Krishna Prasad Pokhrel

Thapathali Campus,
Thapathali.

WIDOWHOOD: THE SEVERE LIMINALITY OF WOMEN

Abstract:
Society itself transforms in the form of social devices so as to
control, regulate and adjust human behaviour. Human needs are the
potential elements and always initiate to the evolution of any forms of
social organization or institution. Human life as translated in terms
with an understanding the meaning of human existence, its needs and
interests is an outcome of a cultural scheme.
Widow culture as built upon the ver y foundation on the ideolog y
of patriarchal sex system must have emerged out to meet the ancient
societal need. The liminal state of women called widowhood, still has
the great effect on the lives of modern society. Due to certain fallacies
of this culture, women and men are treated differently. In this context,
this paper deals about the liminal state of widowhood and man-woman
relationships in the institution.

Introduction:
Women and men are treated differently in most societies, and much of the
research we examine would be found in addressing this differential treatment in their
everyday lives within the context of particular structural or institutional arrangements.
Widowhood as a cultural phenomenon is considered as old as the institution of
marriage. Widowhood, therefore, is a by-product of a cultural practice known as
marriage. Simultaneously, it is a cultural construct that built upon the very foundation
of sex-dynamism.

The cultural phenomenon of widowhood in a patriarchal structural

arrangement like the society of high caste Brahman is perceived to be the most severe
customary practice. Because of the cultural notion of a Hindu wife as expected - no
matter how young or old, should remain chaste and faithful to her husband even after
his death. Shrestha (1998, p.129) asserts that, the higher the rank in the caste
hierarchy, the more exacting the demand for chastity. Further, she is expected to lead
a life in an austerity as well do penance in the memory of her late husband so as to
remain in perpetual mourning.

According to Renzetti & Curran (1999, p.174) widowed women have been
outnumbered by five times than widowed men because of their low mortality rates
than men. Women have a longer life expectancy than men. The life expectancy gap
between the sexes had widened to 7.7 years by 1970 (ibid, p.341). The probability
further ensures women to be widowed more in a way that, men often marry women of
several years younger than themselves in such a patrilineal cultural arrangement.

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Thus widowhood, as an inevitable cultural outcome of sex-system has been
considered to be the very problematic issue among the high castes.

Ideological Structure of Liminality:

According to Marshall, 1998, p.371, the term liminality as introduced by
Charles Arnold van Gennep, refers to an intermediate ritual phase during initiation, in
which initiates can be considered either sacred or potentially polluting to the main
stream society because of their anomalous social position.

With this definition, widowhood is considered to be a liminal state of women

as a powerful social construct used to influence and control their behaviour. Women
are considered the potential source of pollution. Religiously conceived notion of
purity and pollution works on the body of women. This principle works through the
cultural schemes premised upon a fundamental difference between male and female
bodies regarding their vulnerability in incurring impurity through sexual intercourse.
"In the case of intercaste sexual relation, a man incurs external pollution, which can
be washed off easily, but a woman incurs internal pollution, which pollutes her
permanently" (Dube, 2001, p. 163).

Marriage and death of husband mark the important events in the life of
women especially in the society of patrilineal high castes; the institution of marriage
has been the central feature of all forms of human society. The ancient invention of
marriage is seen reducing sexual competition among males. According to Darwin (as
cited in Martin & Voorhies, 1975, p.148), marriage was interpreted as a cultural
solution to sexual jealousy among males. Henceforth, marriage has been the major
source of women's fragile life. It affects women in the various phases of her life. It
makes them to enjoy a joyous life or it may lead to a sorrowful one. Through
marriage, a woman as a bride is brought into a new household of strange
surroundings, where she is bound to be confined within the walls of her lord.
Consequently, she becomes isolated from her consanguineal family and at the same
time she loses the right even to visit her natal home if uninvited and unescorted. Her
movement is more or less restricted in the society. It is said that the duties of women
begins with marriage and wifehood is considered as the ultimate end of womanhood.
Marriage, in the case of women has been inseparably associated with her status.
Marriage is regarded as the gateway to enter the reproductive life as it permits social
approval for sexual relationship to the spouses. And it strictly emphasizes on virginity
before marriage particularly to the females. It is because, women's sexuality is
considered as the subject to strict control and therefore directed to one patriarchal
agent. The great lawgiver Manu advocated as:

