SERICUL TURE AND THE PROCESS OF CHANGE - Institute for ...

While Table 6.3 refers to all sericulture participants and their
relation to head of the family, Table 6.4 refers only to main
sericulturists. As discussed earlier, with traditional stereotypes still
persisting, it is only expected that a majority of the main sericulturists
are males. Moreover, in about half the nwnber of households, the heads
themselves are main sericulturists, all of whom are married males with a
single exception of a separated female. Most of them are also young in
age. A majority of the rest are sons, most of whom are unmarried.
Female main sericulturist is only an exception. Other than the one
female-head main sericulturist mentioned above, there are two other
female main sericulturists who are unmarried daughters. In one of these
two households, the head is already in his fifties and is least interested
himself in sericulture. He has a son who is employed outside the village
but extends all support to his sister and attends to the outside-linked
activities like procurement of dfls and marketing of cocoons. In other
household too, the head is already in his fifties. There are no adult sons
in this family to take up sericulture. The daughter in this household has
taken up sericulture on personal interest with her own experience as a
Assured casual labourer in sericulture households.
Authority Relations and Dyadic Relationship: Subordination of
the individual had been considered to be one of the characteristic
features of the traditional Indian family (Desai 1984: 13). In such a
system., the individual interests had been subjected to the tenets of the
family and of the caste. The head of the family had the authority over
every individual member of the family. 'Traditionally, authority rests
with the older men of the caste and the man, as husband and father, has
head-of-household rights' (Hollway 1994: 249). The dominance of men
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