A Quiet Smile.

ta-da! A writing about Global and Local Sustainability, concerning women, spirituality, and the environment in India (see 'more').

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Community, Compassion and Landscape: Connections of Social and Environmental Problems
Once one knows the story of a place, one cannot help but respect it, wish health and prosperity for it, even love it. Environmentalists from highly industrialized countries have been quick to point out India for problems of overpopulation, inhumane treatment of women, and environmental degradation, but what they fail to understand is the interconnectedness of these problems and the outside influences, which prevents them from being a viable part of the solution. Though the nation of India at the present seems overridden by inequality, deforestation, clean air and water, and loss of culture and spirituality, it is a land that has fostered people for 5,000 years sustainably, through the rise and fall of many conquerors, oppressors, and land abusers. To look at any of these problems in isolation is to misunderstand the essence of the problem. The status of Indian women and the perversion of spirituality directly relate to issues of deforestation, clean air and water, consumption, waste, and sustainable living.
Many come to India each year with the hope of learning sustainable living, deep ecology, and spirituality from a culture that seems to have a better grasp on it than their own. Indians have cultivated a culture for at least 5,000 years; the present culture of the United States has degraded the landscape of the country and the world, and exploited much of its environmental capital in only 250 years. The Indian culture that fostered longevity and sustainability has also suffered through many empires of outside rule, and presently follows a model of economy similar to that of highly industrialized nations. Since the independence from the British in 1947, India has focused on modernizing its ‘backwards’ culture by imitating and competing with other industrialized nations through the development of railroads and other transportation networks, centralization of government, and encouragement of the growth of industry and factories (Prime, 2002). The resulting culture formed a swelling synergy of destructive forces that undermined the villages, human unity, culture and the environment.
India has been imitating the economic systems of the United States and Europe for over 50 years, cramming centuries of consumerism and profit-driven cultural programming into a much shorter timeframe and onto a people without the same historical context. The result has been sprawling and growing cities cloaked by air pollution, families who sell their bicycles for mopeds and then walk because they cannot afford the petrol, and young people who have no sense of self because what they view on television and in advertisements and what is around them are completely incongruous. The same results occur in the United States, but remain hidden by the façade of infrastructure. In the case of the United States, there has been growing environmental consciousness starting with the closing of the American frontier in 1890, through the formation of national parks, wilderness areas, government agencies and environmental education. The environmentalist movements of the 1970’s and today happened amidst an era of movements for civil rights, gay rights, and women’s rights. Unfortunately with this environmental consciousness, there exists some arrogance toward other countries whose environmental condition seems to be in a state of worse degradation.
The United States was also shaped by forces of colonialism and domination, and many within it seem to overlook the problems of their own country and point to problems abroad. Western scholars point out how many Indians live on less than 1 dollar a day, judging another nation by their own monetary system and completely ignoring the marginalized poor of their own country. Indian women’s rights and environmental activist Vandana Shiva states that “The official environmental response [to the global concern for planetary survival] has largely been one of offering technological and managerial fixes which, rather than addressing or solving the basic ecological problems, often create new ones” (Shiva, 1994). The most powerful environmental groups on Earth are primarily white and male dominated, and coming from a place of privilege and consumerist culture. These groups often fail to understand the interconnectedness of problems and externalize the environment as ‘outside’ or ‘wilderness’.
Women from rural India can often offer deeper and richer ecological insights than these environmental groups of overdeveloped countries, because these women have come from a culture in which maintenance of life governs way of life, and gender division has increasingly pushed women to work for the production of sustenance. These women see the environment as “the place we live in and everything that affects our lives” (Shiva, 1994). They recognize the continuity between the Earth body and the human body.
