HIS-20090 Essay

Module: HIS-20090
Tutor: Dr. Gemma Scott

Student Number: 16006108
‘Masculinity was critical to Indian nationalism in the nineteenth century’. Discuss
Nationalism in India is amongst the most unique forms of nationalism ever to be studied. The reason
for this is the unprecedented influence of gender in its discourse as well as the unique ideas
regarding spiritual and cultural traditions. For the purpose of this essay we shall discuss Indian
nationalism within the context of Hindu nationalism, this is due to the vast majority of Indians that
followed Hinduism at the time and as a result a lot of the ideas regarding Indian nationalism are
intertwined with Hindu nationalism. As the academic Sikata Banerjee states, Indian nationalism ‘was
itself an imaginative configuration of nationalist myths and icons based on traditional cultural ideas
aimed at challenging alien colonial rule.’1 These ‘myths’ were particularly pertinent when one
considers the gender based aspects of Indian nationalism as Banerjee again states, ‘Male and female
bodies as well as societal ideas defining cultural interpretations of masculinities and femininities are
potent metaphors for expressing nation.’2 Indeed the image often cultivated of India by nationalists
is that of ‘mother India’ with the female body and aspects such as motherhood, celibacy and
spiritual discipline being emphasised. In this Essay we will explore four key themes, the first of which
is the ‘warrior monk’ ideal propagated by V. D. Savarkar, secondly we will look at the
remasculinisation theory associated with Swami Vivekananda, thirdly we shall consider the idea
regarding the two spheres of life that was often seen as a way in which nationalists attempted to
organise their lives and finally we shall reflect on how masculinity and wider gender themes are
critical to any understanding of Indian nationalism in the 19th century.
Before we get into our exploration of the previously stated themes it feels important to give some
context around the ideals that are commonly found within Indian nationalism. Indian Nationalism
1
S. Banerjee, ‘Armed Masculinity, Hindu Nationalism and Female Political Participation in India: Heroic
mothers, chaste wives and celibate warriors’ International Journal of Feminist Politics, 8 (2006), p. 64.
2
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Module: HIS-20090
seems centred around 3 terms, ‘swaraj’, ‘swadeshi’, and ‘satyagraha’. The term ‘swaraj’ means
home rule, ‘swadeshi’ means self-reliance and ‘satyagraha’ means soul force. All of these are
fundamental to Indian nationalism and help our understanding of it. Home rule is meant as political
independence from Britain and any outside powers, self-reliance means economic and material
independence and soul force is a form of cultural and spiritual independence. All of these terms and
ideas come together to form the underlying foundations of Indian Nationalism which lead to the
creation of the ideal of a truly independent India in both spirit and body. Indeed, the desire for India
to maintain its spiritual and cultural independence has been at the forefront of many nationalist
thinkers and theories and it will be a common theme throughout our discussion of Indian
nationalism.
As previously mentioned the first theme we shall consider is that of the ‘warrior monk’ ideal which is
often associated with V. D. Savarkar. Nationalists such as V. D. Savarkar, saw the British conquest of
India as due to superior British masculinity and that Hindus should seek to overcome the British by
embracing the warrior monk ideal of masculinity.3 This ideal combined the British ‘Christian’
masculinity with Indian ideals of spiritual power and their own religion. The overarching theme was
to overcome the British by force, by adopting the martial and masculine traits of British masculinity,
but maintain the spiritual Indian identity, by fusing their own religious and cultural traditions with
the material aspects of British masculinity.4 The reason for the emergence of this ideal was also
heavily rooted in the relationship between masculinity and femininity. Women were seen as the
embodiment of India and that the British rule characterised the despoiling of India, this in turn
required Indian men to step up to the defence of mother India and thus the warrior monk idea was
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Module: HIS-20090
born. Savarkar’s ideas do share some striking similarities with Vivekananda and his remasculinisation
theory, particularly in the area of combining British and Indian ideal of masculinity and the
relationships between masculinity and femininity. However, this could be down to the fact that
Vivekananda was discussing his theories well before Savarkar and the previously mentioned
similarities are signs of his influence and how important gender-based ideals and politics are to
Indian nationalism.
As we have previously discussed the next tenant of Indian nationalist thought regarding masculinity
is that of the remasculinisation theory of Swami Vivekananda. Swami Vivekananda (S.V.), was one of
the key nationalist thinkers regarding masculinity. According to the academic A. Roy, ‘Through his
various writings and speeches, Vivekananda called on Indian men to become strong, powerful and
courageous in order to fight against British colonial powers and address other forms of social
injustices.’5 What S.V. sought was quite radical as the academic Roy again puts it, ‘Swami
Vivekananda’s rhetoric of remasculinization and Hindu nationalism, which sought to challenge
British colonial rule and its cultural influence by redefining Indian masculinity’6 This redefinition of
Indian masculinity was needed as S.V. saw India as being spiritually superior to the west, and what
was needed was a blend of Western stereotypes of masculinity with Hindu notions of spiritual power
and an emphasis on the role of woman as mothers and the idealised metaphor of India.7
All of his thinking comes from his perception that the material and public culture of British rule in
India had a feminising effect on Indian males. The typical British view of India split its many peoples
into martial and non-martial races, the more settled and culturally advanced areas of India were
considered too effeminate and too weak to rule themselves and resist outside aggressors. This was
seen as a humiliation by S.V. and was a major influence in his thinking regarding Indian nationalism
5
A. Roy, ‘Swami Vivejananda’s Rhetoric of Spiritual Masculinity: Transforming Effeminate Bengalis into Virile
Men’ Western Journal of Communication, 78 (2014), p.547.
6
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Module: HIS-20090
and masculinity, as the academic Roy states, ‘There is a strong necessity in nationalist identity
politics to deal with this sense of humiliation in the most powerful ways. The greater the degree of
humiliation and shame concerning manhood, the greater is the necessity and urgency to deal with
this rhetorical exigence—to overcome the perceived threat to manhood or ‘‘virility anxiety’’ by
constructing a brand of rhetoric characterized here as ‘‘rhetoric of remasculinization.’’8 To conclude
this section, the need to reverse the so-called ‘feminising’ effect of British rule in India, Indian
nationalism sought to redefine masculinity and remasculinise Indian men. Thinkers like S.V. and
Savarkar attempted to do this by combining the material masculinity of British rule with, what they
viewed, as their own superior spiritual and cultural traditions.
Whilst the two previously discussed theories and thinkers are vitally important to understanding
Indian nationalism one of the key concepts that underpins all of their thinking is the division of life
into two spheres the academic Roy stresses the importance of the spheres as he states ‘Hindu
national leaders made a distinction between the material sphere, dominated by the British and the
spiritual sphere where the Indians were superior.’9 These two spheres consist of a ‘public sphere’
and a ‘private/inner sphere’, as previously mentioned by Roy; the first of which is dominated by the
British and Western Europeans in general due to their ‘superior’ material culture, the latter sphere is
by far the most important. The ‘inner sphere’ consists of the home, the family, religion and cultural
traditions. This sphere had a gender-based power dynamic, as the academic Chatterjee states ‘the
Inner sphere is crucial to Indian nationalism the power dynamics between masculinity and femininity
were reflected in the wider nationalist movement.’10
8
9
10
P. Chatterjee, The Nation and Its Fragments: Colonial and Postcolonial Histories (Princeton: Princeton
University Press, 1993) p. 120.
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Module: HIS-20090
However, in order to have the most complete picture of the dynamic that the sphering of life had on
masculinity within Indian nationalism it is important to consider both spheres and the interesting
discourse between them and surrounding them. Firstly, let’s consider the material/public sphere as
Bannerjee states, ‘Indian men felt effeminized in the public sphere under an imperial gaze
constructed with ideas of hegemonic masculinity, they responded by asserting their masculinity in
the ‘inner world’ or the domestic sphere’11 This response by reasserting masculinity in the ‘inner
world’ was crucial to Indian nationalism. Simply put, the desire of Indian nationalists was to preserve
what they saw as the superior religious, spiritual and cultural practices of India from British conquest
whilst at the same time attempting to adopt the superior material culture of the West in order to
eventually achieve independence.12 Indeed, it is often stated that the British may have conquered
the material sphere but the failure to conquer the inner sphere was what would eventually give the
foundations for Indian nationalists to grow and eventually challenge British rule. As we have seen
the sphering of life was of crucial importance and influence on many nationalist movements and
thinkers, such as V. D. Savarkar and Swami Vivekananda. This idea of preserving the inner sphere
whilst adopting the material sphere of the British has played a crucial role in attempts to redefine
masculinity within the concept of Indian nationalism as well as reinforcing the power dynamic
between males and females within Indian society.
The final area that we shall discuss is the overarching relationship between the previously
mentioned thinkers and theories and masculinity, femininity and the idea of nationhood as a whole.
As we have seen the British concept of masculinity has had a major impact on Indian masculinity,
with the British seeing India as the ideal place to create their physical, moral and Christian form of
masculinity.13 This of course, as we have seen, has had a major impact on Indian attempts to
11
12
13
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Module: HIS-20090
redefine masculinity for the nationalist purpose. The overall effect of the interactions between
British and Indian masculinity was a feminising one, as the scholar Chattopadhyay states, ‘While
