FAMILY AND IDENTITY IN INDIA | Tanisha Singh

Context: The following paper is an essay on my views about the Family, its constituents, the inter and intra dynamics of it within the society and gender and its conception, in the Indian context in particular, based on the text given as well as what emerged for me during the class discourse. The essay sort of ties together all the three questions posed in this paper, without necessarily having a demarcation for each answer separately. I have tried to make points that each add to and apply to all three questions of this paper, which all add up to make one big point in the essay. Since our experience of concepts of the Family, Gender, and the Couple all coexist together and parallelly forming a holistic experience, I felt it most natural to write in a way that one idea flows and feeds into the other as a holistic thought, without necessarily or entirely separating the different questions posed in this paper.

Any couple or any sub-unit of relationship exists within a larger social group ever since ancient civilization. Naturally, because of the multitudinous nature of social groups and interactions, there is a tendency and to some extent a need to organize people into manageable and organised groups. The emergence of which is argued differently by different theorists, while some attribute the origins of the family as a social group with the emergence of personal property, and others who see it as a result of agrarian settlement which required setting up of a permanent set of individuals with a set of duties to essentially enable the tending to agricultural farms that was a long drawn tedious process, hence possible to be carried out by permanent settlers. What is evident is that there seems to be a need to organize the human population into manageable groups to ease the sharing of resources as well as to serve other social and emotional functions that come with being a  human.

Otto Kernberg argues that there is an ambivalent relationship between the group and the couple because while there is a lot of admiration from the group but there is also an unconscious tendency to destroy the couple. The couple has to then protect itself against the invasion and seduction is that come from the group rivalries and the possibility of triangular relationships.   

This dynamic is sort of magnified in the context of the modern Indian families who are laden with a historic inclination towards existing in a joint family structure, and an emerging trend towards the psychological and/or physical nuclearization of the couple into a  separate unit of two. Theorists have attributed this trend to multiple factors such as the rise of the urban middle class, modernity, women’s literacy and financial independence,  urbanization, easier mobility across the world, among other reasons. These factors seem to collectively lead to a tendency to alter a settlement system or family system to suit one’s needs in terms of career requirements, economical reasons, psychological reasons, or even simply choice and preferences.

I would consider that progress because one is not tied to a family structure that goes against their well being simply because of tradition or convention. The autonomy of the individual or the couple unit in structuring their personal family life to suit their needs, allows the members to rethink the elements of family life and to create a culture customized to fit the new and personal dynamic between the couple, leading to a more democratic household. I would imagine that this leads to greater filtering of factors governing one’s life at home, leading to a more refined and flexible culture that encourages attitudes of tolerance and acceptance towards those who are different from you. For example, a family with two gay men will assert a different set of values in their households, which may produce children who are more sensitive to the LGBTQ+ community and in general more comfortable with the idea of the other ‘who is different from you’.    

Or let’s say, a feminist woman who makes the conscious choice to move out with her husband from their paternal homes so as to not conform to the toxic patriarchal treatment of women in India, who would naturally create a new set of norms, more equalizing and democratic in nature for their children to experience, who in turn would take that gender-equal thought process to school and to the world at large.

This will not only benefit society at large but also benefit the individual itself, who is moving into a world that is way more closely connected than before, requiring one to interact with different people and cultures around the world, in which case the ability for positive acculturation and accommodation becomes vital for one’s survival.  

This changing dynamic emphasizes the need to move away from the norm and to continuously and consciously rethink and rebuild structures governing one’s social life.

What Otto Kernberg and Sudhir Kakkar are trying to illuminate, however, is the psychological interplay within a traditional family with the couple at its center, but which also applies to the outer social group of one’s friends, colleagues, and other social networks (online and offline) within which the sub-unit (the couple) is constantly submerged. The argument made by the respective authors is however based on the assumption of the phenomena where there is a gradual progression towards individuality.