The role of women in India is far from static, and the quality of life for many is very poor. Many academics from the United States and Europe note the broad range of positions held by Indian women, from high esteem, independence and authority to those of subordination and subservience (Women Images, 1996). While over half of the nation’s women are illiterate and destitute, a few women become quite powerful: 10% of government seats are reserved for women, and Indira Ghandi proved to be one of the most powerful leaders in the world as prime minister. Husbands beat their wives and yet, paradoxically worship Goddesses (Women Images, 1996). Notably, many Western scholars make these same dualistic statements in their books about Indian women, which reinforces the idea that those who are disconnected from their own environment, however good their intentions, fail to understand the interconnected nature of community, cultural, and environmental degradation as they try to fit everything into two or three categories. It also reinforces the mentality of a culture formed by domination of judging people of other cultures based upon one’s own: the United States has a significant percentage of poor and illiterate, a strong history of marital abuse, a high divorce rate, and yet very few female leaders and certainly no female religious goddesses. The women of India must be looked at as individuals, and not statistics or paradoxes.
Spirituality within India is also difficult for an outside mind to grasp and understand. It is not something that happens only on Sundays or only in temples. Hindus call their religion ‘Sanatana Dharma’, or the eternal code of life. It cannot be described in general terms to apply to all ‘Hindus’ (an imposed term), because it varies for each person based on personal beliefs and background, age, region, caste, gender, village, and many other factors. Hinduism is the majority religion, but India is also home to Muslims, Buddhists, Sikhs, Jains, and Christians, but each faith in the Indian context stresses an aspect of spirituality that is all encompassing of every moment of existence. Hinduism is governed by the ideas that everything is a manifestation of the divine, and that all beings or spirits return to the Earth for many lives; therefore all life is to be respected and treasured (Prime, 2002). Such a belief felt throughout each moment of each day by each person is quite powerful and has allowed for the reverence of life for much of India’s history.
Within Hinduism, all Gods, Goddesses, and Deities can be understood to be manifestations of one ultimate reality, and they are worshipped separately for their individual traits and personalities. Many goddesses such as Parvati, Lakshmi, and Sarasvati are wives or consorts of male God counterparts and upon first glance seem to be valued primarily as ‘model Hindu wives and mothers’: obedient, devoted, fertile, and calming. Many Goddesses do have these qualities, but one must also recognize the interdependent and complimentary nature of the relationships between these Gods and Goddesses. Each are dependent on the other and the pair are often viewed as one joined being, and worshipped as androgynous, while the differences are still recognized and celebrated. Also, several Goddesses portray alternate and less mainstream feminine qualities: Radha is the adulterous consort of Krishna who renounces everything for her lord and lover and is driven by jealousy of other women; Durga is a warrior goddess who rides a lion and is independent of men but entices them to battle with her beauty; and Kali is a fearsome warrior who incites people to rage and promotes dangerous activity while wearing a necklace of skulls and dripping blood from her mouth. Often more important to the lives of villagers are the specific deities associated with their village. These protector deities are almost exclusively female, and do not always take human forms. They are concerned with the well-being of that particular village, and are able to inflict pain but also prevent it. The village often views themselves as belonging to their particular Goddess (Kinsley, 1986). This common worship creates a strong community that values and cares for all members and recognizes differences.
Traditionally, each village also protected three types of forest in and around its boundaries. Land was cleared for agriculture and houses, but to completely remove the forest was to remove a great source of natural wealth in fodder, timber, roots, herbs, soil fertility, pure air and water, and shelter. The Mahavan or ‘the great natural forest’ surrounded the village as jungle and it maintained a place where all species of life could find shelter. The shrivan or ‘forest of wealth’ was the basis for the community’s basic needs and prosperity. The tapovan or ‘forest of religion’ offered a place where one could contemplate and seek truth. Ranchor Prime, author of Vedic Ecology, writes, “According to tradition, it was not the trees that should be in the village, but the village that should be among the trees. Villages were planned in a way that useful trees enshroud the whole area with dense groves and gardens” while space for wilderness and self study was situated around the village (Prime, 2002). The village way of life ensured the well-being of all its members through these three forest types. When strong community and a love for all life are inherent to a cultural worldview and spirituality, sustainability and freedom from oppression manifest.
