agglutinate around the same table. On one occasion one of the boys even referred to the perceived head honcho as alpha male and when M queried him further on what he meant the former replied, ‘it signifies the apex of manhood.’ This was extreme in the class I observed. In RV the gender divide is usually stronger in the younger classes but is more or less bridged by class IX/X. Girls and boys speak to each other naturally, sit at the same tables and had lost the ‘unco-ness’24 of yore. Being ‘unco’ was a particular way of life in RV and is most aggressively practised by the boys who thought it was imperative to maintaining status to constantly show their indifference to the girls. It was built into the social fabric; thus, even if boys wanted in the younger classes to interact more extensively with girls, there was a social pressure to maintain a distance. Moreover, the authorities overtly discourage the formation of couples, making it logistically expedient for couples to play down their couple-ness. Thus being part of a couple signalled resistance to the authority structure, whilst staying under cover, even as it signalled a coolness factor among the student body.

24 As a student in 2001–2003 ‘unco’ had currency. It meant ‘uncooperative’. It could also be used in other contexts which are the only ones in use now. Unco means being ‘uncoordinated’ and is used to describe a clumsy person but more importantly someone who is miserly and doesn’t share his things e.g. ‘that guy is damn unco, he refuses to share his grub with us.’

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In the younger classes gender distinctions might be very acute; as when X went and vomited during lunchtime, when he found out that the pickle he had been offered had been brought by a girl or when Y kept a bottle of Dettol handy to wash any stationery if a girl borrowed it. By class X this had passed and by class XI being ‘co’ had become natural. This too, I think was extreme behaviour, an anachronism. When I floated these examples to the present bunch of students, they claimed some degree of being ‘anti-boy’ and ‘anti-girl’ in the younger classes but didn’t seem to know what being unco meant and laughed when I told them. Being part of a couple has unique dimensions in RV insofar as couples avoided extensive open contact with each other in terms of sitting and eating together, casually chatting with each other or even referring to each other. One boy always referred to his girlfriend in the pronoun or by association [X’s cousin] rather than by name. However, there were ritualised forums for interaction and sanctioned ways of being a couple. These included walking to the gate on Sunday night, dancing together at folkie, walking back together after prep, giving each other presents on certain occasions. When one girl first started going out with her classmate, she asked him what they had to do now that they were going out. He replied in earnest with a list of things, some of which I have mentioned earlier. Physical contact was not something openly spoken of. A new boy remarked to me as a quasi-outside observer on the romantic practices in RV, ‘R and K are supposed to be “going around” but I never see them talk to each other. I don’t think they’ve even hugged each other.’ Crossgender touch even in platonic relations was rarely seen and the same boy remarked, ‘Earlier I could so easily hug my female friends and tell them I missed them but here I haven’t even spoken to all the girls in my class.’ In direct contradistinction to this is the excessive homosocial bonding between boys where from the junior classes one noted how they always walked three or four together with their arms around each other. Pair dynamics could be seen at work in other forms, notably in the passing of notes to one another and in ‘dates’. Boys and girls alike told me how pairs often got caught because their ‘notes’ were chanced across by some teacher and as a result they got talked to. ‘Dates’ signified designating a point to meet at, maybe during Games or some other free time, generally at a place considered suitably secluded. One girl remarked on the stupidity of a pair who met at astha (‘who goes for dates to astha, man’) whereas someone else commented, ‘J was so dumb, he set up a date behind the games room, obviously he got caught.’

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A third practice was spending time with each other during juice break.25 I have seen couples sit next to each other during this slot, chatting. When N told me about a classmate who was hitting on B, I asked how he knew this, to which he replied, ‘It’s so obvious that he is banging on her, I mean he uses the time during juice break to go to her desk every day and try and chat with her: that is a forum for couples.’ Boys entering girls’ hostel at night by climbing and reaching the terrace was also a phenomenon that happened from time to time, once a term on an average, students claimed. One boy told me of one such escapade where three of them entered girls’ hostel. He said two of the boys had come to meet their girlfriends whereas he was bored because he had no one to meet. Pairs, whilst being secretive and not overtly communicative to each other in public, didn’t hide from the students, but rather from the teachers. It was important to not get caught or be seen in a ‘compromising position’ as one student told me, for that could mean not getting called back,26 getting suspended or having privileges repealed. Whilst the possibility of authorities cracking down on couples was always a factor, it seemed to have become amplified during my field visit. Class IX students had been told they were too ‘immature’ to interact with each other too much, and as a result boys and girls were not supposed to eat together in the DH, until further notice. All the students found this ridiculous, seniors and juniors alike. One class IX student told me, ‘I don’t know why they are punishing us, we are the most decent batch, we don’t have any pairs in our class right now.’ (As a result of this renewed teacher vigilance, three of the class pairs had dissolved, I was told.) A visiting ex-student who had passed out two years earlier told me he had been debarred from visiting the school for a year when he was caught with his girlfriend in the senior school toilets after prep. School conservatism towards pairs was something the teachers consciously spoke of. With the older students they might look the other way but with younger students they made it a point to dissolve pairs. One teacher rued dating in the younger classes as motivated by peer 25 A 20-minute slot in the morning between classes when students can leave the school building to have juice in their hostels or the DH. They are free to do whatever they like during that slot. 26 In class X ‘getting called back’ is a great preoccupation. The class size shrinks from classes X to XI, and the school exercises some discretion in deciding who can come back to RV for plus-two. Students feel they needed to be on their best behaviour lest they run the risk of not being called back.

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pressure and linked to a kind of ‘social excitement, in which there is no real relationship’. Having a girlfriend/boyfriend subtly increased one’s status (city value) but one had to constantly hide this to not be seen as trying to be cool (RV value) and for disciplinary reasons (school conservatism towards pairs). One boy pertinently remarked, ‘Let me tell you how it works here— if you flirt you are uncool, if you have a girlfriend then you are cool.’ Flirting invited high levels of teasing by the boys of the boys; hence, they were careful about how much and when and where they were seen talking to girls.27 Walking between spaces on the campus students claimed was arbitrary but what I noticed was that no one wished to walk alone. In many instances, boys tended to walk with each other as did girls though pairs often might walk together. In immobile set-ups like the Saturday movie or assembly, students tended to sit in clusters of class groupings and at assembly there was always an easily discernible gulf between the boys’ area and the girls’. They even used different entries in and out of the audi. Boys said they respected a few girls on counts of academic performance, general intelligence and inclination towards sports. Among the girls teasing and rankings were non-issues. Through both their own comments and their behaviour they felt the boys were ‘immature’ in these matters. Having said that, however, it was interesting to speak to a class IX student at junior folk dancing sessions who told me how crucial it was in choosing a partner, a carefully meditated process. The boy should be good looking but one shouldn’t dance too often with the same boy, lest you get teased. One shouldn’t also dance with someone who one is already teased with, lest the situation gets exacerbated. The distinction I observed emerge was that boys found the girls intellectually immature, whereas girls found boys emotionally immature. The most obvious expression of this was in the specially designed ranking system.28 I observed at work, which was considerably refined during the course of my stay. Sports in general and football and basketball in particular were seen to confer a status of coolness for the boys through the eyes of the boys and girls. Even subjects were seen in gendered terms. Whilst it might be 27 One boy explained to me the difference between flirting with a girl and teasing a girl, the former was tease-worthy because the flirter derived he said, ‘distinct sexual pleasure’ whereas when one teased a girl one was doing this to irritate her, behaviour that could be condoned. 28 Check footnote 33.

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most respectable to be studying a science combination in classes XI and XII it was not something ostensibly status-inducing, rather, those boys who did arts subjects were referred to as ‘housewives’ and the absolute ‘housewife combi’ I was told by the boys comprised English, history, art and geography. Perhaps by virtue of the fact that most girls did end up doing these seemingly ‘soft’ subjects they came to resound with negative connotations for the boys. Albeit, once when this debate came up I heard some of the girls launch a spirited defence of these subjects, claiming one could do many things with them. This in itself is not peculiar to RV, because in India in general, science and engineering domains are male-dominated. Why is there this male dominance? Generally, there are more boys than girls in all classes, and hence the total student population shows male dominance, but is this enough to ensure their domination over everything? Whilst girls and boys might perform equally well academically, it was one or two boys who would outshine the rest in an overwhelming way, particularly in maths and science subjects. In each of the classes I observed, it was almost always the male voices that were dominant, whether on current affairs, at student council meetings or even in class. More often than not, there would be a couple of strong male voices who would be best informed and heard most frequently, and whose eloquence was clearly tied to their status in a group. A particular boy in class XI was upheld as extremely smart, very well versed on current affairs and also considered ‘nice’. Likewise, with another classmate of his, described as ‘the best—he’s the basketball captain, he is really smart, he is really sweet and helpful’. In classes XI and XII it was boys who were helming the theatrical productions they were going to put up, boys who were directing and casting actors for most part. In one class there were ‘class politics’ brewing over the play ‘since the class dames29 were upset that they hadn’t been cast in any of the plays, so they later decided to do their own play’. The teachers also felt that male voices were predominant in classes, in general and around whom groups formed, or whose lead people followed. It is hard to say whether this is the case in all co-educational boarding schools, or schools in general, but one makes a generalised argument about patriarchy and girls and boys slipping into normative roles. Perhaps as the pattern set in, it was difficult to break. Further, it is possible that boys were more likely to be conscious of tangible achievements, 29

Girls are often referred to as ‘dames’, with a somewhat pejorative sense attached.

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more aggressively competitive, more interested in showing off and more vocal as a result. Their desire to assert themselves then can also be seen as a desire to adhere to the norm. Furthermore, the boys were far keener on current affairs and I heard some debating with gusto at the dining table and more talk of current affairs by the boys rather than the girls. The girls openly spoke of hardly reading the newspaper, one even proudly referred to herself as a ‘big bimbo’. Why was this playful appropriation of a pejorative identity taking place? Perhaps by naming herself thus it was liberating and eased the pressure to conform to norms of academic invincibility. Inherent in this discussion then, is overall less pressure the girls perceive to shine in extra-curricular areas. While boys tried harder, girls didn’t seem to feel that need to impress at all times in the same way. The male assertiveness, thus, becomes performative in a way. There is also possibly a difference in the way boys and girls measure each other. The boys tend to measure girls by the yardstick with which they measure their own male peers and by the way they separately evaluate girls. Girls, on the other hand, don’t measure boys by their criteria as studiously as the boys do. Let me explain. To measure up to their requirements boys said the girls had to be smart, nice, ‘worth talking to’, play games, and be good looking, i.e., be feminine and exhibit androgynous achievements at the same time. Furthermore, overt flirting or ‘being desperate’ also invited censure. Apart from these qualifications, most boys felt that girls were quite preoccupied with how they dressed and what they wore, and were ‘like girls everywhere, whereas the difference between boys in RV and boys elsewhere is much greater’, said one class XI student. The girls spoke of the boys in less aggregative terms, they weren’t typified to such an extent, nor were they openly ridiculed or derided. The girls seemed not to have distinct criteria by which to judge boys, and tended to be less harsh in their judgement on the boys in an openly vocal or condemnatory manner. Privately though, they admitted that the boys could be two faced, bitchy and condescending. Boy–girl interaction then tended to be overtly guarded but covertly present all the same, in this semi-teasing, semi-flirting form. One manner in which this was sustained was through the De Certauean tactic of what is known as ‘paper chatting’ in the younger classes. Students pass each other notes (particularly during prep when talking and moving around is disallowed) to talk to each other. Contact with girls in non-romantic ways could also be experienced in convoluted forms—through teasing,

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in the role of the ‘hitch man’, and in the ‘joking relationship’ style with senior girls.

Go-Between The go-between was a figure who was born temporarily in the structural gap between a boy and a girl. Either male or female, the mediator between couples might coordinate note passing or verbal messages but it’s at the outset of the pairing that he/she has the most part to play: in conveying to one or the other party that someone likes them. Such figures, or self-styled ‘Hitches’,30 usually operated in the younger classes. When asked what they felt about the self-professed Cupids, students generally laughed about it, and claimed these people were just bored and were hardly taken seriously. Further, how their classmates commented on these cupids was interesting, ‘He is only trying to be a Hitch because he himself wants a girlfriend,’ someone quipped. The go-between, thus, was treated in a semi-joking manner but was still a very real category.

The Joking Relationship It is in the joking relationship (Radcliffe Brown 1940)31 that the boy–girl relation demonstrates another strain of peculiarity. Interaction between senior boys and junior girls is restrained, practically non-existent in middle school and upwards, in school itself (maybe in the holidays or in the various home parties or on treks this is dissolved), a fact attested to by boys and girls alike. Several boys claimed that they never spoke to junior ‘dames’ because ‘there is no need to’ or ‘why should I speak to them, they are so dumb,’ or ‘how should I speak to them, there is never any chance to.’ Younger girls said that the boys kept an aloof distance, never saying hi or being friendly though younger boys were quite chatty. Although verbal bridges were lacking, older boys preyed on the younger girls in terms of food—swooping in on them for their ‘extras’ and claiming that they were never turned down. In other cases the preying might have been romantic in inclination. Senior boy–junior girl pairs 30 The Will Smith film Hitch (2005) features the lead character as a person who helps men and women come together. The term was in use among students at the time. 31 Radcliffe Brown used the phrase to describe the relationship between the wife of the elder brothers and the younger brothers of her husband, characterised by a relaxed joviality and teasing.

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might occur where senior girl–junior boy pairs were less common. For these cases, more often than not there would be some sort of mediator given the low interactional opportunities for the two in question. (By virtue of not having classes together, meals together or living in the same hostel there would be fewer opportunities.) Whilst overtly this might be condoned I sensed undercurrents that indicated otherwise. A senior boy was once told to ‘stick to his own turf’ by another junior boy when he briefly dated a junior classmate and several junior boys referred to one of their classmates as ‘desperate’ for dating a boy three years older than her. These kinds of outcomes can be seen on two levels. First, relating to the confusion and uncertainty inherent in the process of growing up, physiological and psychological factors lie outside the ambit of sociological arguments. Adolescent interactions are presumably fraught and confusing in any situation. Second, we can perceive a deeply encoded understanding of sexuality and social mores. Perhaps the boys viewed the girl as over reaching in her romantic ambitions, and this decision to date someone older was viewed as a personal slight on the classmates who were not deemed fit. Referencing a girl as ‘desperate’ also signals popularly imbibed notions of female sexuality, and the embedded patriarchal code. For the girls, it seemed to be a non-issue. The senior girl–younger boy dynamic I personally experienced as a fieldworker insofar as contrary to my expectations, at first, boys were far more uninhibited and forthcoming, at times even seeking me out to discuss their personal dilemmas. As a much older girl and one who had been a part of the community there were no unwritten rules that required a distance to be kept, for here in fact cross-gender relations were most relaxed on account of the age gap. There would be no real danger of getting teased. One boy told me of a particularly good friendship he had with a girl who had recently passed out of the school whereas a girl attested to the fact of being welcomed and befriended on the volleyball court among younger boys despite being the only girl. The older girl can function on different levels: as confidante, as someone who will indulge a younger boy (in terms of food) and who can be treated as an equal in ways that one’s own age girls or juniors cannot because her age redeems her gender. And finally, because her age limits her as romantically unavailable the relationship suffers no danger of being misinterpreted in terms of

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being teased (avoiding teasing is a huge concern) or being suspected by the authorities. Another possible explanation for the joking relationship was that younger boys and older girls were often housed together, in two of the houses this was the arrangement. Perhaps this has something to do with the fact that senior girls shared a more relaxed and friendly relationship with younger boys rather than vice versa.

