This paper discusses the educational experiment of Rabindranath Tagore and its larger implications for world peace. As violence becomes the new normal amongst the youth of the world, the challenge for societies is to build cultures of peace instead of cultures of violence. In this context, this paper discusses the ideas of Tagore on education, and…

While traditional HIV prevention programs with female sex workers (FSWs) in Karnataka, India, have focused on reducing HIV transmission between FSWs and clients through increased condom use, these programs have not fully addressed the transmission risk between FSWs and their nonpaying intimate partners (IPs). Condom use is infrequent and violence…

Peer relationships in secondary schools in two different cultural areas of India are compared. A general theory of status relations and a specification of the distinctive cultural features of each area are used to explain the observed differences in peer inequality, clique formation, petty deviance, putdowns, fashion consciousness, romantic…

Through a close analysis of an Indian woman's unsuccessful romance narrative, this article examines how class-based ideologies and prejudices concerning English and vernacular medium education sustain and perpetuate dismissive and disparaging attitudes toward people educated in the vernacular. The analysis utilizes theoretical understandings of…

Although arranged marriage has survived in India, the custom is increasingly challenged by the current influx of new commodities, media, and ideas. Interviews with 15 male and 15 female unmarried professionals, age 22 to 29, in Vadodara, Gujarat, showed that educated youth have moved beyond the conventional love-versus-arranged marriage dichotomy.…

Transitions to adulthood are usually defined by markers such as leaving school, starting a first job, leaving the parental home, forming a first union, marrying and having a first child. Youth policy remains strongly influenced by these linear transitions, and by the metaphor of a "pathway" from school to work and adulthood, taking…

This paper aims to understand why and how young Muslim women pursue sexual relationships in the urban bustees (slums) of Kolkata, West Bengal, India. I discuss how girls in heterosexual romantic relationships decide where, when and how to have sex, and the importance of class discourses and popular Bollywood culture in this decision-making…

The writings of Indians in English provide a rich ground to explore the ways in which travellers and migrants from India to England relate to the realities of the place and to their place in it. Language and the literary education that characterised English education in India during colonial times play an important role in the construction of…

The current study examined 1316 South Asian youth socialized in progressively Westernized contexts: "traditional" Indian homeland single-sex schools, "transitional" Indian homeland co-educational schools, and the immigrant "diaspora" in Canadian schools. Results showed youth in the three contexts were similar on…

To date, little research has been published related to cross-cultural differences in such marital factors as love, intimacy, happiness, and satisfaction. The present study compares factors contributing to marital satisfaction and examines correlations between the importance of these factors and the level of satisfaction for three groups: Asian…

A cross-sectional study in a representative sample of 751 women, living in slums, examined their perspectives on partner and relationship factors of domestic violence. More than 17% of women experienced physical violence in the past year. Individual factors related to the husband--namely, poor socioeconomic status, use of alcohol, extramarital…

The media landscape in urban India has changed so rapidly in the past 10 years that it is not easy to consider the ways in which these changes interact with people's lives and beliefs. Apocalyptic pronouncements about the ways in which MTV-style television, films and the Internet are destroying "genuine" Indian culture by promoting…