Day and night women must be kept in dependence by the males of their families, and
if they attach themselves to sensual enjoyments, they must be kept under one's control.
Her father protects her in children, her husband protects her in youth, and her sons
protect her in old age (cited by Sarasvati, 1984, p. 54)

Professor B. Malinowski observed women as the property of men as he

remarked, the wife was regarded as the personal property of the husband as his slave

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or chattel (cited by Prabhu, 2000, p. 146). Human society, in this vein, seeks women
as a type of property that it becomes a legitimate product in the hand of man through
marriage. A.R. Radcliffe-Brown characterized marriage as the means through which
the husband and his kin group acquire rights in the wife. The two types of rights: in
personam (rights in the wife's labour and domestic duties) and in rem (rights of sexual
access) (cited by Moore, 1995, p. 64).
It would be appropriate here to illustrate the concept of 'reification'. George
Lukacs employed it to denote the process by which the social relationships become
'objects' that can be manipulated, bought and sold. Lukacs further observed that there
was less reliance on moral standard and processes of communication to achieve
societal integration; instead, there was more utilization of money, markets and
rational calculations. As a result relationships were coordinated by exchange values
and by people seeing each other as "things" (cited by Turner, 1999, p. 186).
Marital relations are, thus, have become commodified and such commodified
objects now have been the product of sex-dynamism in the capitalist patriarchy. Such
relations, therefore, have become power relations - usually the power of husbands
over wives. Henry Maine assumed that the culture of patriarchal dominance was
evolved in ancient Greece and Rome, that emphasized a spiritual rather than
physiological bond between parent and offspring and both women and children were
reduced to the status of property manipulated by the eldest male (cited by Martin &
Voorhies, 1975 p. 154)

Simone de Beauvoir interpreted as humanity was to male and man defined

woman not in herself but as relative to him; she was not regarded as an autonomous
being (cited by Adams & Sydie, 2002, p. 493)
Hindu system as one of the usual consequences of patriarchy, always seeks
women and her well-being to be derived from her relationship to man. Her salvation
is to be acquired through him. Jones (1974, p. 252) observed that her glory upon earth
and her bliss in heaven and final emancipation depended upon her attitude to him,
specially her obedience and devotion. Gautama (as cited in Manjushree, 1990, p. 39)
declares women's dependence on men with regard to religious matters. However,
Kautilya has accepted the full individuality of women (loc. cit.). As long as the
practice goes, society offers honor to her in accordance with the status of her
husband. Surveillance of the wife within marriage is regarded as necessary and
repeatedly recommended in the classical texts. Narada Smriti quotes:
Women are created for offspring; a woman is the field and a man is the possessor of the
seed; the field should be given to whom who possess the seed (quoted in Dube, 2001
p.121).
The reason for, she is supposed to belong to him (husband) for time and eternity.
The Hindu world view rules women to belong to her husband not only to his life she
should remain as an ascetic widow in the name of her dead husband for her whole life
and even for eternity too. It is therefore a Hindu wife regards her husband to the level
of god as patiparameshwora. She does not dare to utter her husband's name publicly -
the sacred name of her god as to her faith. The real happiness of women is centered in
her husband and therefore, to live without him is considered sin for her. The average

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Hindu wife as Altekar (1999, p. 98) illustrated, would say if separated from her
husband, she would desire neither pleasure nor prosperity nor heaven; she would
prefer death to separation from him. Women therefore, cannot lead an independent
life without her husband in such a male dominated patriarchal society. Hence,
husband was for her a divine incarnation (Jayal, 1966, p. 41), a god that she got in her
husband.

