Maraswini Sen's Paper "(Re)Inventing Feminism within the Discourse of Class Struggle: Women and Intellectual History in Trade Union Movement of Late Colonial Bengal (1920-1947)

How did women trade unionists in late colonial Bengal (re)invent feminism within the discourse of class struggle?

With the global turn in intellectual history, there is an augmented effort at amplifying the ‘small voices of history”. The inherent socio-cultural predicaments make it inordinately challenging to trace conventional sources for mapping the intellectual endeavours of women. Maraswini Sen’s paper envisages rectifying this lacuna by (re)constructing the intellectual praxis of women labour activists in late colonial Bengal. It argues how political practice habitually translates to thought, hence devising a methodology to address the gendered discourse of intellectual history in the Global South.

“Communists like Renu Ray (later Chakravartty), Kanak Mukherjee, and others were producing insightful pieces eloquent in class-struggle and anti-imperialism rhetoric. This paper divulges how these women’s intellectual ventures were critical, ingenious, and not merely a blind emulation of the male members of the party, notwithstanding their marital ties with them. Their emotional investment influenced mobilisation patterns, facilitating greater participation of working-class women in trade unionism and democratising the decolonial public sphere.” (Sen, 2024)

Read further here.

Are interested in contributing yourself to the Journal of the History of Women Philosophers and Scientists?

We are pleased to invite submissions to a non-themed issue that engage with original topics on women philosophers and women’s studies.

You can find more information here.