Anurag’s Reviews > Six Months In India, Volume 1 > Status Update

Given such disparities it even a slight condescension could be refreshing - for example - by Mary saying that Hindoo women - once "developed" by the West - might not be very different from Western women. This speaks more of the innocence of Western women in those days than the social attitudes overall.

Given such disparities it even a slight condescension could be refreshing - for example - by Mary saying that Hindoo women - once "developed" by the West - might not be very different from Western women.

That Lady carpenter could take a letter from India and send it to the somebody in the US - tells us of an obvious mismatch of institutional power in the empire.

It's always interesting to read the women's perspective towards the empire - as it offers a clear escape from the talk of military subjugation and allows us to look at the empire as an exchange of ideas. That women had higher status in England cannot be doubted. That it allowed the empire to claim moral superiority needs to be therefore acknowledged.

British rule through Parsis is also evident in Mary's notes.

Mary has noted that men in the (native) Student's society itself had taken up the cause of education for women in the Bombay presidency (men who were educated in Elphinstone college).

The ignorance of those days can be entertaining - Mary finds that the Indians have a Greek goddess which they call with a slightly different (corrupted) name.