generally speaking there were efforts, at least since the early nineteenth century, to portray the
Indian Hindu male predominantly as effeminate and weak by the British colonisers, especially
following the rebellion in 1857, this perception was almost unequivocally pointed at educated
Bengali middle-class men. Concerns regarding the physical strength, courage and virility of the
Bengali male finally led to the major restructuring of the Indian army under colonial rule. As a
consequence of such identification, gradually through the nature of recruitment, two distinct
masculine-identities were produced, martial and non-martial.’14 These martial and non-martial
identities where part of the British divide and rule strategy but as a consequence it fuelled the
growth of Indian nationalism as a result of the nationalist need to redefine masculinity.
Overall, as we hope to have discovered, Indian nationalism has a very masculine appearance. With
the gender power dynamic such as female nationalists were limited to certain roles within the
nationalist narrative. The idea of heroic mothers, chastity and celibacy all underline the idea of
woman’s bodies being a national redoubt. Indian nationalists see the female body as the
embodiment of Indian spiritual and religious culture which they saw as superior to their British
overlords and as a result Indian nationalism has always had a very influential form of gender politics
associated with it. The idea of women’s bodies embodying the nation was highly influential in the
warrior monk theory as V.D. Savarkar saw the need for a new masculine identity to protect Indian
culture, religion and by extension Indian women from British rule. As Chatterjee states, this ‘new
politics of nationalism glorifies India’s past and tended to defend everything traditional.’15 The past
and traditional of course meaning cultural, spiritual practices as well as the position of men and
women in society.
14
S. Chattopadhyay, ‘Bengali Masculinity and the National-Masculine’ South Asia Research, 31 (2011), p. 270.
15
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Module: HIS-20090
In conclusion, masculinity was not only crucial to Indian nationalism as a whole, but without it is
unlikely that nationalism in India would have taken the path it has. As we have seen and continue to
see Indian society, culture, politics and history still remains heavily gendered with the influences of
the interactions between British and Indian masculinity still felt to this day. A Bannerjee puts it, ‘The
RSS, founded in 1925, and the VHP in 1964, are two major voices of modern Hindu nationalism in
India and both draw on ideas of hegemonic masculinity to animate their national vision.’16
16
mothers, chaste wives and celibate warriors’ International Journal of Feminist Politics, 8(2006), p. 68.
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Module: HIS-20090
Bibliography
Banerjee, S., ‘Armed Masculinity, Hindu Nationalism and Female Political Participation in India:
Heroic mothers, chaste wives and celibate warriors’, International Journal of Feminist Politics, 8
(2006), pp. 62-83.
Banerjee, S., Make me a Man! Masculinity, Hinduism and Nationalism in India (Albany: State
University of New York Press, 2005)
Balaji, M., ‘(Re)producing borders and bodies: masculinity and nationalism in Indian cultural
texts’, Asian Journal of Communication, 24 (2014), pp. 207-221.
Chatterjee, P., The Nation and Its Fragments: Colonial and Postcolonial Histories (Princeton:
Princeton University Press, 1993).
Chattopadhyay, S., ‘Bengali Masculinity and the National-Masculine’, South Asia Research, 31
(2011), pp. 265-279.
Guha, R., Makers of Modern India (Cambridge: The Belknap University of Harvard University
Press, 2011)
Roy, A., ‘Swami Vivejananda’s Rhetoric of Spiritual Masculinity: Transforming Effeminate
Bengalis into Virile Men’, Western Journal of Communication, 78 (2014), pp. 545-562.
Seth, S., ‘Rewriting Histories of Nationalism: The Politics of “Moderate Nationalism” in India,
1870-1905’, The American Historical Review, 104 (1999), pp. 95-116
Seal, A., The Emergence of Indian Nationalism (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1968)
Sinha, M., Colonial Masculinity: The “manly Englishman” and the “effeminate Bengali” in the late
nineteenth century (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 1995)

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Module: HIS-20090

Tutor: Dr. Gemma Scott

‘Masculinity was critical to Indian nationalism in the nineteenth century’. Discuss

critical to any understanding of Indian nationalism in the 19th century.

Vivekananda’s rhetoric of remasculinization and Hindu nationalism, which sought to challenge

constructing a brand of rhetoric characterized here as ‘‘rhetoric of remasculinization.’’8 To conclude

viewed, as their own superior spiritual and cultural traditions.

were reflected in the wider nationalist movement.’10

between males and females within Indian society.

growth of Indian nationalism as a result of the nationalist need to redefine masculinity.

(2006), pp. 62-83.

University of New York Press, 2005)

texts’, Asian Journal of Communication, 24 (2014), pp. 207-221.

Princeton University Press, 1993).

(2011), pp. 265-279.

Roy, A., ‘Swami Vivejananda’s Rhetoric of Spiritual Masculinity: Transforming Effeminate

1870-1905’, The American Historical Review, 104 (1999), pp. 95-116

nineteenth century (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 1995)

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