However, I find myself questioning the premise of this supposed trend of greater isolation of the couple from the larger social group, simply because even though individuals are moving away physically, they are still submerged in the online experience of greater permeability and accessibility or involvement with the social group.  

Through the online platform, one is sharing not only the mundane details of the everyday experiences of the couple with their social group but is also physically taking part in a parallel offline community with the rise of a culture of indulging in group activities, whether it is a dance class, a therapy session, a support group or a book club for feminists.

The couple may be inhabiting together in a more nuclear setup, but socially and psychologically they are more submerged in society more than ever. The only difference is that there is a newfound agency with individuals to decide which social elements to let into their personal world. For example, an Indian gay or lesbian couple may have moved to another country on being rejected by their family, but they are still not  ‘isolated’, as claimed by family theorists because they now have access to a thriving gay community that serves many functions of providing emotional care and support or even monetary support in some cases to its members.

Even in this case, however, Kernberg’s psychoanalytical premise of the intra-psychic conflicts within the couple as well as with the larger social group can hold true in some sense.According to Otto Kernberg, a couple tends to act out or express certain unconscious needs as well as certain developmental conflicts (for example, the oedipal complex), in their relationship because of which often there is a delicate balance between love and aggression in the couple’s dynamic.

When couples nuclearize more and more with greater autonomy in deciding one’s culture and norms or ideals to base their relationship on, there may be a tendency to perform a certain ideal in the relationship. This may not leave space for the irrational aspects of the self to find expression in the relationship, for example, when a woman who is PMS-ing expects to be pampered like a baby by her partner, or when one or the other gets possessive or jealous of the other’s closeness with a friend/colleague, or when an  Indian girl tries to live out her desire to connect with a father figure in a more regressive manner.

These are, as psychoanalysis often points out, very dominant psychic forces that predominantly play out in one’s close personal relationships. Trying to live up to certain ideals in this new democratic autonomous relationship of choice bears the risk of suppression of aggression between the couple only to eventually lead to an outburst that runs the risk of a breakup of the couple.

If there is too much repressed and suppressed aggression, it weakens the couple. If it becomes excessive it may even destroy the couple. Having the presence of the constant  ‘other’ in one’s familial reality, with which a couple interacts sort of as a team, helps one direct these unconscious aggressive tendencies towards these ‘others’ instead of the partner. Oftentimes, when after dinner with close relatives, the couple on their way back home discuss the problematic behaviors by these others, they subliminally assert the unity of the couple against these others.

Moreover, one’s frustrations that come with an exhausting capitalist culture can find release in cribbing about these other relatives or friends without having to target one another. Along with this, there is an added benefit of the natural need to vent about one’s partner by confiding in a sister/brother or close friend which can be used as a (sometimes safe) space to release frustrations that emerge from the relationships as well as to gain perspective and contextual advice on how to mend problems within the relationship. In this way, the psychic release on to the larger social group maintains the harmony within the relationship. 

However, the question still remains, how safe or benevolent, as is often assumed, is this space really? There is sometimes a tinge of bias in family theorists, Sudhir Kakkar for instance, who tends to repeatedly assert that, ’family is also the main source of self-esteem’ or that the family ‘is the glue that holds Indian society together. (‘Family  matters, 2007, Kakkar S.)This depiction often undermines the trauma and toxicity that goes on within the four walls of a family.  

Perhaps like Kant’s philosophy that critiques moral universalism also emphasizes, that any tendency to universalize a concept based on experience is not the truth, universalism in the sociological context must also be replaced with ‘Relativism’, which in the context of the family would mean, negating the norm or normative structuring tendencies and instead contextualizing the structure of family to one’s own social needs and conditions, regardless of what is sanctioned by society. 

Feminist anthropologists (Collier J, Rosaldo M., Yanagisako S., 1992) also point towards this type of approach that looks at the family as an ideological unit rather than a functional one. And ideas can be different for different people.  

