Classes of Labour : Work and Life in a Central Indian Steel Town

Classes of Labour: Work and Life in a Central Indian Steel Town is a classic in the social sciences. The rigour and richness of the ethnographic data of this book and its analysis is matched only by its literary style. This magnum opus of 732 pages, an outcome of fieldwork covering twenty-one years, complete with diagrams and photographs, reads like an epic novel, difficult to put down. Professor Jonathan Parry looks at a context in which the manual workforce is divided into distinct social classes, which have a clear sense of themselves as separate and interests that are sometimes opposed. The relationship between them may even be one of exploitation; and they are associated with different lifestyles and outlooks, kinship and marriage practices, and suicide patterns. A central concern is with the intersection between class, caste, gender and regional ethnicity, with how class trumps caste in most contexts and with how classes have become increasingly structured as the ‘structuration’ of castes has declined. The wider theoretical ambition is to specify the general conditions under which the so-called ‘working class’ has any realistic prospect of unity. Cover Half Title Title Page Copyright Page Dedication Table of Contents List of Illustrations Preface Acknowledgements A Note on the Text Abbreviations and Acronyms Glossary Part 1: Context Chapter 1: Introduction: A Symbol and a Portent 1.1: Preamble 1.2: A ‘tragedy of development’? 1.3: An instantiation of the dream? 1.4: A short guide to the text Chapter 2: Classes of Labour 2.1: The temptations of teleology 2.2: On the concept of class 2.3: Citadel or mountain? 2.4: Naukri and kam 2.5: Jobs as property 2.6: A summary conclusion Chapter 3: Building Bhilai 3.1: An Industrial ‘monoculture’ 3.2: Pioneer stories and the development of class differentiation 3.3: The space of the town 3.4: Peripheral bastis 3.5: Of settlers and sojourners 3.6: A summary conclusion Chapter 4: The Price of Modernity 4.1: Preamble 4.2: Displacement 4.3: Churning 4.4: In the happy world of the fields 4.5: Sacrifice 4.6: A summary conclusion Part 2: Work Chapter 5: A Post in the Plant 5.1: Framing 5.2: Recruitment and the reproduction of the workforce 5.3: Reservations 5.4: Compassionate appointments 5.5: ‘Source’ and ‘note’ 5.6: Promotions 5.7: The size of the purse 5.8: Moonlighting 5.9: The status situation of BSP workers 5.10: A summary conclusion Chapter 6: The Work Situation of BSP Labour 6.1: Preamble 6.2: On the shop floor in the 1990s 6.3: Changes on the shop floor (2006) 6.4: Contract labour in the Plant 6.5: The working world of contract labour 6.6: Union politics in the Plant 6.7: The unions in the mines 6.8: A summary conclusion Chapter 7: Private Sector Industry 7.1: Framing 7.2: Private industry and the public sector 7.3: The unions, the employers and the state 7.4: The Kedia unions 7.5: On the shop floor – a case history 7.6: Differentiation 7.7: Demand labour 7.8: A summary conclusion Chapter 8: Informal Sector Labour and the Construction of Class 8.1: Framing 8.2: The character of construction labour 8.3: The labour chauris 8.4: Sex on site 8.5: Sex and class 8.6: A comparative note on recycling work 8.7: A summary conclusion Part 3: Life Chapter 9: Caste and Class in the Neighbourhood 9.1: Framing 9.2: From village to labour colony 9.3: Livelihoods 9.4: Indebtedness 9.5: Conflict and violence in the neighbourhood 9.6: Class differentiation in the basti 9.7: Caste in the neighbourhood 9.8: Caste ‘atrocities’ 9.9: A summary conclusion Chapter 10: Growing Up; Growing Apart 10.1: Preamble 10.2: The changed context of childhood 10.3: Childhood as a ticking clock 10.4: The work children do 10.5: Shalini’s class 10.6: The end of childhood 10.7: Caste, class and childhood: A summary conclusion Chapter 11: Marriage and Remarriage 11.1: Framing 11.2: Ankalu’s errant wife 11.3: The ‘virgin’ bride and the ‘made woman’ 11.4: Breaking the marriage bond: Some ‘quantitative gossip’ 11.5: BSP and the stability of marriage 11.6: Conjugality and the growth of intimacy 11.7: The burdens of women 11.8: A summary conclusion Chapter12: Self-inflicted Death 12.1: Framing 12.2: Local discourse on suicide 12.3: The statistical fog 12.4: On the causes of ‘causes’ 12.5: Suicide and the law 12.6: A summary conclusion Part 4: Concluding Chapter 13: Focusing and Expanding the Lens 13.1: Framing 13.2: Stocktaking 13.3: The contrast with Rourkela 13.4: In other company towns 13.5: Naukri and kam in other settings References Index The book deals with social transformations brought about by industrialization in and around the steel town of Bhilai in the Indian state of Chhattisgarh.Please noe: T&F does not sell the print edition of this title is South Asia. __Classes of Labour: Work and Life in a Central Indian Steel Town__