Gossip, Rumours and Secrets Potential fissures in the student community might also become apparent in matters relating to the circulation of knowledge, gossip and secrets. At first the separation of knowledge occurs at the level between teachers and students. On a secondary level it occurs between boys and girls and across classes. Everyone attested to the fact of gossiping, male and female alike. Gossip usually centres around who was going out with whom, anecdotes about the opposite sex and stories about teachers. Gossip takes on a more hostel based form since boys and girls alike admitted that the bulk of gossiping happened at night or during rest hour. Class based gossiping also occurred, when students swap hostelrelated stories or gossip about people in other classes. This generally takes place during ‘class walks’ or at the DH. Rumours have a rapid way of spreading in small communities where everyone makes everyone else’s business their own. A girl told me how she had been asked if one of her classmates who had gone to the hospital had cancer. Another explained to me in connection with another rumour how these things spread in almost cartoon-like fashion, ‘the grapevine in RV is very effective. You tell one table, then it goes to the next and like that it spreads.’ I saw this when one of the students who was visiting with her boyfriend was the topic of conversation as their getting married was rumoured. She was fuming upon hearing this and kept wondering how on earth this piece of information with no basis in truth could have originated. In the close environment of this community, information is scarce because not very much happens, hence there is a premium on it. When things do happen, they come to take on an exaggerated shape in the minds of the storytellers. Rumours ricochet with great speed and interest because of the size of the community and the investment of the members in it. Everyone has a stake in the community, hence anything and everything becomes potentially of great interest.

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The Exclusions Then there are those who simply don’t fit in. Invariably there are one or two people who are always the butt of jokes, and never get fully assimilated. Why these figures are important is because in a boarding school, particularly one as secluded as RV where one has to interact with the same set of people daily for a sustained period of time, exclusion can become a very serious issue. In every class I observed (IX, X, XI and XII) there were a few people who may be openly ridiculed, disliked or avoided among both the boys and girls to varying degrees. In extreme cases, I was told there had been teacher intervention to make sure all the students were well assimilated. Among the boys I observed three very different types of exclusion at work. The boys in general repeatedly stressed on the absence of so-called politics between them, saying that ‘if I think you are a %&$! I will tell you so.’ And that ‘it’s not like among the girls when they are superficially nice to each other but behind each other’s backs they all bitch.’ This was something even the girls felt—that there were no outright fights and open hostility but undercurrents of bitchiness and meanness. Of the three excluded cases in one class I observed, all three were boys. There was one boy from Bombay who had joined in class VII, had been here for five years and whom his classmates found annoying because ‘he talked too much.’ This I observed in class, where he often cut in, interrupted and tried to show off a little. There had come a point, I was told, when on the class excursion no one wanted to even share a room with him and the teachers had intervened to give the class a talk on mixing with everyone and including everyone in group activities. Furthermore, this boy claimed to have drunk and smoked, but this did not affect his popularity either way. This boy didn’t seem to realise the extent of his exclusion or was perhaps not willing to talk about it when I questioned him on the subject. There was another similarly excluded boy, but whose marginalisation took another form and whose profile was quite different. He was a Tamilian Brahmin, from a small town, had been to a Brahmins’ only school before this, had joined in the class XI and felt his marginalisation very acutely. His peers felt he was smart but they also felt he was disregardful of student values and annoying in a different manner from the boy above. I suspect it might have also had something to do with the way he looked and dressed. Dark-skinned, with a moustache, short and invariably simply clad, he was referred to by one of the boys as

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‘looking like a Tamilian waiter’. Whilst I don’t think this was the clincher in determining his unpopularity, since I had seen other similar wellliked boys, it physically marked him out from his more urbane peers. He had many complaints about his classmates, said they made a lot of fun of him, hiding his things, making fun of his accent, refusing to lend him things. He felt standing up to them physically was out of the question because of his small stature and that speaking to the teachers about it only exacerbated the situation because he had violated the norm of not telling on others to teachers. The other students also found this to be particularly reprehensible and tormented him further on account of this, they readily admitted. In the same class there was a third boy who also faced problems from his peers, but seemed didn’t readily admit to this, though I was told he had cried on occasion when the ragging got too much. His chief flaw, his peers felt, was his ‘slowness’, he thus got bullied and ragged a fair bit. He had joined in class III, and he stayed in the hostel. All the three boys were treated better by the girls, I was both told and observed. Whilst the third was openly ridiculed and often didn’t realise it, the first was overtly avoided but only covertly commented on and the second was basically a target in the boys’ hostel. As one might notice, there is no model per se based on which exclusion and unpopularity are premised but more often than not, it is related to one’s attitude and ability to relate with a group and hold one’s own whilst also conduct peer relations according to group norms rather than clothes, shoes or talents. While intelligence is valued, on its own it is not enough—students have to at least try to assimilate by keeping up with jokes, not telling on peers and not flaunting one’s coolness. Among the girls, similar varying patterns were observed. I was told V was unpopular because she was ‘annoying’, whilst another was ‘too talkative’. The girls by and large felt that exclusions were not planned or evident, but that some people might be introverted, some people had their own politics with others, whilst undercurrents of bitchiness of a random nature could be sensed. I often heard the comment ‘oh look at her, she is so weird’ or ‘I can’t understand why he is going out with her’ but these were admitted in one-on-one sessions and couldn’t be keenly felt on the surface of everyday life. These kinds of politics were generally hostel based, as I observed when quizzing the girls about the boys and vice versa, they always said, we don’t know, you should ask them, and vice versa. Exclusions, I sense,

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take a hostel-based form as well as a class-based form but are felt more acutely in the hostel.

Pedagogy and Student–Teacher Relations Pedagogy at RV assumes a different form because of its self-proclaimed intent of deviating from the text book, encouraging independent thinking and in teaching arrangements outside the classroom. In nontraditional classroom encounters (e.g., outdoors, or in the auditorium) even the way space is organised suggests teacher–student equality. Benches under the trees outside school are arranged in a circle, or for several classes. Class XI and XII discussions take place in a round table manner. The equality presupposed in a circle dilutes the nature of traditional confrontational pedagogy. (One of the teachers told me how they had even changed the staff room seating arrangements to circular with a view to removing the structural suggestions of hierarchy between teachers.) No matter where classes occur one consistent feature I observed was that students never raised their hands and were ‘allowed’ to speak, they spoke when they wanted to sans any formalities. That apart, even the tone was non-deferential. On one occasion, when a boy thought he had been particularly belligerent, said, ‘Sid [the teacher], I mean …’ somewhat toning down his aggression, to which Sid replied, ‘I don’t mind your tone … you can speak however you like.’ The embracing of the alternative form of the encounter also occurred in the way they reacted to time in the classroom. The ringing of the bell didn’t signal a quick slamming of desks and putting away of books— there were times when discussions continued after the bell and teachers had to end the class. But the pedagogic encounter often appeared in disguised forms in other locations—the DH for one, where I heard students discuss differential equations amongst each other. Or on another occasion where a student thought he was skiving off work by reading Hawking’s Brief History of Time instead of doing his Environment Education project, when in fact Hawking in another context might be considered a highly academic reading. No one took notes, although people invariably listened, or at any rate tended to. Teachers were always a point of discussion and here too, contradictory behaviour made itself manifest. At different points in time, and

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always as something to be proud of, various students pointed out to me that the student–teacher relationship in RV was ‘different’ and ‘much more relaxed’. On one hand, teachers, as traditional symbols of authority and the figures to be rebelled against, represented an opposition. On the other hand, teachers were in far too much proximity for a permanently antagonistic relationship to exist; besides the nature of the community fostered a sort of bonding predicated on relaxed joviality. The RV student is consistently styled as ‘unique’ and ‘different’ by students and teachers. In the classroom there was no hand raising formality, teachers often admitted to their mistakes or a gap in knowledge, referred to students by pet names or surnames, and the class teacher in particular fostered a fairly close relationship with their own class, often even participating in its variety programme. As house parents, fellow trekkers, when seated with students in the dining hall, the student–teacher relationship could and did maintain much flexibility and the potential for closeness. One peculiar point of interest is the way teachers were spoken to in RV. Women teachers were called akka32 (so you would have Aruna Akka for instance) so as to emphasise the Krishnamurti ethos of abolishing teacher–student hierarchy. However, this seemed to be subverted by the fact of the male teachers being called ‘Sir’ (e.g., Shirali Sir, Kumaraswamy Sir) rather than anna the South Indian term for older brother. With the akka usage it was first name plus akka whereas in the male teacher case it was surname plus sir. In this discrepancy in the linguistic structure lies an argument that institutionalised cultural practices contain an innate bias towards patriarchal authority. Anna and akka carry informal connotations whereas sir is a formal, Anglicised term. On one occasion when I referred to one of the DH assistants as sir, one boy quickly corrected me, ‘Don’t call him sir. He’s just an anna. A gay anna that too.’ Despite this, there were some teachers (men) who were simply referred to by name, without the sir addition such as Sagai, SK and Sid.33 No woman was at the time addressed by her name alone.

In Telegu, akka means sister. When I asked one of the teachers about the discrepancy he said this was something that had puzzled students and teachers alike over the years. He came up with an explanation that perhaps in the 1930s and 1940s both men and women teachers were referred to as Anna and Akka respectively but when the school had its first English principal he might have been called Sir and thus over time this practice crystallised into calling the other male teachers sir as well. 32 33

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Nature and the Environment The best platform to observe pedagogy at work at RV is in discussions related to nature. Students are constantly exhorted to keep their surroundings clean, to save water and electricity, to avoid the use of plastics. The priority given to nature and the environment can be seen on notice boards carrying articles about birds and trees or on bird watching trips arranged on Sunday mornings or in periodic compulsory subabul34 cutting trips. This, like weeding and planting, is a term-wise compulsory activity that is referred to as ‘Community Service’. The teacher in-charge jokingly remarked, ‘Do not consider this child labour, we are not exploiting you.’ A group of girls whom I chatted to whilst weeding complained about the task and having to do all this work because the teacher in-charge was ‘hyper about all this’ but nonetheless soldiered on. I noticed in this episode in particular and in general in student attitudes how students react to natural creatures. Centipedes and other creepy crawlies are treated with awe rather than with fear. There were a couple of boys who were avid snake catchers. They said they loved looking for snakes and observing them. Several students went bird watching, on a good day, I was told, ‘there might be up to 50 people who come for ‘birdie’, and this is an activity that takes place between 6:30 and 8:30 on Sunday mornings, weekly. Since RV is also an officially designated bird preserve, they also run an Ornithology Certificate Course that is actually only for those in college but which some class X to XII RV students have taken up. When I went bird watching there were about 12 people who had come with their binoculars and notebooks. There were greenhorns and old hands alike, and I was told a good session meant seeing around 30–40 different species. But as in other matters relating to pedagogy, here too the student attitude comes to be ambivalent, shaped by inside and outside values. One of the teachers told me, ‘children here have a definite feel for nature, it’s not something they have to be taught,’ and clearly students here have an attitude towards their surroundings different from those brought up in urban settings. The student council takes initiatives to check on water metres, one girl I knew took up litter picking as a personal crusade and several students told me that they ‘feel guilty about using plastics so we have tried to become more conscious of that.’ 34

It is a large, evergreen, fast-growing shrub or a small tree found in the area.

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But again, it is consciousness that fades in and fades out, determined not just by trips to homes in the cities but also because part of their attitude towards nature is framed through pedagogy. There was a huge outcry when grub from home was banned and one classroom discussion I attended contained a very contradictory flavour.35

Competitive and the Non-competitive Ethos The students sought to upend the alternative nature of the pedagogy with values they thought they needed in the dog eats dog world outside. Apart from competition giving rise to harmless fun (cheering during matches, or comparing last year’s play with this year’s) the students perceived a training in competition as crucial to their participation in the outside world. Students constantly stressed (both when asked as also in passing without being asked) the disadvantages of being in RV in terms of being prepared to face the real world. The alternative value system was simply not a viable policy because they were acutely conscious of the roles they might be called upon to play in the real world. One remarked, ‘RV doesn’t prepare you for life outside,’ whilst all those who said they wouldn’t be coming back after the class X said this would be on account of needing to study hard to compete for places in the Indian Institutes of Technology or further their prospects in general. At an all girls’ table I once floated the ‘what next’ question and got some very clear responses—ranging from BA and BBA, to one who wanted to go to MIT to two others who simply ‘wanted to make a lot of money’. Another time a boy from Bombay told me, ‘I want to do engineering, and go to America, but I want to bring up my children in India.’ It is in this moment that the school as a socialising agency, in the student perception, has failed. The school has failed to prepare them for the lives they must live outside the bubble. Moreover, this is not something said in hindsight, but with foresight. That is not to say that the school fails to prepare students for post-school life outside this semi-utopia but that students think it fails to do so in the conventional sense.

35 During the course of the discussion itself students suggested ways and means of reducing electricity consumption, of conserving water and so on but as soon as the discussion ended they pounced on me for being a part of the batch that took the initiative to ban grub. What I sensed was their own students were open to and keen on environmental protection but when it was forced upon them they resisted and retreated to the trappings of the former consumerist life they knew.

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The rebellion against the school then can be cast in two terms—rebellion for the sake of rebellion and rebellion for the sake of what they see as a legitimate concern—one’s career prospects.

Student Attitudes towards Krishnamurti The mixed emotions with which students view Krishnamurti tend to become more positive with the passage of time, once again conforming to the pattern I outlined above (rejection at first, acceptance later). Teachers claim they never forced him down students’ throats although some of the older students apparently later said they wish they had been exposed to his teachings earlier. The class I spent two weeks with was gradually introduced to Krishnamurti by their class teacher by way of the study centre where his books, videos and some of his memorabilia are maintained. Initial resistance grows into potential interest or at any rate tolerance towards Krishnamurti-related issues. Another class XI student told me she had gone through his books but didn’t think reading about him or his works was part of the point of being at RV. ‘The school is run on Krishnamurti’s philosophy and worldview and the point is not to force him into our lives but to live by his teachings.’ Another boy said he found peers of his who read Krishnamurti pretentious because he claimed ‘we are too young to read and understand that, the people who do don’t really mean it.’ It is difficult to gauge sincerity levels of students’ interests in Krishnamurti but dismissing it as completely insincere also smacks of a certain cynicism and hypersensitivity about perceptions of coolness.

Student Solidarity against Authorities The negotiation of pedagogic practices is another two sided coin showing up the dilution of outside values problematised with the need to absorb them. Consumerism becomes a tool to be wielded in the war against authority as well as each other.36 (This happens in terms of breaking rules by keeping contraband items (phones, Discmans), or buying mass produced ready mix items.)

36 American students use consumer culture as a weapon against each other in the Milner thesis (see Milner 2006).

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Pedagogic practices are inculcated as well as railed against in micro ways. The democracy board—a bulletin board where students could post gripes and suggestions—is a good example of fighting the system through the system. By system I mean the (supposedly alternative) educational system articulated by the adult school authorities. For example, in a forum for expressing their grievances in writing students can raise issues and call for change, but this need not mean what they want will be heeded, just that they will be heard. In situations where students and teachers are seen to be pitted against each other the students, particularly since this is a boarding school, will rally around each other. Student Council and the D-board are two examples but another is the oft celebrated so-called boarding school ethos of refusing to tell on one’s peers. Rule breakage was not an automatic passport to coolness because invariably it occurred in fair-sized groups (e.g., making Maggi in the hostel) but those who didn’t were never ostracised. Two girls told me about an anorexic in their class who they had tried to counsel on their own but only when her condition really appeared to deteriorate did they feel they had to report her, and even when they did they said they felt guilty for ratting (i.e., informing the teachers). Information about couples was also an open secret between students, knowledge they collectively denied the teachers. As I demonstrated above, the boy who ratted on his peers had a hard time. Another boy who was getting bullied in one hostel almost started crying and threatened to ‘boo’37 to the teachers. Apparently he often said he would. What would happen if he actually booed I asked? Then, he would be bashed, even more I was told. Another example is the student council. Free to be attended by anyone from senior school the council meets once a week for an hour before lunch on Sundays. Issues that the council takes up vary and meet with varying results. Most students felt that the class XII students tried to control affairs more so than the others. Whilst I noticed a tendency for the class XII students to speak up more, I also found the boys spoke up more, or at any rate were louder and more heeded. Even then, despite divisions of gender, section, hostel and so on, students became united for an hour a week against those who they perceived made the rules and determined their lives. At the two sessions I attended, a major topic on 37 ‘Booing’ refers to weeping about something in an unseemly fashion but could also mean, depending on the context, reporting on one’s peers to the authorities.