Speaking of normative behavior, Engels in his writings ‘The origin of the Family,  Private Property, and the State’ (1884) points to the origin of the family in the Victorian era through marriages of convenience, arranged by parents. As with the rise of capitalism and subsequent division of society into different classes, monogamous marriages started to take place within one’s own class, so as to pass on the property to one’s heir, which subsequently led to patriarchy. Like the state, the family comes about in the interest of a  small ruling class seeking to maintain control over their property.

Because these were not marriages of love, Engels posits, that oppression of one sex by the other, haterism on the part of the man and adultery on the part of the woman became the paradoxical reality of monogamy. To which the Catholic Church believed there was no cure, so they abolished divorces. 

Engels then posits that society at the helm of a social revolution with Socialism and the subsequent eradication of class would see the end of these marriages of convenience,  and a rise in marriage emerging out of mutual love, reciprocity and intimacy, which he calls, the ‘individual sex love’.  

Engels’ attempts to ground the family within the economic system and offers socialism as a valid solution to problems with the traditional Family System, where there would not be any private property to pass on and the children will be the collective responsibility of the society. As much as it is important to look for other alternatives to the current ruthless capitalism system, Socialism as the other end of the spectrum is probably not the answer. Because what good is a society where simply a big communal family replaces the smaller one, in a way that this community becomes another replica of the malpractices of the family only at a much bigger scale.  

I guess what I am trying to say is that personally, I would not want to live in a family system where I would have to deal with an even greater and ambiguous number of family members. If I were to be a child in this communal setup, I can imagine feeling lonely within this big crowd, perhaps longing to belong to someone who would love and prioritize me over the rest of the children in the commune. Who would one exactly look to for their needs, where there is such a diffusion of responsibility, in a commune where supposedly all members are expected to look after the children?  

However, even if not necessarily through a socialist state, but perhaps through a more prosperous economic system, we may be able to directly improve the quality of our relationships. Perhaps, if inequality decreased, and everyone’s basic needs for survival were met properly through ‘universal basic income/services’ for instance, one would have more time and energy to nurture their own psyches as well as those of others.  Perhaps, individuals would have more time to think deeply about human nature and existence, leading to more constructive ways of human social organization. Parents would have more time to tend to themselves and their partners which will, in turn, give them more space to indulge in better parenting, leading to a cycle of healthy relating to one another in society. I do believe that the pressures of everyday life take up a major chunk of the psychic resources we have, because of which our emotional lives take a back seat. And emotionality/sentimentality as an experience is far more immediate and important to the human experience than the material chase of the market. I think, in a  lot of ways we have got our priorities wrong. We live in a hyper-masculine, unconscious,  reactive and toxic system where one is driven by scarcity and fears, fighting for survival,  that doing and being good is out of the question. How does one then create any kind of family that is healthy and sufficient enough to meet the actual needs of its members? 

One of the drawbacks of universalizing an idea of the Family is that it loses its contextualize and ends up becoming a baseless normative convention that generations feel compelled to follow because all the other functions of the social life are based on this universality of Family as a basic unit of governance. In class, it was often referred to as a  basic unit of consumption, however, I do not agree with that conceptualization,  because I think consumption happens at an individual level as well. Consumption doesn’t end with family. What appears to me is that Family is definitely a basic unit, although not of consumerism, but of governance and social organization. States or any community, even tribes, for example, will feel the need to divide its population into smaller units that ease management. And if people are not divided into smaller groups, communities, religion,  class, caste, and family identity being one’s id card to the society, states and governments will not be able to rule. To rule you must divide/or at least sort, otherwise how would a politician or tribe head find followers? For access and penetration, the organisation is a must.  

Undeniably, the organisation has its own benefits, such as proper allocation of resources,  having someone be accountable for the needs of a set group of people, the ability to be heard, etc, however, when it is solely dependent on the existence of a single template of a  basic sub-unit that is family, for your membership to the society, it can become a limitation.