Normative Exertion of Liminality upon Women:

"We are considered bad omens. We are excluded from all 'auspicious' events.
We are expected to stay by ourselves. We are not treated as human beings with life, a
body and emotions". - quoted by Chen, Martha Alter (Internet source, March, 2004)

"…… it was when I lost my hair and had to wear a red sari that I realized for the first
time what it was to be a widow. I spent days and days with tears constantly filling my
eyes, but there was no way out ….[F]rom that time, I was supposed to live the life of
an ascetic, observing several fasts a month, keeping various vows, restricting what I
could eat and showing special piety in the worship of God. I had to be careful when I
went out because the sight of a widow was supposed to bring ill luck. People used to
tell me, "You must have sinned in your last birth. And this is the punishment meted out
to you. Now, if you behave well and worship God devotedly in this birth, He will
reward you in the next birth." - Anandibai Karve (quoted by Madan, T.N in Nanda
B.R., 1976, p. 80)

These voices of widows as cited above are more enough to illustrate the
vulnerability in their daily life. The economic, social, psychological and cultural life
of these women is highly affected by this culture of widowhood. Especially in a
Brahman community, widowhood is little noticed dimension of the most
discrimination that women face. A man may grieve for his deceased wife, but a
woman at her husband's death should face not only a personal loss further a major
restructuring of her life. Widowhood is therefore a life-event which cuts-off former
social roles and relationships that makes a widow to adjust herself into a new social
environment. The widows are not allowed to wear fine and bright coloured
(especially red) attire. She should wear only a single coarse clothing of plain white or
dark color. She should eat only plain vegetarian food once in a day. She is regarded as
an 'inauspicious' thing and therefore should not be exposed herself to people on
auspicious occasions. People think it unlucky to see a widow's face before seeing
other things in the morning and therefore a man may postpone his journey if he
happens to encounter a widow at his sait (the time of departure). As a widow, a
woman is devoid of reason to adorn herself. Thus, widowhood constitutes the greatest
and saddest changes in the life of a woman.

Death itself is an inevitable and extreme shock. The death of husband is a

devastating blow. With the death of her husband, a woman's auspicious wifehood
ends and immediately she falls under into the dreadful world of widowhood. The loss
of husband according to Bankoff (quoted in Patil, 2000, p. 22) is felt more than any
other loss and further it disorganizes a woman's life deeply. A widow is forced to

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change her habits of eating, sleeping, dressing and conversing. She is made to lead a
miserable life that in every step, she has to face emotional trauma, social stigma,
familial exploitation etc. The death of the husband marks a dramatic shift in the
perception of the community towards the widow, as it becomes a transition from
marital to a widowed status. Henceforth, she is forced to find a new support system,
new sources of attachment and new social relationship so as to adjust her in the new
status. Many a time, as Patil (2000, p. 30) advocates, a widow faces difficulty in
adjusting to her new status because the social norms and taboos put her in most
disadvantaged position, and restrict her social interactions.

A piece of poem by Parekh, Nikhil (Google search, March, 2004) would

illustrate more the condition of a Hindu wife at the demise of her husband. Here, the
vermilion means as an auspicious symbol of respect and joy of a Hindu wife that she
gets at her marriage by her husband.
Without those two pinches of vermilion;
she was ruthlessly ridiculed at every quarter of this conventionally
acrid society;
Without those two pinches of vermilion;
she was treated worse than what people could have treated
barbaric dogs on stray streets;
...................................................................
O! Yes for once upon a time it was indeed those
two pinches of vermilion glistening profound between her hair;
that had granted her the status of an embellished queen;
with this same society saluting her with loads of respect,
While today she felt that the worst sin
she had committed was to marry;
for after her husband unfortunately quit his last breath;
she had become the same treacherous word on everyone's mouth;
which she forever wanted to forget;
she had become just one another in the devastatingly augmenting list of "NEPALESE
WIDOWS".
(The word 'NEPALESE' is replaced instead the word 'INDIAN')

Conclusions:
After demise of her husband, a woman is left unprotected and uncontrolled.
And her sexuality is considered threatful to the moral order and family lineage in the
patriarchy. She is therefore, expected to lead a chaste, austere and ascetic life style.
The reason for, she is to be neutered or unsexed and disfigured culturally and
consequently depropertized. Widows in this process are defeminized and equally
dehumanized. This is what we called the liminal state of women as evolved along
with the growth of patriarchal sex system in the society, which has severe impacts on
the life of women.

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