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students’ mind was the cancellation of the variety programme38 and the RV Cup Football Tournament, both said to have been done to downplay competition. Many arguments were raised against this by the student body both in the classroom and in the council meetings and they perceived this as taking the no competition policy to the extreme of removing fun from their lives altogether. The manner of institutionalisation of the non-competitive ethos was not well received by the students. Not only this, it created conflict on a different but equally pertinent scale—it drove the teachers against the students.

Citizenship Issues Part of the study was investigating in what manner students received and understood notions of citizenship, and as I probed these issues they fell into the same pattern of rebellion–renegotiation. The authority line was ‘we don’t teach students how to be good citizens, rather we incipiently show them good values,’ particularly so since Krishnamurti philosophy espouses breaking from thinking in nationally bounded terms but rather as world citizens. The students I interacted with had clearly never been taught to think in terms of citizenship roles and attested to this when I asked them if they had learnt much civics in class. Each of the respondents answered the questions on their own terms, giving personal examples and even thinking about it and bringing it up with me later. One said, ‘Why do you ask what it means to be a good Indian citizen? You should ask, how can you help people without worrying about which country they come from.’ Most students answered the citizenship questions in broad terms ranging from ‘following rules’ to being ‘in harmony with nature’ (most common response) to ‘not bribing, cheating, being corrupt’. Invariably the students said they thought RV tried to make them good citizens, largely in nature-related activities—reducing the use of plastics, litter picking, weeding and so on. And most students felt they were in some small measure, and by their own personally imbibed parameters of judgement, reasonably good citizens, though they always added the rider that their behaviour at home was different. What I noticed was that the understanding students picked up of citizenship stemmed from their appreciation of informal rather than formal 38

The variety programme is usually put up in the first term by class XI students.

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processes in the pedagogic encounter. They consciously attempted to balance both a love of nature and a desire to rebel against the strictures that lay on them. Thus citizenship too became framed in terms of the nature debate. Inevitably it was a debate couched in terms of morality rather than ethics or legality. Citizenship attitudes covered a range of issues and themes. At RV with citizenship issues again, one feels the wrappings of the bubble making itself visible. Encased in this kind of environment, cut off from television and media images, given limited access to the Internet, phones and outside world there is a kind of other worldly placelessness that can be felt. One of the teacher trainees remarked to me that in RV she didn’t feel like she was in India at all (she wasn’t Indian). This is a conscious attempt on the part of the school to denude students of their identity as national citizens, and instead to try and shape them as world citizens and good human beings in keeping with Krishnamurti’s vision. Further, there are so many students here who live outside India that a sense of what it means to be Indian has no one flavour. One of the teachers said that 15 per cent of the student population is from outside India. I spoke to some of these NRI (non-resident Indian) students— from Kenya, Vietnam, Uganda, Dubai. When I asked them what it meant to be a good citizen they felt that in abstraction they were good citizens, but not good citizens of India because they belonged to another place. In the questionnaire I handed out, the way students reacted to the question ‘what do you understand by the term good citizen?’ did not logically lead them to answer ‘do you think the school tries to shape you as good citizens?’ The way they felt the school tried to shape them as good citizens was significantly different from the way in which they defined good citizenship itself. Whilst the former drew the response that a good citizen is one who ‘follows rules’, ‘is dutiful towards the country’, ‘contributes to the welfare of the country’ and who ‘doesn’t harm others’, the second question was met with answers such as ‘they are making us aware of the environment,’ ‘I used to want to be rich, now I want to work for wildlife,’ ‘showing us the lives of rural people’, ‘not polluting and littering’. These were the responses of students in class X. When I casually put these same questions to some of the students last year when they were in class IX and also to the present class VIII and IX students, I got

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different emphases in the kind of responses. These students answered more in terms of learning to love nature, helping at the Rural Education Centre, helping those around them, opening their mind. This slight shift towards more ‘correct’ or ‘technical’ answers in the class X students can be possibly explained by the fact of their doing civics towards the end of their class IX year. Again we see contradictory impulses in their citizenship responses. On one hand students ‘define’ citizenship in general and ‘good citizenship’ in particular in terms of belonging to a nation, following the rules and not violating community norms, when it comes to specifics related to their own lives citizenship becomes keenly connected to the environment, nature and morality. We can see how what is taught in the classroom as a subject in which an exam has to be given is differently nuanced with everything that students are exposed to in their day-to-day life, outside the classroom, in teacher attitudes, in school policy. Here too we see how the school is struggling with its place in the schema—there is the citizen-free philosophy on one hand, but the more reality-oriented imperative of having to teach students what’s in the syllabus. Clearly, students were actively concerned about what they thought of as important rather than paying lip service. Several students upbraided me when I gave them the questionnaires for what they thought was a blatant wastage of paper. They told me I should have printed on both sides; one of them told me I could have done such paper saving printing in the staff room itself. Students and teachers alike felt that students were more socially aware rather than politically aware. They were deeply concerned about their surroundings often taking the initiative in some matters. One boy said the Student Council had been successful in one regard when a friend and he decided to separate all the junk that had piled up at the old swimming pool, a voluntary enterprise they took up and that other students have enthusiastically responded to. When I showed up one Sunday afternoon to watch their progress I found 16 students from senior school helping with the task at hand, students from different classes and houses working in coordinated fashion under the leadership of the two class XI boys who had initiated this process. Awareness about the need to reduce plastic usage is strong and student attested to making an attempt to reduce their plastic consumption at RV. At the same time they railed against the grub ban. You see the

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contradictions at work once again: a deeply imbibed sense of responsibility towards nature as well as a desire for grub and what it entails. From the survey I took, only 3 out of 24 claimed to have not brought illes to school and two of these were day scholars. The former principal remarked on how one barometer of the growth of students over the years was in seeing the kind of assemblies they did. Rather than the sensationalist, topical issues that used to be chosen earlier, now students were choosing topics related to politics, economics and social issues. Some of the assemblies I heard during my visit included one on Thomas Hobbes, the economics of fruits and vegetables, the Rubic’s Cube, the Inflation Crisis. Whilst the Journalism Club was present, watched movies and discussed current affairs, it was quite fluid as an entity and didn’t meet even once during the course of my stay this time. Students were not particularly political, a fact attested to by themselves and by teachers alike. In some instance they showed liberal, leftist tendencies—pro-disarmament, anti-war—but this seems more of a posture as to what one should be perceived as rather than authentic ideologies. Sometimes students spoke on the assembly platform (once a week a teacher spoke, twice a week students were meant to) on current affairs or other issues, and in general General Knowledge was quite good—whether related to the debates around global warming or jazz music or environment issues. Nationalism could be obliquely observed in a few instances outside of the nature framework. I heard two students once having a debate on the merits and demerits of playing the national anthem in theatres before screening the movie, where one said, ‘I feel proud to hear it.’ As an institutionalised practice, Independence Day and Republic Day were school holidays (one teacher said, ‘We have to, otherwise it’s illegal’) and there was the mandatory flag hoisting, with students dressed up in white. For the students though, the high point was the Independence Day tricolour sweets more than anything else, made twice a year. In their understanding of citizenship too, students demonstrate contradictory impulses. There are learned responses through the official curriculum and the learned responses filtered through the Krishnamurti lens. Isolated from a larger context, the idea of citizenship as an ideal to be practised is not a nationalism-based project but a deeply individualistic one. The local and the hyper-local become magnified but in the abstract sense of belonging to a larger world the intermediate space of the nation comes to be erased.

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Teaching of History Connected to the citizenship understanding that students glean is how it is officially taught. Unfortunately, I wasn’t able to attend civics classes which are held towards the end of the year and was only able to attend the history classes, these I did of classes IX–XII. Some had teachers who overlapped. In classes X and XII, for the exam going batches, history was taught in a distinctly business-like manner in keeping with exam requirements. The teachers both told me this and demonstrated it in class. Assignments and worksheets were de rigueur in keeping with the board exam style. Classes IX and XI were more relaxed in terms of the workload. However, all classes were shown movies connected to topics that were being taught. I attended screenings of one Renaissance documentary (class IX), the feature film Dr. Zhivago shown in connection with the Russian Revolution (class XI) and a BBC documentary on Germany in World War II (class XII). Classes XI and XII were taught World History by the same person and were small groups of students who had specifically chosen to study history. All of them said they enjoyed history and they really liked their teacher. (I should add, I enjoyed his classes too, he was good.) I noticed how they responded to his questions, asked questions of their own, discussed the movies they had seen and remarked on articles related to the topic that they had read. By virtue of the fact that these were smaller groups of students who had chosen history as one of their subjects there was a greater level of student enthusiasm and participation than in classes IX and X.

Transitions at RV Having not done adequate fieldwork in the junior classes it would be hasty to compartmentalise the RV experience into distinct phases, but I did notice some significant kinds of transitions at work from class to class. There was a marked shift in emphases and concerns when students moved from class VIII, which counts as junior school to class IX which marks the beginning of senior school. But for one student, who said that they didn’t have as much work here as they did in other schools, all the class IX students I spoke to said that the move from VIII to IX was a

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major jump. The most significant change was that they now had to write exams, and that their workload had increased. They said they were given several tests a month and they seemed to spend a large part of their holidays just doing homework. Another major point of change was the hostels in which the students lived. Several class IX girls were now housed with the seniors, as also some of the class IX boys. This also meant a shift in the direction of friendships. The girls remarked how boy–girl relations also improved by the time the class reached class IX. The incessant teasing that was a feature of the junior classes was now a thing of the past. Class IX to class X only meant a similar increase in work, particularly since the board exams would be at the end of the year. Students told me they took tuitions during the holidays. This was also largely true for the transition from class XI to class XII. In class X though, for the first time the students are faced with the very real possibility of having to leave RV, or at any rate the fact that many of their friends will not be coming back. In these years, the calling back phenomenon becomes a preoccupation, with students striving to ensure they don’t break too many rules. In student perceptions the things that affect one’s chances of getting called back included doing well academically (to ensure one got one’s combination of subjects), not being in a ‘pair’ relationship or at any rate not getting caught doing so, and generally not breaking too many rules. But on the whole students this time seemed less concerned about the matter than those whom I spoke to last year, perhaps this was connected to the fact that all of last year’s batch had been called back. Even the principal told me that calling back was not the carefully thought process it used to be, and now they nearly called everyone back. It is in class X also, that the identity of the batch as a batch sets in. Though there are two sections and students pass through different hostels during their stay, there is a greater sense of the class as a composite whole. The transition to class XI is nuanced in its own way. Class XI students felt they were now treated less like children and were also given more responsibilities, further they could be more relaxed since they wouldn’t be judged on the ‘calling back’ factor. Students claimed to show a more conscious interest in the running of the school, in taking up responsibilities of their own accord (the Garbage Committee for one, the RHC group for another) and in Krishnamurti as well. Classes XI and XII are also the years in which there are no sectional divisions, so the sense of class unity and community becomes stronger.

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Class XI was also the year in which several new students joined, making the dynamics more fraught. It was also the year when one only did subjects of one’s choice, that too without the pressure of board exams, so class XI was a relatively relaxed year in which there were several opportunities to study less and enjoy overall school life. And finally class XII. The students felt at this stage there was a lot of bonding, given that this was the last year. There was apprehension about leaving RV, apprehension tinged with excitement. People had career choices to make, exams to do well in and the life outside RV to lead. I wasn’t around to see students at the finishing stages, but based on personal observations students who had been there since class IV and earlier, did show greater keenness to leave. At this point friendships are more or less set, the class has either absorbed or rejected the new students in whatever degree, and students claim to have matured beyond petty politics and boy–girl friction and teasing. Equally crucially, as controls from the authority body get loosened in the higher classes, students’ rebellion too gets diluted. As students grow up, with the reality of leaving RV approaching closer, celebration of the school and the alternative way define student impressions and interactions. It is in fact as controls are loosened, that students have increasingly come to accept and celebrate in the idea of RV. Though as a socialising agency, the school should have prepared students for the so-called ‘world’, it is in the idea of RV that students continue to seek refuge. Once again, anticipated nostalgia and the comfort of the community become powerful factors.

RV Culture Despite the inevitable fissures that separate students and students from teachers, I would like to suggest something more composite that is also at work in the form of a pan-RV culture. The unique nature of the pedagogic encounter at RV fosters something more than the usual teacher– student relationship, the hierarchy is considerably diluted. It becomes possible then to discern an RV culture at work. Whilst Krishnamurti never spoke in terms of communities, and even abjured the term, people at RV seemed to use the term rather freely.

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The culture at RV first and foremost is a culture fostered in isolation. Spatial separation promotes in quasi-Darwinian fashion the development of a parallel culture in an island unto itself. The chief features of this culture draw from the realms of geography, history, language and rituals. The culture is created through discipline and resistance of both the school itself and the students. Thus, the cultural system that emerges is generated by the school’s imposition of a certain way of life as well as the way students receive, distort and then recreate that way of life. The culture is created as a two-way process with the students as subjects and actors, and the school as a discplinarian authority system and a redemptive, benevolent authority system.

Geography I detailed at the outset the way space is used in terms of being structured in opposition to outside norms, but here I will make a case for the way in which the community appropriates these spaces as their own. Amorphous physical spaces with no clear boundaries eventually become well-known places which are central to RV culture and the collective imagination. They become nodal points in a 350-acre map that make concrete and negotiable the expansive local geography. The entire community draws from this shared geographic vocabulary—the veg. garden, BBT, which are even institutionalised in the daily routine by the morning PT runs to the different places. Additionally, there is an awareness of the need for the community to look after this near-sacred locale—a notion of self-sufficiency that extends to an equal participation in these activities whether through weeding or rural health centre work by students and teachers alike. The local community is also a part of this extended community. First, several small villages lie adjacent to the school and are a visible part of the locale. Second, the school provides work that transforms some locals from subsistence peasants into wage labours. The chief architect of the valley’s sustainable development projects pointed out that ‘without integrating the locals and mutually adjusting our needs we cannot function smoothly as a school.’ The level at which the community operates then expands to take into its wings the local economy and livelihoods. Thus the campus is a self-contained, self-sustaining unit.

