Words of Her Own: Women Authors in Nineteenth-Century Bengal

Drawing on a spectrum of genres, such as autobiographies, diaries, didactic tracts, novels and travelogues, this book examines the socio-cultural incentives that enabled the emergence of middle-class Hindu and Brahmo women authors as an ever-growing distinct category in nineteenth century in Bengal and factors facilitating production and circulation of their creations. By exploring the intersections of class, caste, gender, language, religion, culture in women-authored texts and by reading these within a specific milieu, the study opens up the possibility of re-configuring mainstream history writing that often ignores them.