Does the image of Indian women as helpless victims of patriarchal domination accurately reflect their lives? Or are they active in negotiating with, and even challenging gender, caste, racial and class oppressions? How far do the main issues in their lives relate to women from other times and places? One of the main themes underlying this course is the diverse ways in which we need to locate women's agency when, for most of history, women had very little voice. Another is to examine critically how the ¿making¿ of ¿Modern¿ India, first under the auspices of a colonial state and then through a post-colonial regime, has been intimately connected with women¿s lives and the ideologies around gender. We will read a wide variety of texts: autobiographies, memoirs, pioneering feminist tracts, films and the products of women¿s ¿labor¿, in order to ¿recast¿ Indian women. The course will start with a set of lectures and will then be organized on a discussion basis. Students will be expected to write short papers, participate in quizzes and discussions, and to do a set of class presentations.