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Rituals and Practices The successful creation of the school culture lies in the power of the ritual; as routinely institutionalised practices, rituals are codes for cultural systems (McLaren 1999): in this case emphatically ‘different’ practices. Unity is established through the manner in which people at RV engage in shared practices. The morning assembly is one such, in which the senior and junior schools and teachers, for some 15-odd minutes sing Hindu devotional/spiritual songs, gathered in a circle. As I had earlier suggested the circular formation itself precludes a sense of hierarchy, particularly since everyone sits on the floor and sings. An unspoken bias in this is that all the songs sung are Hindu devotional songs. When I asked the music teacher about this he replied, ‘for all these years we have had the same songs … I don’t mind having any number of other songs … it’s only because I don’t know other religion songs that I am not able to include these.’ The ‘assembly books’ have by now institutionalised the songs and chants. Another teacher said that over the years so many of these songs have accumulated that it would be unthinkable to tamper with them, and that ‘there would be particular outrage felt by the ex-students’. Asthachal is another such practice that ritually briefly unites the entire school in the same activity—watching the sunset every evening. At RV, school rituals have been discussed in some detail (Thapan 2006), indicating three of them that play an important role: weekly tests, asthachal and morning assembly. I would like to add another crucial RV ritual to this list: folk dancing. As much as the practices themselves it is the ideology of uniqueness that comes to be associated with these practices that solidify them. Take ‘folkie’ for instance, where else do students get together for an hour a week to do quaint European folk dances? Other ritual-like practices include ‘going uphill’ an RV staple that means the same to everyone—going up Cave Rock Hill. Or dish washing—a termly rotational duty for students every Sunday in the dining hall after lunch. These and others together map a grid of understanding RV through the minutiae of the every day and so forging a common community bond. We have school rituals on one hand, and on the other we can see something similar to rituals—practices that agglutinate over time and achieve a kind of ritualistic significance—patterns that form and are

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difficult to break. Any new change in the routine or schedule is often treated with responses ranging from suspicion to rebellious outcries.39 One of the teachers remarked that these weren’t really ‘traditions’ in the manner that students assumed them to be and that shaking up the calendar every now and then should be viewed positively and a change to be looked forward to. Other kinds of practices that crystallise are those linked to who sits where in the assembly and at astha. I constantly asked the students why the senior boys occupied one part of the audi, why the senior girls another, why the juniors agglutinated in other spaces. No one came up with a satisfactory explanation, they all said, ‘this is how it has always been, there is no explanation for this.’

‘RV Lingo’ Third, is the issue of language and an argot that can be distinctly identified as ‘RV lingo’. Membership to the community occurs by way of language that equally unites all participants. Specific RV words abound that commonly signify an entire cultural vocabulary to its members. Thus we come across words such as exu, boys hos, excur, labba, ille, special o and so on.40 Apart from specific words, there is a specific kind of slang or phrases, ‘to clip it,’ ‘to pop someone back’. On one occasion I heard a bunch of students discussing the new boy from Bombay, ‘he’s a little weird … he keeps saying dude this dude that …’ Later the boy in question told me he had been ‘fully assimilated into RV lingo’. And teachers too, I noticed, drew from the same stock of words, both in formal and in informal settings. Language in its finer nuances is also influenced by South Indian inflections —so everyone says ayyo or achi.41 39 Two examples that come to mind easily are the RV Cup football tournament and the class XI variety programme. Upon their cancellation by the teachers students were up in arms and demanded repeal on both cancellations. Both had achieved a certain status in the school calendar and were events eagerly looked forward to by the students. 40 Exu refers to being excited, excur is a short form for excursion, labba means to cook up a story, ille refers to contraband items and special o is a short form for special occasion. 41 Ayyo, an exclamation, widely used in South India which generally covers the emotions of surprise and dismay. Achi, another word found in South Indian languages refers to food items that have someone else’s saliva. For instance, ‘He has achi-ed it so I cannot eat it now.’

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One of the students I spoke to at length had such a strong South Indian accent that I was convinced she was South Indian, but later I found out she was from Delhi. She said, ‘Yes, everyone uses South Indian words here, that’s really common.’ Girls and boys might be called by their surnames, nick names morphed tremendously over time and even teachers used nicknames or surnames to address students in class. Another nomenclatural pattern I noticed was the way names were recycled and reused. Thus, siblings tended to be called after their older siblings—e.g., Dey, Bubba and every Aniruddha were apparently called Anda.

Assimilation For a community that so physically and spiritually maintains its distinctions from a perceived other, it is how the neophyte into the valley is treated that becomes insightful to observe. Either there can be newcomers who come for temporary purposes (ex-students, parents, guest speakers/teachers or miscellaneous visitors) or newcomers who arrive for a long stint (new staff and students). It is the latter category to whom at first RV appears as a unified body into which membership must be gained. The new students whom I spoke to (and one of whom I once was) were being viewed with a mixture of suspicion, curiosity and as potential romantic interests. New girl– old boy interaction was more reserved than old girl–new boy interaction at first. Two of the new girls who had come from the same school both attested that ‘everyone was very friendly and nice’ and that they ‘weren’t really homesick’ although the older students felt that at first the new students appeared to be friendlier with each other. One of the new boys told me that he felt like a part of the place right away, ‘this is nothing like my old school. People are so open, so friendly, not the kind of crazy group politics I have experienced.’ He added, ‘on my first night here all the guys sat me down and told me all the stories and happenings in the past so many years, so I was caught up really fast.’ Two other boys told me, ‘Sometimes people are homesick, but eventually everyone becomes a part of the community.’ One of the definitive ways in which this occurs is by getting up to date on all the stories and myths relating to both teachers and students. Another way is by participating in mockery of other members of the community—catching on to common jokes, particularly those connected

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to teachers. Associated with this is getting mocked oneself, a particularly definitive act in cementing community membership. Within 10 days of my first visit, I found myself being teased and was told, ‘When you get teased you know you have been accepted.’ Students often had an instrumental interest in short-term visitors such as parents—they brought food or other exciting material goods and news of the outside. Students always spoke excitedly about their parents visiting, particularly since this meant they would be getting grub. Ex-students were also potential curios and were immediately accepted particularly if they were recent enough to be recognised and also because they were tacitly understood to already be a part of the community. And during their stay they participated in the same shared rituals—eating in the DH, dancing folkie, singing during assembly and were conversant with the physical and emotional landscape of the valley.

Concluding Remarks My thesis started out with an idea of the school and its students shaped by the ‘bubble effect’: a physical and psychological sense of a cocoon. This cocoon contained within it several related but contradictory impulses. There is the authority-rebellion paradigm where the school is authoritarian and rebellious, leading to a mixed culture among students of accepting authority-imposed norms whilst also rejecting these, depending on context and their own place on the career graph. Student culture thus becomes a composite of several mixed strains with multiple fissures. Students compete against each other and cooperate with each other against the larger authority system. The school, in turn, ruptures the route followed by socialising agencies in the process. By disobeying conventional schooling practices (e.g., deemphasising marks, downplaying competition, doing away with a uniform), the school rebels against a preconceived idea of schooling, even as it forms a part of a broader education system. This rebellion then is partly successful in that it fosters the idea of uniqueness, and maintains that idea much after students have left the school to enter the mainstream. In some senses, in the true nature of the socialising agency the school has prepared its students for the remainder of their lives, but whether it

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has prepared them in the manner expected (making them ‘good citizens’ or competitive workers) is moot. Consumerism, an important entity to be fought against, becomes a weapon for students at first, later morphing into a less subtle one as the students grow up, when its absence becomes something to be held up as a badge of difference. But despite these, it is possible to discern a composite ‘RV culture’ over and above a separate student culture. This is thanks to, as I described, a series of shared practices and elements. The bubble endures not just in its immediacy during a student’s career at RV but also after, in the form of an imagined bubble. The community doesn’t merely exist in space; it exists across space and time, as an imagined community. It inheres through this shared identity in a far more powerful form as compared to other schooling experiences because of the school’s ostensible aim from the outset of channelling an alternative education. The veracity of that is open to challenge, but the legacy of an imagined alternative sense of self and identity persists.

References Anderson, Benedict. 1983. Imagined Communities: Reflections on the Origin and Spread of Nationalism. London: Verso. Bakhtin, Mikhail. 1993. Rabelais and His World (Trans. Hélène Iswolsky). Bloomington, IN: Indiana University Press. Bidwell, Charles. 1965. ‘The School as a Formal Organisation’, in James G. March (ed.), Handbook of Organizations. Chicago IL: Rand McNally. Bourdieu, Pierre. 1990. The Logic of Practice. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press. Dalal, Roshan. n.d. ‘Rishi Valley School: The First Forty Years’, in Radhika and Hans Herzberger (eds), Rishi Valley Education Series, Volume 10. de Certeau, Michel. 1984. The Practice of Everyday Life (Trans. Steven Rendall). Berkeley, CA: University of California Press. Durkheim, Emile. 1956. Education and Sociology (Trans. and Intro. Sherwood D. Fox). New York, NY: Free Press. Krishnamurti, Jiddu. 1981. Education and the Significance of Life. New York, NY: Harper Collins. McLaren, Peter. 1999. Schooling as a Ritual Performance: Towards a Political Economy of Educational Symbols and Gestures. New York, NY: Routledge.

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Milner Jr, Murray. 2006. Freaks, Geeks and Cool Kids. New York, NY: Routledge. Rabinow, Paul. 1984. The Foucault Reader. New York, NY: Pantheon Books. Radcliffe Brown, A.R. 1940. ‘On Joking Relationships’, Africa: Journal of the International African Institute, 13 (3): 195–210. Thapan, Meenakshi. 2006. Life at School. New Delhi: Oxford University Press. Weber, Max. 1997. The Methodology of the Social Sciences (Trans. Edward A. Shils and Henry A. Finch). New York, NY: Free Press.

8

School Experience: An Autobiographical Approach* Meenakshi Thapan

Autobiography, Autoethnography and Schooling

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emembering our schools and our experience at these institutions lies in the buried past of our childhood memories that we seek to uncover only in our thoughts or with friends and family. Sometimes, it becomes important to write about them, to share them with others, to help understand childhood and our experience of schooling and all that it does to shape us as individuals and social beings. Bourdieu has referred to the genre of autobiography as ‘conventional and illusory’ and prefers the term ‘self-socioanalysis’ for writing about his engagement with the world

*The authors of the chapters in this volume have contributed remembered vignettes of their own school experience which is used, without their names, in this chapter. The authors have also changed the names of their schools for this purpose. All the vignettes of experience provided in this chapter are based on the authors’ education in private schools in India.

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as a social scientist (2008: 1).1 To avoid slipping into nostalgia, maudlin memory and a kind of self-indulgence, Bourdieu sought in this work to look at himself as if he were the object of analysis. Autoethnography is one methodological technique of using autobiography, ethnography and interpretation to explain the phenomena under study. However, this is not always an approach favoured by scholars as it involves sharing aspects of self-reflection that reveal personal life stories and views that in fact bring out the ethnographer’s emotions, vulnerabilities and spirit in intimate detail. Using autoethnography to focus on a subject such as schooling helps us to examine the lived experience of students from an intimate and personal space which we have traversed, thus connecting ‘the practices of social science with the living of life’ (Ellis 1999). It is imperative, however, that our sociological tools of analysis are constantly by our side so that we know the conceptual categories and frames through which we may seek to understand this well-known and yet new forms of experience that we confront through our research. It is in this sense that ‘autoethnography is one of the approaches that acknowledges and accommodates subjectivity, emotionality, and the researcher’s influence on research, rather than hiding from these matters or assuming they don’t exist’ (Ellis, Adams and Bocher 2011). Such an approach may, however, be criticised for being based on emotion, subjectivity and a romantic kind of engagement with the subject, but this is not necessarily always the case. In understanding educational experience, it is essential to focus on individual educational experiences so that, as researchers, we may go behind the veils that obfuscate our understanding of what it means to be a student, a person, studying particular kinds of texts, taking part in the educational experience of the institution, rebelling, accepting and expressing emotions and feelings in the articulation of that remembered experience. This is a crucial aspect of our analysis as it is through such experience embellished as it may be through the passage of time with nostalgia, selective memory and the tendency to erase that which we do not seek to remember, that one may aim at an understanding of schooling processes from the lived and remembered experiences of adults as children and youth. Such memory is no doubt based on the different kinds of experience that social living engenders. Caste and gender are two significant 1 At the same time, in this engaging and deeply insightful work, Bourdieu (2008) provides us with vignettes of his childhood, his life in a boarding school and the ways in which this experience developed in him the ability to use techniques and strategies for survival in difficult circumstances and affected his behaviour vis-à-vis others in later years.

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axes that shape memories in markedly different ways.2 It is well known that Dalit writers bring thick description, affect and rich experiential accounts into their understanding of the everyday. Pandian (2008: 34) refers to this as a kind of ‘radical empiricism’ that transcends ‘the divide between theory and fact and open[s] up spaces for alternative politics for subaltern groups’. This is done through the narration of a ‘self-conscious ordinariness of the lives narrated’ through representational forms such as poetry, fiction, autobiography and testimony (ibid.: 35). In doing so, Dalit writers vividly bring out their lived experience of caste oppression in a stratified society. It is through a reading of these texts that we may come to understand the experience of being a Dalit, the complex ways in which caste works, the challenges and forms of resistance that are a part of everyday life and the centrality of caste. In other words, it is only through reading and listening to these stories that we are able to arrive at a nuanced understanding of caste in the lives of women and men in India. As social scientists and researchers, we are obsessed with the need to examine and analyse problems through an ‘objective’ lens that portrays the subject of study within a disciplinary framework with appropriate indicators, perspectives and paradigms of understanding.3 This is, however, as we all know, only a ‘partial truth’. It has been argued that perhaps all research is the uncovering of partial truth: ‘Ethnographic truths are … inherently partial-committed and incomplete’ (Clifford 1986: 7). As sociologists and anthropologists, working especially in the field of education, we perhaps tend to imagine that we are uncovering ‘reality’ in all its multifaceted aspects and therefore need to rely on so-called objective methods, tools and techniques. However, it is important to recognise that the uncovering of ‘truth’, ‘reality’ or whatever we are after, involves, in addition to these techniques, another understanding that is grounded in the personal, known and experiential levels. This includes the presence of memories of a clearly, perhaps muted, remembered past that tend to shape our understanding of experience in the present. By denying this aspect of our understanding as researchers, we are in a sense eliminating ourselves from our research. The idea that researchers are telling stories in and through their research is not new. ‘Narrative inquiry’ has been around for a long 2 A consideration of the subtleties of this varied experience in any depth, however, lies outside the scope of this chapter. 3 See Gopal Guru (2002) for a critique of social science discourse in India that sits on judgement on essentially what constitutes the ‘science’ of the social sciences and dismisses all that it sees emerging from the domain of affect or politics.

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time and is now increasingly used in studies of educational experience (Connelly and Clandinin 1990: 2). Interestingly, the main reason for the use of narrative in educational research is ‘humans are storytelling organisms who, individually and socially, lead storied lives. The study of narratives, therefore, is the study of the ways humans experience the world’ (ibid.). Although Berk (1980) posited the early use of autobiography for the understanding of education, this perspective was soon overtaken by other and apparently more pressing concerns, namely, to understand the processes through which persons are educated. The work of William Pinar (1978, 1994, 2004/2011) stands out for its sustained emphasis on autobiography as a significant tool for understanding curriculum. In the opening paragraph of his 1975 presentation at the American Educational Research Association annual meeting, Pinar elaborated on the method of currere:4 It is regressive—progressive analytical—synthetical. It is therefore temporal and conceptual in nature, and it aims for the cultivation of a developmental point of view that is trans-temporal and trans-conceptual. From another perspective, the method is the self-conscious conceptualisation of the temporal, and from another, it is the viewing of what is conceptualised through time. So it is that we hope to explore the complex relation between the temporal and the conceptual. In doing so we disclose their relation to the self in its evolution and education. (1975: 1)

Simply put, Pinar is arguing for the use of biography and autobiography in imagining, constructing and engaging with the curriculum. For our purpose, Pinar’s method is an important effort to move outwards, from autobiographical experience, to understand the lived experience of students in school. He concludes this chapter with the understanding that, The method attempts to reduce the distance between the researcher and his subject. This is not reduction of spatial distance, but of role distance. This reduction lessens I think the likelihood of super-imposing on our subjects our ideas of what it is they are doing. The matter of understanding the relation between pre-conceptual and conceptual reality is crucial. By moving in the past, one observes how the conceptual is only a part, however integral a part, of the biographic situation. One can observe how one places upon 4 Currere is the infinitive form of the Latin noun curriculum and is a method devised by Pinar for ‘the systematic study of self-reflexivity within the processes of education’ (Source: http://curriculumleadership.edublogs.org/curriculum-as-currere/).

