Some of you might have read an article this week by the Sikh-Australian poet, Sukhjit Kaur Khalsa, on the issue of 'Challenging Patriarchy in the Sikh Community'. It was a raw and powerful piece that honestly spoke of the 'inequality' and 'bigotry' faced by a young female advocate of gender equality in the community - an ideal that is cherished within gurbani, but sadly is not consistently translated into practice in everyday life.

 

However, some of the terminology and concepts that Sukhjit refers to in her article might understandably have been new and unfamiliar to many who have not had the opportunity to read about gender studies - perhaps when she made this suggestion to her critical readers, for example:

 

"I suggest you learn more about sociology of gender roles, psychology of attraction, anthropology of culture, human sexuality, and the history of clothing."

 

Perhaps you may have been wondering, "where can I actually learn about these issues, and from a Sikh perspective?" Hopefully this post can help with that question!

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The first issue to clarify is: what is meant by the term "gender" in this context? It does not just relate to whether you are a girl or a boy, but instead Sukhjit refers to an intellectual argument about the definition of "gender" provided by Joan Wallach Scott, a feminist academic. Scott argues that our ideas about gender roles and the 'distinctions' between 'men' and 'women' stem from:

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"an ongoing, fluid process whereby sexual difference acquires socially or culturally constructed meaning."

 

This essentially means that many common ideas about how the so-called 'natural' or 'biological' differences between men and women support the creation and enforcement of separate, distinct roles and rights for men and women, are actually just ideas that have been created by historically shifting cultural politics. Or simply put, the idea that 'women are the weaker sex' and are therefore 'more suited' to domestic and passive roles is actually just a culturally-constructed fiction, which has no real basis in what we are encouraged to call 'feminine nature'!

 

Gender theory works to highlight the politics of society and culture which seek to define and enforce fixed gender roles on us all, often done for the purpose of concentrating power in male hands. This may potentially seem like a complicated topic, but exploring how 'ideal' roles and relationships were historically constructed and imposed upon Sikh men and women alike is an important issue that bears heavily on many key gender-related issues that we still grapple with today (e.g. female infanticide, domestic violence, and mental health issues for men and women). Many of these issues are directly addressed and criticised by the Gurus in the Guru Granth Sahib; but yet tragically they continue to blight the Sikh community, and arguably, society at large. 

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Academics researching about the role and status of Sikh women in the past and present are increasingly utilising gender theory, and working to understand how gender relations informed the construction and development of a Sikh community, as well as shaping the way in which histories of that very community were written. Three key introductory books that we recommend to those of you keen to delve into this topic are: