https://soundcloud.com/shivani-das-983855902/when-are-you-getting-married-pt2?si=4266c89917104ff99f7d8b849f5a7ae1&utm_source=clipboard&utm_medium=text&utm_campaign=social_sharing
The episode "When are you getting married?", navigates the looming pressure and presence of marriage and other covid-induced situations at home.
This episode is in Malayalam. The host for this episode is Aswathy Nair, a postgraduate in Women’s studies and the respondent for this episode is a researcher who has preferred to stay anonymous.
This podcast is created by Shivani Das and Shivani Sankhla, as part of the Ideosync UNESCO Information Felłowship, June 2021 special cohort on intersectional feminism and digital rights.
Part 2
(Intro music)
Aswathy: Hello, Welcome back to episode three of the Women’s emancipation terms and conditions applied podcast, ‘When are you getting married?’. This will be part two of this episode.
Aswathy: OK. So when so many marriage-related conversations were taking place in your life, and when it was occupying such a huge chunk of your headspace, and in a context where you had to deal with it the whole day - what were some tools or support systems that you had in place or which you had to create to negotiate with these daily conversations and increase your bargaining power, or to navigate because it must have been a very difficult time also, it still is, there is an ongoing pandemic so all of this was taking place against that backdrop so what all helped you during that time?
Respondent: So, when the marriage situation started, at first I was shocked because in my mind I was still a student who was learning and in my head, the identity of a student was what I most liked, and the most important. It was when I had such a stand that my father and mother said marriage time is here (laughs) to approach me. I have two cousins who got married at the age of twenty-three. During covid, the marriage industry or wedding industry became a lot more cheaper because you’re not expected to invite a lot of people, you’re not expected to have a grand celebration, you can have it lowkey. And you won’t have to say that it is because of a shortage of money; it is because of protocols (laughs). Right? So once more my mother and father - because of my economic class location, and caste location, one can say that the accessibility for marriage and wedding purposes increased. So while talking to me about this, I used to ask my parents “what makes you think I’ll marry right now? What did I do? (laughs) I would ask them “why would you think that I would marry right now?” So what made me the most vulnerable was studying from home, actually. People were working from home, but they had an income. I did not. I completely did not have any other income and my studies or the studying that I was doing from home was not validated. I was seen as a useless person by my parents, as in - what is the value that you are bringing to my home? Hm? I’m bringing nothing. So then there were a lot of - when marriage conversations begin, the thing that we come to understand the most, and what that is conveying, is that you’re taking up too much space now. You should leave. Right? That’s how a woman is made to feel small, and how you convince her to occupy very little space. All of this greatly affected me mentally, and my mental health. While planning my future, I couldn’t imagine a future. There was a constant pressure of marriage, hm? I began questioning very consistent relationships I've had since a young age - will they be there for me? The biggest relief, or my support system, were my friends. They never ever - I am indebted to them in the ways that they have shown up for me. During that time, there was no mobility. We couldn’t get out of our homes, what could we do? So I got that space from my friends, and the faculty professors also gave me that space. If there was any problem, they validated that problem that yes, it is a problem. This is wrong. We are very hush-hush about the things that go on inside our homes with family. We don’t tell anyone. We normalise it, but the kind of emotional impact or the impact on my mental well being - my friends and professors really valued that, they supported that, and said yes, you are right. What’s happening with you is wrong, it’s not the right thing to do.
Respondent: After this, things became more tight, as in whenever I would say something, my parents started sitting me down to talk. “You tell us what the problem is.” And then, as we see in serials and cinema - if there is someone, you tell us (laughs). And it’s not about whether there is someone or not. It’s about my decision to not get married. I have a problem with marriage, I don’t have a problem with companionship because my life is full of it. My life is brimming with it.
It is at that time that I thought - my headspace was fully being occupied by this marriage conversation. So I thought why not maybe bring something productive out of it? Because it was already occupying so much space. So I thought of converting it into research. I attempted to study the dialogue delivery between mothers and daughters. How mothers aid socialisation or condition their daughters into marriage. I started noting those conversations. Started studying them. The biggest thing this research gave me is a gateway, what do you say, the way patriarchy typically works - what we’d call its mode of Operandi - is alienation. To alienate a woman from her social support system, from anything that gives them a space to rant, to vent, to actually quantify their issues. That is the space that patriarchy denies. But what I got from this research is access to that space. Access to a community that was going through the same things. I was able to build solidarities with my participants who were contributing to the study - Who were women of the same age or more or younger but were going through the same thing in different ways.
Apart from that, what I got was a new perspective. My mother - my mother and I found this conversation of marriage extremely draining for both of us and we, as women, were portrayed as totally opposite to each other. Opposite to each other meaning - good and bad. Bad - me, good - my mother because she stood for culture. She stood for marriage. I stood for individuality. I stood for freedom. I stood for liberty. Both my mother and I lost a lot of sleep over that. I found a bridge in that too, because my study humanized my mother as a survivor of multiple institutions of patriarchy. If we talk about that, marriage is an institution of patriarchy, family is an institution of patriarchy, motherhood is an institution of patriarchy. It would only be surprising if you don’t become pro-marriage from motherhood. Because motherhood gets legitimized only within a marriage. Motherhood is not what this society values. It is a form of servitude. It is only valued within the ambit of marriage. So the validation that I got from that study, I can’t actually put into words*.* I never thought that my thoughts could ever have any academic value, never - but I got that. And the final report gave many others the same validation that I seeked from the study. The research also opened up a new career path for me. That feeling was very precious to me. To write something out of my own experience that has value. One can say that it carved me out as a new individual altogether. If I talk about right now, Aswathy, my parents know what they can expect of me and what they cannot. Maybe I have not conveyed my imagination, full imagination, how I imagine my life, I give that little by little as breadcrumbs but they have a very good idea of what I will not have. And for that I’m grateful to my friends who always showed up, always showed up, and I owe my life to them actually. Right now I have the space to move out, to have a career of my own because I, through all of this conversation, I’ve made it clear to my parents that, you know, there is a path that I’m going to take - you can support me or you cannot, that is your choice. I will let you decide that, but I’m going. That’s what happened.
Aswathy: We hope that this episode and the experiences and personal accounts shared by the respondent have helped in developing the strength and hope of our listeners. Apart from that, we also hope that this will help in encouraging and strengthening the conversations that try to frame gateways of resistance and gateways of liberty. Also, we thank the respondent for talking with us and giving us time for this conversation. Thank you listeners for supporting us and listening to our podcast.
(Outro music)