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reality one’s ideas, and how, with currere, one can allow reality to release its own ideas. (Pinar 1975: 13)5

There is in this understanding a merging of the biographical and conceptual through the lives of the different subjects who occupy positions in the world of the school. This conceptualisation is similar to that undertaken by Andre Beteille who argues that the advancement of knowledge is possible only ‘if we are prepared to give serious attention to accounts of the past or the present put forward from points of view that are different from our own’ (as cited in Karlekar and Mukherjee 2009: xv). We cannot therefore attempt to capture the present, however close it is to our immediate comprehension, unless we have the openness to listen to the past and present through the voices of others as much as ourselves. This is the premise with which work for this volume was conceived and undertaken. The authors were asked to reflect on their own autobiographical experience of schooling and how this may have not only shaped them as young people but also provided them with an experiential understanding of life at school. It was therefore assumed that most of them engaged with their research for this volume from this perspective. All researchers seek to understand social reality through different ways of knowing. Although we may argue that all ways of knowing ultimately lead to an adequate understanding, there are no doubt differences in the approach and method. Jerome Bruner (1990) has made the distinction between two ways of knowing: ‘narrative knowing’ and ‘paradigmatic knowing’. In narrative knowing, there is an effort to engage with and reflect upon personal experience, whereas paradigmatic knowing is completely dependent on scientific inquiry.6 Narratives (e.g., life stories) have thus become ‘important sources’ used by teachers in school classrooms in Canada (Kanu and Glor 2012: 15). By identifying with that or those whom we attempt to teach, as in classrooms, or with those we seek to study, there is an erasure of difference and an understanding emerges from one’s own life experience, however different that might have been. 5 Pinar is, however, well aware of the ‘dangers of exhibitionism and exposure’ that might prevail as a result of the use of this method while transacting the curriculum and therefore declined its use as an instructional device in the school curriculum (2004/2011: 36). 6 In similar vein, Stanley Tambiah distinguishes between the ‘discourse of causality’ and the ‘discourse of participation’ and argues that the latter emphasises ‘sensory and affective communication and the language of communication’ while the former is an outcome of ‘rationality and the language of cognition’ (as cited in Pandian 2008: 40).

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The acknowledgement of one’s own experience, similar or dissimilar as it may have been, in this engagement with the subjects of our study is a first step in the articulation of the ‘complicated conversation’ that Pinar (2004/2011: 47) refers to. Pinar adds, a ‘complicated conversation’ also serves as a ‘conversation with oneself [as a ‘private person’] and with others threaded through academic knowledge, an ongoing project of self-understanding in which one becomes mobilized for engagement in the world’ (ibid.).7 Without such complicated conversations as researchers, seeking to understand life at school, we are denying ourselves the possibility of understanding the experience of others as it happens in the present, or how it has been experienced in the past, and of how it may possibly happen in the future.

School Experience and a Search for ‘Alternatives’ My primary experience of schooling was one of loss, of complete emotional and familial loss, as a result of being sent away to boarding school when I was 11 years old. Memories of the schools earlier attended resonate with a certain joy and presence of a sibling in the same school and mother at home. Boarding school by contrast had no family, very few friends and was basically a nightmare from start to finish. The absence of family was the first hard-hitting reality and a gnawing sense of incompleteness that appeared to only grow with time.8 Memory has a sharp physical edge and one of the things I seem to remember missing most at school was my mother’s physical warmth, her soft body, her fragrance and a bodily smell associated with only her particular body which appeared to be unlike anyone else’s. The food she cooked at home, her gracious sartorial sense, the flowers she tended to in the garden, all added to this 7 Pinar describes currere as conversation as a ‘… conversation in which interlocutors are speaking not only among themselves but to those not present, not only to historical figures and unnamed people and places they may be studying, but to politicians and parents dead and alive, not to mention the selves they have been, are in the process of becoming, and someday may become’ (Pinar 2004/2011: 43). 8 Alan Macfarlane refers to his experience at boarding school as ‘structurally resembling Dante’s great work. The first part was Inferno-Hell’ (2010: 7). He goes on to describe all the dreadful aspects of school experience through Purgatory and rests in Paradise when his mother returned to England and remained there ‘like an ordinary mother’ (ibid.: 10).

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remembered smell. My father’s absence rested more in the fact brought home to me clearly in boarding school: he was never around, neither at home, nor at school. It was in a sense a double absence. At home, he was always off to some unknown place, to which we had no access, surrounded by men in green uniforms when he showed up, and most of the time, simply just not there. Sometimes he telephoned me at school, his voice very far away, and we had long conversations, not so much about school work but whether I was playing enough sport, about my mother and brother. He rarely visited me in school and when he did, it was the same, he was visiting me but not available, because he was once again surrounded by people. I was hugged, briefly talked to, and then, on my own. I felt lost, isolated and very, very alone. One author of a chapter in this volume shares her experience of entry into boarding school life, One distinct early experience, something I surprised myself with, was homesickness during the first two months of shift to boarding school. I surprised myself because I was eager to leave home, the city and state and everything that it stood for. I was excited about the new adventure that I assumed awaited me. However, the early months were physiologically and emotionally excruciating as much as they were rich with new possibilities of starting afresh, making new friends, just being alive in the beautiful setting that was the school. I understand that it was the unfamiliarity of the place, and the community, the new world that I had stepped into that was unsettling. Waking up every day in the morning in an unexpected place left me floundering a little. It makes me realise now, that as children, how much quiet strength we find in routine and that which is known to us ...

This commentary brings home to us the idea that it is the unfamiliarity that creates the emotional experience of loss, insecurity and vulnerability. It is the task of schools to bridge this gap by creating a nurturing environment based on care, affection and an equal partnership. While the emotional experience of loss would be experienced by all new entrants to school, the sense of not having access to the warmth and affection of familial life is particularly the case in boarding school. Boarding schools do, however, vary in the kind of disciplinary regimes they practise and in the efforts they make to comfort young children and help them feel at home. In my school, there were strict rules about everything and there was harshness and a sense of disciplining, bordering on the maniacal, that appeared to be present in most teachers. It was an all girls’ school and all students had to wear a clean, neatly

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ironed uniform, hair had to be combed and plaited, nails clipped short, no jewellery or ribbons and shoes polished.9 The overall picture that was to be presented was of complete discipline, from clothes, hair, shoes, nails, to demeanour which of course had to be submissive and respectful, conveying intelligence without too much independence or fearlessness. There was a sense in which the school completely took over one’s embodied self and sought to control one’s soul as well through further disciplinary tactics that would enter conversations with teachers, morning assembly talks and the general sense of creating ‘good’ citizens that prevailed in the school. We were being groomed to be ‘good’ girls, in line with our ‘good’ backgrounds, to go out into the world to become ‘good’ wives and mothers, and if by chance, some of us got to do something else, that was a bonus for us, not necessarily expected or sought out by the school. Independence was therefore not encouraged and for someone who expressed her views frequently, my report card sent home inevitably stated, ‘She tends to be opinionated and has the habit of answering back’ or that ‘She is very argumentative.’ This was not the ideal that the school sought to create; instead it sought out passivity, submission and a quiet intelligence that ensured a well-rounded socialisation for a life well suited to a particular social milieu. This brought home to me, quite soon after I completed school, rather clearly the idea that schooling was always oriented to socialisation into the dominant culture and did not encourage or even initiate resistance, rebellion or agency of any kind other than that which served the fulfillment of its own goals. While this approach to inculcating a culture of obedience through strict disciplining is perhaps germane to most schools in India, whether government, private, aided, or any other, the severity with which they are experienced is worse in residential schools of different kinds.10 9 As my loving mother had never taught me how to braid my long hair, I was at a complete loss in the first few days. The matron of my ‘house’ did not resist from pointing out this aberration in front of my peers, ridiculing my incompetence and embarrassment, and sending me off with an ayah to learn how to do this. I remember being humiliated and spending several nights silently weeping under the covers for something that was not my fault. 10 The experience of being disciplined and slotted into a kind of a groove of similarity and therefore the erasure of difference are not something that bring to mind a starry eyed memory of boarding school life as portrayed in some popular English writing by Enid Blyton that was devoured by children of my generation and social class. For a visual understanding of the ways in which boarding schools seek to develop disciplinary regimes of homogeneity, see MacDougall (1997/2000). See also Bourdieu (2008) for a discussion of his experience of boarding school in France.

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Over time, I became aware that this kind of educational practice, with its constant criticism of the students in its care, of pecking away at their self-esteem and confidence, that resented independence of thought and action, and sought only to constrain, control and destroy, was probably not the only form of education available in a country as diverse as India. I was of course both wrong and somewhat naïve in my understanding of the forms of education available and the ways in which different educational institutions catered to varying sections of a complex and unequal society. Nonetheless, I sought to write a thesis for the MPhil programme at the Department of Sociology in the Delhi School of Economics on a theme which I thought would bring me nearer to understanding what ‘alternative’ processes of education were all about. I selected the works of Rabindranath Tagore, Swami Vivekananda and J. Krishnamurti as texts for understanding alternative perspectives on education, its goals, processes and outcomes. I followed this up with a study of a Krishnamurti Foundation, India, school, for my thesis for the PhD programme, which I considered very different in its approach to the children in its care, to the curriculum, to relationships between teachers and students, to its goals and outcomes.11 I cannot say I have discovered the ‘best’ education system, or even the most progressive; each comes with its own sets of benefits, problems and dilemmas. However, I discovered that, unlike my own school and many others like it, there are other schools that deeply value and nurture the children in it with their care. Nonetheless, although it is important that all education systems value their students and treat them with dignity and respect, only some schools in India do so. Children belonging to particular communities and socio-economic backgrounds have a particularly hard time in school, and outside it, as do girls, differently abled children and children who work.12

Discipline as the Bedrock of School Experience The kind of strict disciplinary regime that prevails in boarding schools in India and elsewhere is not limited to such schools alone. Day schools are This was published as Life at School. An Ethnographic Study (Thapan 1991/ 2006). See, e.g., Nambissan (2003, 2006), Singal (2011) and Karlekar (2000) for studies of children in the context of inequalities and schooling in India. 11 12

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also well known for such practices as research and daily news items show us. This culture of strict disciplining is an outcome of the expectation that the ‘educated’ child or young adult must embody all the virtues of humanity and be rigorously schooled to do so. The fact that such severe and often violent disciplining may in fact have the opposite effect is not foreseen or even important to educationists who follow such regimes. Some children are unable to cope with them or suffer the consequences for entire lifetimes, whereas others, depending on their family and social backgrounds, are able to take them in their stride. As Ravi Verma, a chess enthusiast in the U.S., writes about growing up in India, In most Asian countries, kids are being punished physically and mentally, so that they can be disciplined. Every morning in preschool, I used to hide in my house and start crying. I did not want to go to school because I was getting beaten by the teacher. I remember getting locked in a dark bathroom by my class teacher with rats running around, and it smelled bad. The maximum time I’d have to spend in the bathroom was the whole day. I remember crying and looking outside of the small window, watching what the other kids were doing. This experience reminded me a scene from a film, where a prisoner wants to escape from the prison.13

In his important work Discipline and Punish, Foucault (1977) draws our attention to the disciplining of the body that takes place in institutions such as prisons, reform institutions and inevitably schools, that serve to incarcerate individuals for long periods of the day. The aim of punishment is not so much to actually inflict pain on the body, but to ensure a ‘suspension of rights’ so that an individual is made to suffer the punishment at a deeper, emotional level. Changing forms of physical punishment in the 1800s in Europe, Foucault argues, from inflicting mere bodily pain, move towards an effort to ensure that punishment was now to act upon ‘the heart, the thoughts, the will, the inclinations’ and thereby, the intent of punishment is to ‘strike the soul, rather than the body’ (Foucault 1977:16). There is in this formulation an insightful understanding of what educators seek to do through school education: essentially, enforce conformity and acceptance of school goals and processes and, in effect, exercise power over very young children and youth who are in their care and custody for large parts of the day. Power is exercised through first exercising disciplinary control over the bodies 13 Source: http://www.mrbye.com/stories/public_html/Verma,%20Ravi.htm (accessed on 25 January 2013).

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of students, creating what Foucault called, ‘docile bodies’, by spatially enclosing, partitioning and ranking them, but also by seeking to control their minds, through indoctrination of different kinds. This does not happen in a straightforward manner and is a complex phenomenon characteristic of school life in general. An author describes her school experience as a disciplinary experience perhaps common to a school anywhere in India: During my school days great care was taken to maintain complete discipline in school premises and also outside. Rules were put into action right from the beginning of the morning assembly. Anyone who arrived after the first bell for the assembly is made to stand in a separate line and is later given good and stern advice to come on time. Students were made to stand in lines in ascending order of their school class. Kindergarten kids had their separate assembly in their respective rooms. Anyone who made noise or talked was made to stand outside the line and may even be made to kneel down; any fault in following the uniform code, not cutting the nails properly, tying ribbons made of a color other than red also invited the same punishments. Inside the class the rules were equally strict. Any student who talked was made to stand up, stand outside the class, stand on the bench and hold his or her ears. In serious cases, offence like not doing homework and not bringing the required books or copies, the student was ordered to go to each class in the school from Ist standard till Xth and confess his/her mistakes to the teacher present in the class at that moment, and in front of the entire class. This was especially humiliating in front of juniors. The senior classes and most of all standard X had greater responsibility in maintaining discipline. They were supposed to monitor the junior classes when the teachers had meetings or there were zero periods for the preparation of various activities in school. They were also given the responsibility for ordering in line formations when the juniors came up for the classes or when the classes ended.

Students themselves are trained to become disciplinarians as they get through school by aiding teachers and school administrators in the task of enforcing ‘the rules’. They are assigned the role of ‘monitors’, ‘captains’, ‘group leaders’ and the like. These roles are played out with some seriousness by senior students while at school and often result in the bullying and ‘ragging’ of younger students. It results in the creation of a student culture that is closely modelled on the school culture of control and domination. The insidiousness with which power is sought to be exercised by using older students against younger ones breeds a culture

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of fear, distrust and sycophancy in the student body. The most devastating forms of such domination are visible in boarding schools where students are more at the mercy of other students and have no recourse to justice.14 Apart from the corporal punishment that is meted out with unfailing regularity in many Indian schools, government, private or aided, or insinuations and snide comments that are made about students’ caste or regional identities, students are expected to treat the teacher with complete submissiveness and passivity. Teachers are considered the repositories of all knowledge, are to be respected and no questioning is tolerated. Any attempt to do so meets with further punitive measures. The effort of the school appears to be one of attempting to break the free and independent spirit of students to ensure that they are churned out of school well socialized into the norms and values of society. If this were indeed possible, we would have to contend with the social products of indoctrinatory schools of different kinds whether these belong to religious denominations or to otherwise ideologically grounded educational institutions.15 It is important to assert, however, that students do not unquestioningly accept all that is given to them and their expression of their independence, autonomy and dissent takes many different forms, all of which may not be considered appropriate by either those who exercise discipline in schools or those who critique such methods. We need to move away from a Foucauldian paradigm that tends to view all subjects as circumscribed and docile bodies to one that allows the space for self-assertion, negotiation, manipulation and even a rejection, to take place. Paul Willis’s work (1977) no doubt brought home to us the limitations in the exercise of agency as his lads tended to produce forms of behaviour and talk that sought to recreate and even reproduce the ways in which they were expected to behave, i.e., as ‘working class’ lads. Although they rebelled against school disciplining and regulations, they displayed, e.g., a sexist attitude towards young women, and their general attitude did not allow them the possibilities of any transformation in their everyday lives. Students, however, find multiple ways of expressing themselves about their view of a particular text, about the salience of working with the system in order to pass examinations and be in the For a recent study and analysis of school bullying, see Horton (2012). The works of Sarkar (1996) and Sundar (2005) point to the attempt of the RSS-run schools to build a kind of Hindu identity over other communities. It is also important to recognise the work of Froerer (2007), among others, that points to the agency that students exercise while being indoctrinated at such schools. 14 15

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teacher’s ‘good books’, about negotiating school rules and manipulating or breaking them in order to get what they want out of school. This is not to deny that students are not oppressed by school systems but also to recognise that they have voices that can be heard and asserted to meet their own goals whenever it is possible and realistic for them to do so.