The perversion of this spirituality by a shift of values to consumerism and greed breaks down community and severs the cultural continuity between an individual, a community, and the Earth. The most violent abuse of women, bride burnings, often happens as a direct result of a wife not bringing enough dowry to the marriage. Similarly, if a woman’s husband dies, she is seen as a burden on society and encouraged or pushed onto her husband’s funeral pyre to be burned alive (Bumiller, 1990). When a culture starts to value conquest and control more than compassion, moving from communion to patriarch, beings with less quantifiable work get marginalized (Sisters of the Earth, 1991). The externalization of women’s work and nature’s work from the dominant economic thought has allowed the contributions of women and nature to be exploited but not recognized, though these tend to be the contributions that provide the most basic necessities for life rather than for profit. The link goes far deeper into cultural programming; women and nature are often compared as synonymous. Francis Bacon, principal founder of modern science, described “nature as a woman, and science as a quest to capture her, subdue her, and wrest her secrets from her virgin territory” (Sisters of the Earth, 1991). The subordination of Indian culture and spirituality by British rule and by the country’s subsequent move towards industrialization and modernization has caused serious environmental degradation and devaluing of women.
Deforestation in particular has been significantly detrimental to health and community around India. Villages gradually gave in to the country’s demand for timber, and allowed the sacred groves to be cut until throughout India few remained. Simultaneously, people had to pay more to get their basic needs met rather than gather food and fuel from their immediate surroundings, had to focus on earning enough to support the family as housing, food, and water became more privately owned and operated, and could not afford to send all children to school. Often young girls have to stay home to help with housework and childcare; most parents rationalize that an educated man can make much more money than an educated woman to support the family. Without the trees, water, soil and air quality went way down and increased instances of costly disease while undermining the abilities of farmers to farm. The situation has degraded to the point where women have very little control over how many children to have, and often have more than they desire because they follow a safety in numbers mentality to ensure that enough children will survive to adulthood to care for the parents. By focusing on making profits rather than community, Indians are losing their ability to profit from anything.
Change is coming from the very same downtrodden women who have been marginalized throughout this process of commercialization. Women from villages have been getting together and forming bank groups to offer low interest loans to group members, so that a woman might prevent her husband or son from taking her earnings and spending them without her approval, or so that a woman does not have to take out a high interest loan from a bank that she does not understand because she cannot read. Activist Ela Bhatt founded one of the most powerful women’s trade unions in India and university professor Vina Mazumdar is working to stop government corruption, and founded the Centre for Women’s Development Studies. The state of Kerala currently has one of the highest quality of life to lowest annual income ratios in the world, 97% of the people are literate, and population growth is stable because the government pushed for education of women (Bumiller, 1990). The most famous struggle of Mukti Sangharsh meaning ‘Liberation Struggle’ or ‘Exploited Peasants, Workers and Toilers’ Liberation Struggle’ (the majority of whom are female) centered on building a small dam to hold rainwater for the irrigation of 900 acres in two villages, operating on the principle that clean water should be provided on an equal basis to all (Shiva, 1994). The members of a culture that feel its problems the most potently are often the most motivated to organize and find solutions. Indians are still for the most part directly in contact with the declining natural world, and as they realize the culture, spiritual, health, and environmental support that they are losing, more and more they are coming together to find real solutions that work for everyone.
The process of finding and implementing solutions that do not cause more problems needs people who understand the interconnectedness of the problems and are willing to work on multiple scales and include all stakeholders. Just as the status of Indian women and the perversion of spirituality directly relate to issues of deforestation, clean air and water, consumption, waste, and sustainable living, the formation of a solution directly relates to the recognition and understanding of these problems, and willingness to be a force of positive change. India does not need ignorant criticism anymore than any being can benefit from such unenlightened jabbering. Nay, India needs people willing to restore community, foster the environment, and seek truth and the divine with every fiber of their being.

Bibliography
Bumiller, Elisabeth. May You Be the Mother of a Hundred Sons: A Journey Among the Women of India. (1990). Swapna Printing Works: India.
Kinsley, David. Hindu Goddesses: Visions of the Divine Feminine in the Hindu Religious Tradition. (1986). Shri Jainendra Press: Delhi, India.
Prime, Ranchor. Vedic Ecology: Practical Wisdom for Surviving the 21st Century. (2002). Mandala Publishing: Novato, CA.
Shiva, Vandana. Close to Home: Women Reconnect Ecology, Health and Development Worldwide. (1994). Vandana Shiva Ed. New Society Publishers: Philadelphia, PA.
Sisters of the Earth: Women’s Prose and Poetry about Nature. (1991). Lorraine Anderson, Ed. Vintage Books: New York City, New York.
Women Images. (1996). Pratibha Jain and Rajan Mahan, Eds. Rawat Publications: New Delhi, India.

Posted by: Deborah Krug on Apr 26, 07 | 9:03 am

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