Description
This book studies the relevance of dowry as a customary practice in Indian marriages. It examines the historical articulation between traditional cultural texts and modern statutory law to understand how daughters are valued and how dowry as a custom defines this value. The author creates a conceptual link between modern, medieval and ancient marriage rites that formulate and embed dowry behaviour and practice within Indian society. This book also provides a critique of the cultural textual tradition of India and South Asia. It asserts for the first time that Vedic materialism is at the core of an adequate understanding of how dowry as wealth comes to occupy such a central position in the field of marriage.
An important study into the custom and tradition of South Asia, this book will be indispensable for students and researchers of cultural studies, women’s studies, gender studies, religion, history, law and South Asian studies.
Table of Contents
Foreword by Professor Werner F. Menski
Preface
List of Abbreviations
Introduction
Chapter One: Dowry and fatal auspiciousness
Chapter Two: Text and Context
Chapter Three: What is ‘good custom’ or sadācāra?
Chapter Four: Legal texts, religious rites and social traditions
Chapter Five: The phantom of dowry in context and text
Chapter Six: Ancient marriage expectations and the Ṛgveda
Chapter Seven: Dowry in ancient marriage arrangements
Chapter Eight: Anti-dowry law: A misguided strategy?
Chapter Nine: Dowry as sadācāra becomes dharma
Bibliography
Index