Peers and Others: The Experience of Student Culture and School Life Life at school is largely experienced through the world of peer group relations and the student culture that encompasses all school experience. Memories of school are rarely linked to academic growth or evolution, to textbooks or disciplinary subjects. Relationships are most cherished and remembered, and this happens in the context primarily of relationships with peers at school. They constitute most significantly the world that is inhabited by students and make up the student culture of the school. Peers can make or break school experience. The trauma associated with school life is not limited to being reprimanded or caned by teachers and other school personnel. It is also importantly the experience of inclusion, friendship or exclusion experienced vis-à-vis peers. Trust forms an important ingredient of this experience of friendship and a breakdown in trust is experienced as betrayal: Peer relations were defined by trust and my early adolescent experiences of friendship taught me some of the hardest lessons in breach of trust as ‘friends’ were not very helpful and often harmed by misleading. School meant a difficult place during that time. Later on a wiser ‘me’ made friends with discretion. So while friends still meant fun, now I made sure that I was with people who are trustworthy and honest whatever else they may or may not be. These lessons in human behaviour and social relations are experienced first-hand through peer experiences and go a long way in shaping who you become.

For this author, peer group relations were critical to her memory of school, There were small and frequent incidents of pettiness, jealousy, taking advantage, etc. For instance, it was my birthday and I had got pastries for my friends, a bunch of my friends could not meet me in the recess so I

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asked two of my friends to take the pastries for them and give them their share and there were several of them. I happened to see from my class room window that they were eating away everyone’s share and were laughing. This was not an act of friendly mischievousness. They later told me that they could not find my other friends. Another time one of them said we will share all our secrets with each other and you must share all. Later during a conversation she asked for some favour and said that she will call my mom and tell her all the secrets about me. They would study at home but would pretend to be taking it easy and say why do you have to spend so much time studying that is so boring. I could not trust them or expect any help or advice. These two-three friends were always judgemental about clothes, house, leisure, etc. and would be more keen on making fun at the expense of the other than being with you. I left them abruptly and then for months they kept calling me back in the group but I never went back but neither did I complain to anyone not even to them. I used to remember this ‘sudden boycott’ for many years to come when I felt cheated. Now I find it silly and have learnt better, more humane ways of dealing with such issues.

While to the adult eye, these may appear as trivial experiences, they strongly define the young student’s learning experience in school. Such learning encompasses the world of human relations, reciprocity, building trust, acts of kindness and betrayal, all features of the crucial and emotionally binding experience of being together in an enclosed and circumscribed space. The peer group is also well known for its exclusion and even rejection of those it does not find admissible into the tightly knit and somewhat exclusive cliques that girls, more than boys, excel at maintaining. Another author in this book writes about her experience of the student culture and how she manipulated and used her experience to gain acceptability in school and be one of the crowd: I remember having a tough time in making acquaintances. It was always not easy to make quick friends and in Stephens it proved to be hard for there were well-defined groups. They were less hospitable to new comers. There were not one but many cliques, each having a distinct set of members. The popular groups also had the prettier girls. One of the many attributes to be among the most coveted group was through looks and attitude. I remember we had staged ‘Snowwhite’ in fifth standard. Jahnavi who played the lead role almost became school princess after that. She was famed to be really exquisite. In class she belonged to the most happening lot. They formed a well sorted out group who would seldom mingle with their other mates. The class teacher had made pupils sit according to their roll numbers to get more interaction from the class. However this was a partial success as

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within class interaction was minimal and it was more often the less trendy girl making an unsuccessful effort to build a rapport with her neighbour. In the leisure hours all would clamour back to their groups. Boys in this respect were more gregarious. They would indulge in various team sports like cricket or football. During lunch break the girls made circles in the main lawns and would bind themselves to their favourite mates. Gossip was never ending and some topics would be more scandalizing and would get awed responses. Girls would be categorized as not very innocent in case of talking on so-called tabooed topics like menstruation or something related to sex even though subtly. Boys would spend most of their free time playing and showing off their strength. I remember arm wrestling was a rage among the boys. As for studying in co-ed there were frivolous crushes and few typical affairs. There was also some achievement to speak to the smarter guys or being friendly with the seniors. Usages of some phrases and words were beyond comprehension. Words like ‘stupid’, ‘shut up’ were as much exploited as possible. The way phrases like ‘O my god’, ‘O my goodness’ were used made the girls perfect actresses. They were untapped potentials of art as the faces they made conveyed more than words. Not all were expert in this art of ostentation. Normally those who were already confident of their charms were the grand masters. Few amateurs too at times can get a few eye brows raised as by and large all learn the rules of the game. This was not a futile exercise. Probably this school literally taught me how to harness one’s ability and to explore the most naïve way to feel important. Naïve as it seems now but for that period that was probably the most prudent way to savor momentary stardom. I to be very honest was in awe of these stylish girls who had some charm. I guess it was not very hard to feel so. With liberalization just opening up giant markets and easily available access to cable network made someone like me to be smitten by those who have already got a taste of the newer gurus of fashion and living.

Gender stereotypes prevail in this narrative: girls play and enact Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs while the boys engage in arm wrestling. Girls conquer ‘style’, gossip and talk about sex and menstruation while boys show off their macho ‘strength’. Both roles are no doubt performed with a view to being understood precisely within the stereotypes within which they must obviously be played out. No doubt, there is a lack of awareness of the possibilities of contesting these stereotypes that have been learned through the family, the media and the functioning of the school itself. At the same time, the author seeks out ‘momentary stardom’ by trying to explore the ways through which she could portray herself as being one of the charming and perhaps most pretentious young women in the school by using skills of ‘art’ (literally, here, to be artful). The author, in a very

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Goffmanesque moment, reveals the art of ‘impression-management’ in peer group interaction and the possible pay-offs of such engagement to be one of the most ‘happening lot’ of students. This make-believe world is sustained by students while they are in school so as to maximise their gains in intra peer group interaction and sometimes, inflects their understanding of themselves and others after school as well. In India, there is no doubt that family, caste and social class backgrounds to a large extent determine our peers in school. While none of the authors have specifically referred to caste as playing a significant role in this process, family certainly figures as an important marker of peer friendships and networks. In the following vignette, the allusion to social class is present through the acquisition of a particular kind of accent while speaking in English, the language of a particular social class and milieu. It is obvious that those with the ‘gift of the gab’ belong to this group. It is also revealing that group dynamics were the preferred form of interaction over dyadic or triadic relationships. The student having a gift of the gab was admired. There were at times problems in making the correct pronunciation. A heavy Assamese accent was audible. However the girls who wanted to throw attitude made sure they had a more stylized accent. Generally one’s family background had a bearing in terms of making friends. As my dad was in judicial service the quickest friends I made were with the children of my dad’s colleagues. I was not always as fortunate but the times I did have previous acquaintance it was much easier for me to have my own set of friends as there was beyond school interaction. It was unlikely for someone to be completely by himself or herself. One tended to stick to huge groups. One to one interaction was rare.

The author continues: We had quite a few communities studying together in our class. There were Assamese, Bengalis, Marwaris in majority. There was no fixed intercommunity interaction but there was a mutual bonding and common language greatly facilitated that. There was also a distinctive eating style and a lingering aroma of their [food] delicacies almost became an identifying mark. There was this Marwari friend of mine who would get the most awesome pickle and no matter how much we tried making that at home, it was never as authentic. Somehow lunch time always kind of depicted different people coming from different cultures expressing themselves through their cuisines. Another strong expression was the body art. After any festival my Bengali friends would come with red vermillion [alta] on their palms.

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Intricate designs of mehendi adorned hands of my Marwari friends applied mainly on the occasion of family weddings.

The complexity characteristic of school life is present in the allusions to differentiation according to regional and linguistic backgrounds although no apparent caste or class distinctions are obviously stated. Nonetheless, the bonding within cultural groups would no doubt create differences among themselves and thereby in the student community. In the more elite private schools, these differences are cloaked and do not stand out as sharply as they do in government and aided schools. However, the recognition that there is a subtlety to their expression does not remove the fact of their existence. Another author says: Although stratifications on the basis of language and class did exist, they were subtle, manifesting themselves not directly but through popular conceptions of ‘coolness’ defined in terms of accents, clothes, after-school activities, and interactions with the opposite sex. Oddly, however, in my memory of school life and peer hierarchies (which is, of course, only partial and subjective), while students were divided into groups of friends, these boundaries were often fluid, and there were often differences between friends within the classroom (those one sat next to in class, who helped with school work and projects) and friends outside the classroom (those with whom one spent the class breaks, and time after school). Friendships were often clearly (and mutually) demarcated in time and space, usually out of necessity since students were randomly divided into multiple sections within a batch. And even though the outside-classroom friends were prioritised over all others, what this created was diverse pergroup interactions that could serve to preclude clear hierarchies in terms of—as with popular representations of North American schools—‘geeks’ and ‘cool kids’. This might also have to do with the overwhelming and pervasive force of the student ideal among school students such that being bookish was rarely treated with derision by any student.

This last statement above draws our attention to another point critical to students’ experience of school life: being bookish or a ‘nerd’ tends to be a celebrated category in all schools in India that valorise such students. Teachers constantly point to the many virtues embodied in them, ask other students to replicate them, and their status as school ‘toppers’ and frontrunners in fulfilling school goals are rewarded with appropriate medals, points, certificates, school blazers and other forms of public approval. It is not this factor alone, however, that lends this category of students an almost iconic status. All students seem to acknowledge

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academic success as the most valuable outcome of schooling and therefore tend to contribute to the valorisation of not only such students but also to the school’s academic goals and efforts to attain and sustain them at any cost. In government schools there are, however, greater variations in the ways in which different schools seek to address academic success as well as in the students’ celebration of it. Most students in state-run schools seek employment after school and are concerned with academic success only if it helps them attain better livelihood opportunities and is therefore not as a goal in itself. The derisory attitude of teachers at many such schools who point to the inabilities of students (and parents) to meet the academic standards required of them although they do not themselves make any effort to meet them either in their teaching or in their interaction with students has been observed by scholars. In private schools however, to be a ‘bright’ and ‘good’ student, defined primarily through academic success, and adherence to school regulations, is perhaps the aspiration of every student. This does not, however, imply that students are not anti-school culture and do not exercise their will to rebel, contest, negotiate with or change school regulations of different kinds. The understanding of teacher domination and the hegemony of school ‘authorities’ (that includes the principal, teachers and others in a position of authority over the students) are therefore central to school experience across schools of different kinds. The author continues: Such was the hegemonic power of the disciplined, scholarly, morally righteous girl that those students who might, in other circumstances, be viewed as ‘cool’ or worthy of emulation, were usually perceived as deviant, or sometimes, more harmlessly, just different. The primary division that dominated my life at that school was between students (my friends and I) and the teaching staff. Being viewed as deviant and indisciplined by those in positions of authority, rather than my own peers, shaped my understanding of patriarchy as structural—both men and women participated in the reproduction of the social order. As teenaged girls, our bodies were critical sites of control for school authorities (a majority of whom were women). Some of our primary battles with teachers were based on our attempts to be ‘cool’ and too follow the latest trends—colouring one’s hair, piercing several holes into one’s ear, wearing our uniform skirts a little shorter than what was acceptable to the school. In hindsight, I understand these to be feeble goals, hardly ‘feminist’ by any stretch of the imagination, but at the time, they seemed central to my right to individuality, and to autonomy over my body. Most of all, rules stating that we were not allowed to do these (fairly

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harmless) things, seemed arbitrary and illogical. Perhaps not being allowed was what made us do it anyway. We went to such an extent in our imagined rebellion that every morning before assembly, friends would gather to carefully apply black mascara on to the red streaks on one girl’s hair so that she would not be punished by the authorities! The school uniform, too, was the terrain upon which authorities and students played out their struggles for control. As we grew older, the uniform seemed less and less appealing, and girls would make every effort to adapt it to improve their appearance. So the skirt would be made shorter, the belt worn a little lower, the socks pulled below the ankles to show more leg. But this sartorial defiance had its own limits. Doing nothing about the length of my skirt—which I did not consider inappropriate in any way—following warnings from a particularly conservative teacher, she finally resorted to humiliation to force a change. After the daily school assembly, in front of several students, she found me a needle and ordered me to lengthen the skirt by removing the seams. I did so, and spent the rest of the day with threads hanging from my long skirt. The initial humiliation of the exercise, however, was soon replaced by humour, as I laughed at the teacher and her ridiculous attempts at forcibly controlling how I wore my uniform. Much of these assertions of power over our bodies and sartorial practices had, it seems, to do with fears of ‘Westernisation’, possibly in light of India’s liberalisation (although this was a school set up by Christian missionaries during the colonial period). A glimpse of this came from the school’s decision one year to forbid students’ from visiting the Archies card store across the road on Valentine’s Day. The boys’ school run by the same institution was also nearby, and many boys and girls knew each other—being neighbours, attending the same tuition classes and so on. Girls were forbidden from meeting any of these boys in public (while still in their school uniform) on this day.

The strict disciplining about bodily display and interaction across the sexes is not particularly evident in this school (run by Christian missionaries), but is common in private schools across India. There is a perceived danger among school authorities of enabling women to go astray by allowing them short skirts or free interaction across the sexes. There is little effort on the part of such schools to address issues concerning bodily display as the objectification of women or counsel students about interaction across the sexes. The focus is more on controlling sexuality through forms of display, adornment and interaction. It is this that students rebel against. They express their agency through different ways of challenging teacher diktats and forms of authoritarianism. Whether or not their actions meet with success is not the point, it is the students’

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engagement with the regulation through an expression of agency that matters. The agential act may even be an effort to hide a transgression, such as attempting to hide streaked hair, in the account above, or as another author put it, ‘Furtive attempts at trangressing school rules and the quiet sense of accomplishment that kicked in after, was … pleasure.’ The ebullient spirit of being a student does not dissipate in constrained situations or closed spaces, and students are not socially regimented and disciplined ‘docile bodies’. They engage with and construct their social worlds to the extent it is possible. The situation is far more complex in government schools and for students who are poor and Dalit, struggling to obtain an education against all odds. Dalit writers, in writing autobiographical texts, focus on the humiliation and shame they suffer while at school at the hands of upper caste teachers: for example, time and again, my physical training teacher and class teacher world come to the classroom or the school assembly and ask the Dalit children to stand up for some reason or other … They would record our names … It is humiliating to stand in front of about 2,000 children with bowed heads—as if we have committed some crime. (as cited in Pandian 2008: 37)

In spite of the experience of public humiliation, the author reiterates the identity of the untouchable and it is the exercising of this ‘moral and political option’ (ibid.) that lends it an agential form that highlights the widespread and all pervasive nature of caste oppression. There is a kind of fearlessness in naming and recording of the experience that through its very ordinariness asserts its agency even as it chronicles what appears to be a banal part of the everyday.16

Understanding Schooling Our experience of our own schooling inevitably affects our research on schools. We tend to somewhere compare our experience with that which 16 In an insightful essay, Veena Das describes the ‘ethical as a dimension of everyday life in which we are not aspiring to escape the ordinary but rather to descend into it as a way of becoming moral subjects. Such a descent into the ordinary does not mean that no attempt is made to work on this ordinary in order to improve conditions of life but that such work is done not by orienting oneself to transcendental, objectively agreed upon values but rather through the cultivation of sensibilities within the everyday’ (Das n.d.).

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we encounter and sometimes, we seek to justify the past because we encounter a far more meaningful school experience. At other times, we may seek to critique the past from our advantageous position as adults who are now equipped with the intellectual and methodological tools that make our engagement with the past apparently justified. An author sums up her feelings about undertaking such an exercise in precisely the ways that make it problematic, When I ventured into this project, I was filled with contradictory feelings. One the one hand, I was looking forward to the ‘ease’ of conducting this work since I have been through the same system of education and therefore ‘knew’ my field. On the other hand, it made me nervous for there was a need to keep one’s personal experiences at bay and understand the material, the ‘field’ in its own standing. So the familiarity was at once enabling and also a possible obstacle.

The sociologist inserts caution in the face of ‘knowing’ the field and at the same time is deeply conscious of the obstacles her prior knowledge may in fact pose. At no time, therefore, are we free from the past which is central to our constructions of ourselves as sociologists and anthropologists engaged in the understanding of different dimensions of social life. When I started fieldwork in a school that was markedly different from the one where I spent most of my growing years, I felt I was breathing in freedom through the very air that pervaded the school. I have spent several months over long periods of time at this school, marveling at the ease with which teachers and students connect with one another, the friendship bonds between them, the classroom processes that are full of energy and bristle with intellectual skirmishes but are by and large egalitarian encounters, the large expanse of nature which inhabits the lives of the children captured in a space that liberates them as much as it encloses them. This very refreshing contrast to my own school experience filled me with hope and a positive attitude towards educational practice that is perhaps reflected in the ways in which I have sought to comprehend this school’s efforts to accomplish its goals. I could not put it better than one of the authors who has studied at the same school: What is it about a place that makes at least a handful of teachers interested in the project of teaching and learning, mentoring anyone who seeks that support, what is it about some places that rescue students’ individuality, prevent an obscuring into nothingness? What is it about some schools that take seriously living, not mere existing—that make living, if not formal education, stimulating?

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The author is however quick to add that perhaps her recollection of her school experience is embedded in nostalgia although she poses these questions to fellow sociologists of education engaged with other kinds of schools. The experience of being in school is, however, not so enriching or uplifting as this chapter has emphasised. School is that dreadful place that must be tolerated but it is also that hugely entertaining world where we hang out with friends, share secrets, unlock desires, seek out pleasures and learn the skilful art of transgression from one another. It is also that cerebral place where we learn to be nerds, we cram, struggle to excel and learn, to perfect the art of succeeding at examinations or being cast out of the academic world as losers, inept learners, failures. These labels stay with us, sometimes for short periods, but sometimes for a lifetime. This is what schooling does to us; it seeks to make all of us into one kind of social animal. In a Durkheimian sense, we progress from being empty slates, a tabula rasa, into a ‘well-adjusted’ member of the society. An author ponders over her understanding of a girls’ school from her own experience of being in a single sex school and arrives at a crucial conclusion about the role of all schools in reproducing the social order: When we first began fieldwork at … school, I thought to myself, how different this school is, and how different my teenage years were from the girls at this school. And our experiences were probably remarkably different— we came from very different economic and social backgrounds; our access to education, information, and opportunity differed; our peer interactions centred on very different after-school activities. And yet, as I reflect on my school and theirs, I am struck by how similar they were, both trying to construct moral, disciplined women—modestly dressed, and well-behaved— through controls on sartorial practices, on appearances, on movements, on sexuality. I realised that the school’s unique role in maintaining and reinforcing the patriarchal social order transcended the boundaries of class, region and religion.

This vignette draws out the importance of schooling as both a ‘conservative force’ and also as an agent of cultural and social reproduction in society.17 This is not a new finding but one that serves to emphasise the paradox that schools are cloaked in tradition much as they try to educate, or to draw out young minds into the future through access to new forms 17 An early essay by Bourdieu was entitled ‘The School as a Conservative Force’. See Bourdieu (1974).

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of knowledge and skills. Schools in this sense are the keepers of tradition and, simultaneously, the bearers of change and transformation, not only through what they seek to do but, significantly, through what the participants in them seek to make of them.

Concluding Remarks In an early essay, T.N. Madan (1975) examines the dilemmas of living intimately with strangers during the period he was engaged in fieldwork among the Kashmiri Pandits in rural Kashmir. He was at home in the field and yet in his own community people were strangers to him. His was the sociological eye that sought intimacy from an inculcated strangeness. For the sociologist of education, the study of schools is embedded in the experience of a similar sense of ‘strangeness’. The familiarity, however, emerges from the experience of having been a student in a school, somewhere, at some point of time. This is what makes the task of the sociologist of schooling a unique exercise: at once inside a strange space but from a remembered past. The aim of this chapter has been to acknowledge this past in the construction of the present and to recognise the possibilities this opens up for our understanding of different kinds of schools in India.

References Berk, L. 1980. ‘Education in Lives: Biographic Narratives in the Study of Educational Outcomes’, The Journal of Curriculum Theorizing, 2 (2): 88–153. Bourdieu, Pierre. 1974. ‘The School as a Conservative Force: Scholastic and Cultural Inequalities’, in John Eggleston (ed.), Contemporary Research in the Sociology of Education, pp. 32–46. Cambridge: Methuen & Co. Ltd. ———. 2008. Sketch for a Self-Analysis (Trans. Richard Nice). Chicago, IL: The University of Chicago Press. Bruner, Jerome. 1990. Acts of Meaning. Cambridge: Harvard University Press. Clifford, James. 1986. ‘Introduction: Partial Truths’, in James E. Clifford and George Marcus (eds), Writing Culture. The Poetics and Politics of Ethnography, pp. 1–26. Berkeley, CA; Los Angeles, CA: London: University of California Press.

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Connelly, F. Michael and D. Jean Clandinin. 1990. ‘Stories of Experience and Narrative Inquiry’, Educational Researcher, 19 (5): 2–14. Das, Veena. n.d. Ordinary Ethics: The Pleasures and Perils of Everyday Life. Available online at http://www.academia.edu/1241779/Das_Ordinary_Ethics (accessed on 28 January 2013). Ellis, Carolyn. 1999. ‘Heartful Anthropology’, Qualitative Health Research, 9 (5): 669–683. Ellis, Carolyn, Tony E. Adams and Arthur P. Bochner. 2011. ‘Autoethnography. An Overview’, Forum. Qualitative Social Research, 12 (1). Available online at http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:0114-fqs1101108 (accessed on 10 December 2013). Foucault, Michel. 1977. Discipline and Punish. The Birth of the Prison (Trans. Alan Sheridan). New York, NY: Vintage Books, Random House. Froerer, Peggy. 2007. ‘Disciplining the Saffron Way. Moral Education and the Hindu Rashtra’, Modern Asian Studies, 41 (5): 1033–1071. Guru, Gopal. 2002. ‘How Egalitarian are the Social Sciences in India?’ Economic and Political Weekly of India, XXXVI (50): 5003–5009. Horton, Paul. 2012. Bullied into It—Bullying, Power and the Conduct of Conduct. London: Tufnell Press and Ethnography and Education Publishing. Karlekar, Malavika. 2000. ‘Girls’ Access to Schooling: An Assessment’, in Rekha Wazir (ed.), The Gender Gap in Basic Education: NGOs as Change Agents, pp. 80–114. New Delhi; London: SAGE. Karlekar, Malavika and Rudrangshu Mukherjee. 2009. ‘Introduction’, in Malavika Karlekar and Rudrangshu Mukherjee (eds), Remembered Childhood: Essays in Honour of Andre Beteille, pp. vii–xvi. New Delhi: Oxford University Press. Kanu, Yatta and Mark Glor. 2012. ‘“Currere” to the Rescue? Teachers as “Amateur Intellectuals” in a Knowledge Society’, in Susan Gibson (ed.), Canadian Curriculum Studies: Trends, Issues and Influences, pp. 11–28. Vancouver, B.C.: Pacific Educational Press. MacDougall, David. 1997/2000. Doon School Chronicles, Centre for CrossCultural Research, Australian National University, 143 minutes. Macfarlane, Alan. 2010. ‘Of Dragons, Hobbits and Anthropologists,’ in Malavika Karlekar and Rudrangshu Mukherjee (eds), Remembered Childhood. Essays in Honour of Andre Beteille, pp. 1–18. New Delhi: Oxford University Press. Madan, T.N. 1975. ‘On Living Intimately with Strangers’, in A. Beteille (ed.), Encounter and Experience: Personal Accounts of Fieldwork, pp. 131–156. New Delhi: Vikas Publishing House. Nambissan, Geetha B. 2003. ‘Social Exclusion, Children’s Work and Education: A View from the Margins’, in Naila Kabeer, Geetha B. Nambissan and Ramya Subrahmanian (eds), Child Labour and the Right to Education in South Asia: Needs versus Rights, pp. 109–141. New Delhi; Thousand Oaks, CA; London: SAGE.

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Nambissan, Geetha B. 2006. ‘Dalits and the Right to Education’, in Ravi Kumar (ed.), The Crisis of Elementary Education in India. New Delhi; London; Thousand Oaks, CA: SAGE. Pandian, M.S.S. 2008. ‘Writing Ordinary Lives’, Economic and Political Weekly of India, IVXXX (38): 34–40. Pinar, William F. 1975. The Method of Currere. Paper presented at the annual meeting of the American Educational Research Association. pp. 1–19. Available online at http://www.eric.ed.gov/PDFS/ED104766.pdf (accessed on 10 December 2013). ———. 1978. ‘Notes on the Curriculum Field’, Educational Researcher, 7 (8): 5–12. ———. 1994. Autobiography, Politics and Sexuality: Essays in Curriculum Theory 1972–1992. New York, Bern, Berlin, Frankfurt/M, Paris: Peter Lang Academic Publishers. ———. 2004/ 2011. What is Curriculum Theory? Routledge: Taylor and Francis. Sarkar, Tanika. 1996. ‘Educating the Children of the Hindu Rashtra: Notes on RSS Schools’, in P. Bidwai, H. Mukhia and A. Vanaik (eds), Religion, Religiosity and Communalism. New Delhi: Manohar Publishers. Singal, Nidhi. 2011. ‘Disability, Poverty and Education: Implications for Policies and Practices’, International Journal of Inclusive Education, 15 (10): 1047–1052. Sundar, Nandini. 2005. ‘Teaching to Hate: The Hindu Right’s Pedagogical Program’, in Tom Ewing (ed.), Revolution and Pedagogy, pp. 195–218. New York, NY; Basingstoke: Palgrave-Macmillan. Thapan, Meenakshi. 1991/2006. Life at School. An Ethnographic Study, 2nd edition. Delhi: Oxford University Press. Willis, Paul. 1977. Learning to Labour. How Working Class Boys get Working Class Jobs. New York, NY: Columbia University Press.

About the Editor and Contributors Editor Meenakshi Thapan is Professor of sociology at the Delhi School of Economics and Co-ordinator of the D.S. Kothari Centre for Science, Ethics and Education at the University of Delhi. She was Co-ordinator of the European Study Centre Programme, University of Delhi (January 2010–March 2012) and country partner (India) for the EU FP7 Project on EuroBroadMap. She is Series Editor for the series on Women and Migration in Asia, Volumes 1–5 (SAGE 2005–2008) and editor of Vol. 1: Transnational Migration and the Politics of Identity (SAGE 2005). She has also published Life at School (1991, 2006), Living the Body (SAGE 2009) and edited Embodiment: Essays on Gender and Identity (1997), Anthropological Journeys (1998), Contested Spaces. Citizenship and Belonging in Contemporary Times (2010) and (with Roland Lardinois) Reading Pierre Bourdieu in a Dual Context. Essays from India and France (2006).

Contributors Chandana Anusha is a graduate student in anthropology at Yale University, with an undergraduate degree in the literature in English from Lady Shri Ram College, Delhi University and an MA in sociology at Delhi School of Economics. While she continues to be interested in the intersections of modes of stratification shaping educational opportunities and experiences in schooling, her current research tries to understand how land rights get legally articulated and contested, recently exploring the regional operations of a legislation that guarantees user and ownership rights over forest land. As an MA student, she also studied Filipina immigrant anxieties with reference to the Catholic Church in Milan with a research fellowship from the European Studies Centre Programme at the University of Delhi in 2010.

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Parul Bhandari is a PhD student at the Department of Sociology, University of Cambridge, and a Cambridge Commonwealth Scholar. Her doctoral thesis is on contemporary marriage practices among the urban middle class in India. She read for the MPhil in sociology from the University of Cambridge, and her dissertation was on matrimonial websites in India. She has presented papers from her MPhil and doctoral thesis at various conferences such as at the University of Wisconsin, University of Helsinki, Kyoto University, University of Delhi and Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU), New Delhi. Her primary research interests are marriage and the family. She has worked on the EuroBroadMap Project EU FP7 and has published an article entitled ‘Understanding Europe Through Indian Textbooks: An Analysis of Representations of Europe in Indian School Textbooks of History, Geography and Social Sciences’ in the proceedings of the EuroBroadMap project conference at the University of Rouen, France, in 2011. Maitrayee Deka is a student in the PhD programme at the Department of Sociology, University of Milan, working on informal electronic markets in Delhi. She has completed her MPhil in 2010 from the Department of Sociology, Delhi School of Economics, on corporeal practices and gender in cyberspace. She has worked as a research assistant in the EuroBroadMap project EU FP7, and has published an article ‘Understanding the Limits: The Perceptive, Practical and Imaginative Realm of the Private and the Public Spheres in Context of the Immigrant’ in the Working Paper Series, Migration: Global Reconstructions of Intimate and Public Spheres, 3rd Next-Generation Global Workshop, Kyoto. She has a joint publication (with Meenakshi Thapan) ‘South Asian Migrants in Europe: Heterogeneity, Multiplicity and the Overcoming of Difference’, published under the European Studies Programme Working Paper Series 2010/11, University of Delhi. Bhavya Dore has been working as a journalist at the Hindustan Times in Mumbai, covering school and higher education since October 2009. As a daily reporter, she has been reporting on various issues including the Right to Education Act, issues of employability and various educational reforms. She has also written on other issues including books, films and culture. She has completed BA (Hons.) in English literature from St. Stephen’s College, MA in sociology from the Delhi School of Economics and MPhil in development studies from the University of

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Cambridge on a Commonwealth Scholarship. She has previously done freelance work for Outlook Traveller. Anannya Gogoi is Assistant Professor in the Department of Sociology, Dibrugarh University, Assam, since February 2011. She has completed her graduation from Miranda House, Delhi University, and MA in sociology from the Department of Sociology, Delhi School of Economics. She is currently pursuing a PhD in the Department of Sociology, Dibrugarh University. Her publications include ‘Clean Energy Options and Community Participation’ and research articles in the North Eastern Research Bulletin (volumes XX and XXI). Her areas of research interest are sociology of gender and urban sociology. Tanya Matthan is currently a student in the MPhil programme at the Department of Sociology, Delhi School of Economics. Her dissertation examines the socio-natural dynamics of the mining industry, focusing on the shaping of ecologies, labouring bodies and political economies in the course of mineral extraction. She has a BA in Journalism and an MA in sociology, both from the University of Delhi. Her past research includes a joint project on forest councils and common property resources in Uttarakhand. Her areas of interest include political ecology, economic anthropology and the sociology of law. Anuradha Sharma teaches sociology at Kamala Nehru College, and has earlier taught at Lakshmibai College, Maitreyi College and Shyama Prasad Mukherjee College, University of Delhi. She has recently been awarded a Phd in sociology by the University of Delhi and has contributed a chapter to a volume on contemporary India titled Samkaleen Bharat: Ek Parichay. She has also contributed a chapter on ‘Quentin Skinner on Reading a Text’ in a book titled Reading Gandhi. She has translated three articles from English to Hindi for the Hindi version of the same book Gandhi Ek Adhyayan.

