Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- List of illustrations
- List of tables
- Preface
- Map 1.1 South Asia: provincial/state divisions
- 1 Land rights for women: making the case
- 2 Conceptualizing gender relations
- 3 Customary rights and associated practices
- 4 Erosion and disinheritance: traditionally matrilineal and bilateral communities
- 5 Contemporary laws: contestation and content
- 6 Whose share? Who claims? The gap between law and practice
- 7 Whose land? Who commands? The gap between ownership and control
- 8 Tracing cross-regional diversities
- 9 Struggles over resources, struggles over meanings
- 10 The long march ahead
- Definitions
- Glossary
- References
- Index
- Cambridge South Asian Studies
6 - Whose share? Who claims? The gap between law and practice
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 14 January 2010
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- List of illustrations
- List of tables
- Preface
- Map 1.1 South Asia: provincial/state divisions
- 1 Land rights for women: making the case
- 2 Conceptualizing gender relations
- 3 Customary rights and associated practices
- 4 Erosion and disinheritance: traditionally matrilineal and bilateral communities
- 5 Contemporary laws: contestation and content
- 6 Whose share? Who claims? The gap between law and practice
- 7 Whose land? Who commands? The gap between ownership and control
- 8 Tracing cross-regional diversities
- 9 Struggles over resources, struggles over meanings
- 10 The long march ahead
- Definitions
- Glossary
- References
- Index
- Cambridge South Asian Studies
Summary
To my brother belong the storied palaces;
But, alas, for me, the foreign land …
O my father.
If I take my inheritance, my brothers will forget they have a sister. If I give it to them, they will remember me and take care of me if I need them.
Women of most South Asian communities today have considerable legal rights to inherit landed property. But to what degree can they exercise their rights in practice? What factors constrain them from doing so fully? These questions are addressed here primarily in relation to traditionally patrilineal communities, with a brief contrasting look at traditionally matrilineal and bilateral ones. Although regional differences are highlighted at various points in the discussion below, a more systematic examination of the crossregional variations is deferred to chapter 8.
The gap between law and practice in traditionally patrilineal communities
Ethnographic information, although it is extremely fragmentary, consistently indicates that women in traditionally patrilineal communities of South Asia rarely realize the rights that contemporary laws have promised them. Custom still dominates practice. Hence the vast majority of women do not inherit landed property as daughters, most don't do so even as widows, and few women inherit in other capacities. To the extent women inherit, it is usually under very restricted conditions.
- Type
- Chapter
- Information
- A Field of One's OwnGender and Land Rights in South Asia, pp. 249 - 291Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 1995