Index access to elementary education in India, 4 agency in schooling, 5–6, 351–352 Ahmedabad city, 10, 12, 17, 156–157, 168, 175, 227, 242, 254n9, 267 aided schools, 2–4 autobiography, 333 Dalit writers, 335, 352 fieldwork experiences, 353 hegemony of school ‘authorities’, 350–351 school experience and a search for ‘alternatives’, 338–341 student culture and school life, 345–352 autoethnography, 334 Benei, V., 9, 267 Beteille, Andre, 11, 229, 337 Bourdieu, P., 68, 99, 99n30, 228–229, 232n4, 334, 354n17 Butler, Judith, 31 citizenship education, 155–157, 176– 179, 228 civics and, 159–160 developing alternative modes of, 175–179 English medium private school, Danilimda, Ahmedabad, 168– 171 Erudite Public School (EPS), 86–93 ‘good’ citizen, idea of, 160 Government Boys Senior Secondary School (GBSSS), 164, 168 history teaching and values of freedom, 162–163

Kiranjyoti Vidyalaya (Sarvodaya Vidyalaya), 138–151 private unaided English medium school, Juhapura, Ahmedabad, 171–175 relationship between understandings of identity and citizenship, 157–159 Rishi Valley School, Andhra Pradesh, 319–323 St. Margaret’s, 200–202 teaching about/for ‘reconciliatory empathy’, 178–179 co-education, 21n1, 25, 273, 306. See also Erudite Public School (EPS); Kiranjyoti Vidyalaya (Sarvodaya Vidyalaya) private school for underprivileged children, 12 competition, 39 convent schools, 7, 16. See also St. Margaret’s Corsaro, William A., 26, 35 cosmopolitan imagination, 154, 154n1 currere, 336 curricular framework, colonial model, 4, 4n4 Davies, Bronwyn, 23, 31 de Certeau, M., 198 Delhi Cantonment Board, 4 Delhi Ladli Scheme, 108 Directorate of Education of Delhi, 108, 110, 151, 161 disciplinary regime, 341 Erudite Public School (EPS), 74

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Kiranjyoti Vidyalaya (Sarvodaya Vidyalaya), 113, 118–121 Rishi Valley School, Andhra Pradesh, 275, 277–279, 282–294 St. Margaret’s, 184, 192, 194, 196– 198, 212–213 Durkheim, Emile, 111 economically weaker section (EWS) category, 25 educational institutions in India, 12 elementary education in India, 4 enrolment into school, 3 Erudite Public School (EPS) academic activities, 67n2 as an ‘Ideological State Apparatus’, 77 beauty and aesthetics of body, 94–97 bodies at, 76–78 citizenship, understanding of, 86–93 consumption, understanding of, 93–99 curricular activities, 70–72 discipline, 74, 76 disciplining of the mind, 78–80 discussion of politics and politicians, 87–89 founding Society, 72–74 holistic personality development at, 78 ideals, 74–76 ideas of ‘ethnic’ nation, 100 Indianness, student perspective, 83–86 individual’s notion of citizenship, 92–93 knowledge of the self, 78 link between brands and consumption in, 97–99

lobby, 80–82 main building of, 73 minimalistic consumption attitude, 99 mode of training of the mind, 79 modesty of dress and habits, 76 as a ‘neutral’ organisation, 68n4 norms, 74 ordered multiplicity and everyday practices ‘Indianness’ from the students’ perspective, 83–86 citizenship, 86–93 parent body, 73 process of education, 68 promotion of Indian culture, 74 puritanical notion of order, 76 references to social realities, 89–92 shared goals of education, 68 spiritual register, 78 teachers dress code, 77 textbooks, 71, 82 teaching staff, 74–76 trust managing, 72–73 ethnography, 1, 8 autoethnography, 183, 334 categorisation of people or actions, 24 discursive practices, 24 ethnographic endeavours, 22–25 ethnographic truths, 335 multi-site imaginary of, 24 post-structuralist paradigm, 23 radical ethnographic orientations, 24 requirements of, 8 of schooling, 11–17, 66 socio-symbolic perspective, 23 types, 183 ethical subjectivities, 155 Ethnographic Imagination, The, 22 experience of education, 5

Index Falah-e-Darain, 229 Fiske, John, 58 formal schools, 4 Foucault, M., 77, 119, 196n18, 280, 342 friendship, 31 Gandhi, M. K., 140, 162–163, 173–174 gendered identities, 31 gender relations in peer group, 6–7, 31–33, 45–51. See also peer cultures in school; student culture age groups and, 48–49 dance, drama as gendered expressions, 60–62 discriminations, 45, 48 ‘forever friend’ promise, 33 jesting, 49–51 Kiranjyoti Vidyalaya (Sarvodaya Vidyalaya), 129–130 making fun of other, 32 Rishi Valley School, Andhra Pradesh, 301–313 ‘silly/sensible dichotomy’, 47 St. Margaret’s, 207–210 stereotypical segregation, 32, 45–46 teasing, 50 trust, 33 TV viewing, 57–58 Government Boys Senior Secondary School (GBSSS), 161 classroom encounters, 166–167 citizenship education, 164, 168 good behavior, ideals of, 164 history teaching and values of freedom, 162–163 location, 161, 161n11 media influence on students, 163 morning assembly, 163–165 peer dynamics, 165 popular culture, influence of, 163

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preference for national leaders, 162–163 religio-national identity, sense of, 164–165 rights, teaching of, 167 selfless service to nation, value of, 163 singing of national anthem, 164 student culture, 165 teacher–student interaction, 166– 168 textbooks, 162 truancy, issue of, 168 government grant-in-aid schools, 2–3 government schools, 2–3, 160–161 government schools in Delhi, 4 Gupta, Dipankar, 228, 242–243 Gurukul system of education, 115 help, among peers, 28–29 Ibn-battuta, 43–44 imagined community, 90, 284 imitative behaviour, 36–39 ‘getting ahead’ of others, 39 text reading sessions, 38 Jamaat-i-Islami, 228 Jawahar Navodaya Vidyalayas, 139 Jesting masculinities, 49–51 Kiranjyoti Vidyalaya (Sarvodaya Vidyalaya) administrative activities, 111–112 all-rounders, 128 annual examination, 116–117 assembly celebrations, 139 assembly ritual, 115–116 average types (students), 128 behaviour and dressing style of students, 136 ‘boyfriend–girlfriend’ relationships, 130

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brotherhood and sisterhood among the boys and girls, 130 buying and sharing food, 137 caste among the students, concept of, 109 citizenship education, 138–151 civics textbooks, 144 classrooms, 107, 121–123 closed circuit cameras in premises, 119 closed student group, 129 co-curricular and extra-curricular activities, 112 co-educational institution, 106 construction of school as a sacred space, 115 consumer behaviour of students, 132–133, 136 culture of consumption, lack of, 137 discipline, 118–121 economic background of students, 109 establishments near, 106 family relations, impact on students, 147–148 fashionable average types (students), 128 flow of authority and power from teachers, 120 formal celebrations, 117 friendship among group members, 129–130 gift giving, 136–137 group bonding, 129–130 key features, 108–109 maintenance and supervision of, 113 moral education, 111 multiple dimensions of rituals, student and teacher culture, 138–151 music activity, 112

objectives, 110–111 organisational structure, 110 principal’s office, 107 Red Card holders, 118 religious rituals, 117–118 rituals, 114–118 school building and facilities, 107 school fees, 108 seating arrangement, 130 sections, 110 strictness of rules, 120 structure and functioning of, 114 student culture, 127–138 student population and houses, 112–113, 142–143 summer, autumn and winter breaks, 108 teacher–student interaction, 123– 127 textbooks, 144–145 TV viewing, 133–134 understanding school as an organisation, 110–114 Krishnamurti, J., 178, 274, 341 lived dynamics of everyday culture, 22 MacDougall, David, 8n10, 10, 48n9, 340n10 Madan, T. N., 355 madrassas, 7 Marcus, G. E., 23–24 McLaren, P., 35–36, 284 mindfulness practices, 177 missionary-run schools, 4n4 monitoring of others’ actions and feelings among the peers, 39–44 Municipal Corporation of Delhi (MCD), 4 Muslim girls’ school, post-riot Ahmedabad , 226 buildings, 230 central objective, 229

Index character-building efforts, 239 citizenship and belonging, 253– 257 definition, as a school for Muslim girls, 229 education in the wake of Godhra, 260–267 geographical location of, 230–231 ilm al adab education, 232 language and individual/group identities, 241–248 language stratifications and peer group divisions, 251–253 language use and learning within the school, 242–248 moral conception of adab, 232–238 moral education, 232–238 post-riots changes within school, 257–260 school assembly, 239–240 science in Urdu medium, 248–251 student population, 230 trust management, 230–232 Muslim Trust schools, 15–16, 155– 156, 242 narrative inquiry, 335–336 Navodaya Vidyalaya Samiti, 139–140 New Delhi Municipal Corporation (NDMC), 4 nicknames, 44 norm breakers, 42 parent–teacher meeting (PTM), 40–41 peer cultures in school, 10, 21–22, 26–27. See also gender relations in peer group; student culture age groups and, 31 creating a ruckus, 35–36 as a dialogue, 26 gendered peer contexts, 31–33, 45–51 gender identity and, 31

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Government Boys Senior Secondary School (GBSSS), 165 imitation, 36–39 importance of, 26 interaction over dyadic or triadic relationships, 348–349 Kiranjyoti Vidyalaya (Sarvodaya Vidyalaya), 129–130 making fun of other, 32, 42, 44 monitoring of others’ actions and feelings among the peers, 39–44 peer acts in playgrounds, 51–57 peer bonding, 35–45 peer discourse, 34 peer performatives, 34–35 Pratyantar School, 27–31 rifts between peers, 30 Rishi Valley School, Andhra Pradesh, 284–285 significance and identification of peers, 27–31 St. Margaret’s, 207–210 street corner state, 35–36 pedagogic encounters, 15, 166 peer relations, 12–13 Pinar, William, 336–338 play camaraderie during, 52–54 gender as an axis, 54–57 meaning and significance of, 51–52 popular culture, 6 Practice of Everyday Life, 198 Pratibha Vikas Vidyalayas, 4 Pratyantar School, 25, 27, 49, 62 cultural life, 57–60 economically weaker section, 25 extra-curricular interactions, 27 help in peer context, 28–29 importance of peers, 27–31 monitoring of others’ actions and feelings among the peers, 39–44 peer relations among students, 27

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rifts between peers, 30 RTE (Right to Education Act), 25 school habitus, 29 sharing in peer context, 30 student–teacher interaction, 27 private fee paying schooling, 4 private schools, 2–3 run by an educational society, 13 quality and equity in school education, 5 Rishi Valley School, Andhra Pradesh, 17, 178n18 assimilation process, 329–330 boy–girl interaction, 307–310 brand consciousness, 286–288 circulation of knowledge, gossip and secrets, 310 citizenship education, 319–323 class identity, 285 clothes and Fabindia brand, 288– 290 competitive and non-competitive ethos, 316–317 consumer culture, 286–288, 295– 296 exclusions, 311–313 excursion and holidays, 298–300 formal structure, 278–281 gender dynamics, 301–313 go-between, 308 hostel-wise groupings, 285 ideological underpinnings, 274– 275 ‘illes’, 296–298 injunctions, 280–281 Internet timings, 281 joking relationship, 308–310 life at, 272 local context, importance of, 300 nature and environment, 315–316

notion of RV vs outside world, 272–273 organisation of time, 277 pair dynamics, 303–305 pan-RV culture, 325–330 physical and ideological separation, 271 popularity vs coolness, 291–294 rebellion against the school, 317 rituals and practices, 327–328 RV lingo, 328–329 RV-specific coolness, 294–301 school as socialising agency, 280 senior–junior relations, 300–301 shared geographic vocabulary, 326 silences, process of, 281 spatial topography, 275–276 student attitudes towards Krishnamurti, 317 student culture, 278, 282–294 student divisions, 279 student interaction and friendships, 284–285 students at, 272 student solidarity against authorities, 317–319 student–teacher interaction, 274, 313–319 submission and resistance, tactics of, 275–278 teaching of history, 323 transitions at, 323–325 Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) schools, 158, 236, 344n15 RTE (Right to Education) (ACT), 25 Saraswati Shishu Mandir Primary School, 7 Sarvodya schools (Vidyalayas), 4, 14, 105–106, 140–141. See also Kiranjyoti Vidyalaya (Sarvodaya Vidyalaya) school cultures, creation of, 6–11

Index Hindu nationalist ideology, 7 media, role of, 9–10 peer culture, 10 popular culture, influence of, 6 Pratyantar School, 57–60 religion, role of, 7 Rishi Valley School, Andhra Pradesh, 325–330 socio-political context and, 7 St. Margaret’s, 207–210 schooling agency in, 5–6 as a ‘conservative force’ and as an agent of cultural and social reproduction, 354 disciplinary regime, 341–345 ethnographies of, 11–17 experience of being in school, 354 formal aspects of, 8 in India, 2 relationship between ‘ideas’ and, 9 school experience and a search for ‘alternatives,’ 338–341 students’ experience of school life, 349–350 teacher domination and hegemony of school ‘authorities’, 350–351 understanding, 352–355 schools in India, types, 2–3 self-socioanalysis, 333 sharing, 30 Singh, Bhagat, 162–163, 173 sociology of education in India, 2 spatial organisation of Delhi, 209n23 St. Margaret’s academic orientation, 191–193 celebrations at, 189–190 challenges in disciplining students, 197 Christian aspects of school life, 198–200 Christian moral lessons, 202 Christian teachings, 202 classroom behaviour, 212–213

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construction of identities by students, 204–206 consumer behaviour of students, 215–217 dress code and hairstyle, 196–197 dual identities of students, 188 functioning units, 185 group norms, 210–215 influence of family’s religious ethic, 203–204 interaction and association with boys, 217–220 interaction with Hi-fi group, importance of, 214–215 links between citizenship education and character education, 200–202 lunch break, inter-group interaction during, 211–212 neatness, 196 organisation of students’ body, 190–191 organisation of, 184–185 parent–teacher meetings, 202 peer group dynamics, aspects of, 207–210 physical beauty and style aspects, 213–214 rituals, 188–190 roles and duties of officials and teachers, 194–196 rules for students, 196 school charter, 186–187 seating arrangement in classroom, 210–211 spatial dimensions, 188 special programmes for underprivileged children, 187 student culture, 207–210 student groups based on attributes, 207–209 student population and houses, 184 surveillance, 196

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state run government secondary schools, 4 student culture, 345–347. See also gender relations in peer group; peer cultures in school Government Boys Senior Secondary School (GBSSS), 165 Kiranjyoti Vidyalaya (Sarvodaya Vidyalaya), 127–138 Rishi Valley School, Andhra Pradesh, 278, 282–294 and school life, 345–352 St. Margaret’s, 207–210 Sykes, Marjorie, 12 teacher–student interaction Erudite Public School (EPS), 70–72, 75n11, 76–80, 82–99 Government Boys Senior Secondary School (GBSSS), 166–168

Karanjyoti Vidyalaya (Sarvodaya Vidyalaya), 123–127 Muslim girls’ school, post-riot Ahmedabad, 249–250, 257, 259, 264 Pratyantar school, 27 Rishi Valley School, Andhra Pradesh, 274, 313–319 St. Margaret’s, 194–196 textbooks, 12, 157, 162–163 triangle of learning, 11 trust, 30 TV viewing, gendered patterns, 57– 60, 133–134 as a cultural medium, 59 issue of ‘plausibility’, 58 Waghid, Yusuf, 177 Weber, Max, 210 Willis, Paul, 22–23, 229, 344