Family as a membership card to society brings with it specific rules of inclusion to this membership, for example, which community one marries into, which gender, which religion, etc become important matters of consideration. This can lead to a  marginalization of a lot of people who do not fit in with the norm.  

According to me, Family is not as much an issue, as is the top-down hierarchy based on which a Family is formed, and the inter-connectedness of all the other social functions such as religion, politics, the law also into this common template of a Family.  Because then, to participate in and form a Family one subsequently feels compelled to participate in identifications of caste, religion, etc.

This close ended-ness of Family breeds divide, which brings me back to my previous point of moving away from the normative constraints of a family as a functional unit and exercising greater agency in setting up a personal system of relations that works for you. Whether that means, two female friends living together to raise their adopted children in one household, or a group of childhood friends living together with their respective partners. Or even the traditional joint family if it works for those involved. Family in itself is not as limiting, but rather the superimposed tones of hierarchy, order, compliance on the family system is what makes it problematic.

A painting depicting Hierarchical proportion, which is a technique used in art, mostly in sculpture and painting, in which the artist uses unnatural proportion or scale to depict the relative importance of the figures in the artwork. In Egyptian times, people of higher status would sometimes be drawn or sculpted larger than those of lower status. During the Dark  Ages, people with more status had larger proportions. 

I have used this artwork to depict the hierarchical order in which family and society seems to be entrenched, and how symbolically it can feel, where some elements are bigger and occupy more space than others causing marginalization and predominance of a certain norm over the actuality of nuances in a society.

An Analogy:  

To further elaborate on the division and control that comes with this tendency to organize into sub-units of Family, can be compared symbolically, with the rise of the internet and the current budding laws around governing it. Ever since the time of the internet boom in the early 90s, any and every thing could be available on the internet. The internet was more free and variegated, a space for all kinds of content/data. However, today the state feels threatened by the equality of space that the internet offers to all voices and has begun to try to control it.  

In a way, the internet space can be imagined as a representation of the prehistoric state of humanity, perhaps before the imposition of state laws, and in the context of Family for instance. All content on the internet was mostly free, and all kinds of content were allowed to exist in the beginning.  

Constructive forces acted upon this content on the internet to organize it in a way that each type of content found a place or category to which it belonged. So in that sense,  data/content was subjected to organizing forces but not with the intention to control, but simply to give space, or to make the content reach its right audience (greater accessibility).  

In a sense, these constructive forces empowered the internet and everyone and everything present on it just by allowing it space to be. However what is happening over the years is that the Government wants to decide what is the right kind of content and what is not, and which kind of content deserves to have a place on the internet and which kind doesn’t. These control forces, as opposed to constructive forces, are similar to the familial, religious, state structures imposed on to human populations.  

Family and Gender Relations: Having to exist within a certain type of Family structure is one prescription, the other is  Gender within which one must learn to exist. The rules are sort of given to you already,  and whatever may be your personal inclination, you are socialized from the very beginning to fit into this predetermined structure of gender. Gender and Family go hand in hand because one cannot do without the other in the conventional sense. But, I would like to believe that it can. It’s like saying that a company that doesn’t assign job titles and positions cannot possibly get any work done. So, this argument that gender roles are important for the smooth functioning of the household and nurturance of children must be challenged.  

Adding to my previous analogy of a family being your id card to society, one could similarly say that gender too acts as some sort of a pass into the civilized society. Or better even- a dress code. Gender is like the dress code which you are expected to adorn before you enter the social gathering. And just like dress codes, there are always a few people who refuse to adhere and end up wearing what they like. But this analogy only minimizes the burden that comes with one’s gender.  

Gender is often the most asserting experience of your life because it forces you to view the world in a certain light and for the world to view you in a certain light. Gender comes with certain expectations. In a way, both Family and Gender are constructs that are designed to get you to behave in a sanctioned manner that is normative. Both these constructs are tools that uphold the norms of the society intact. And the inflexibility of these norms is what becomes a problem in a world where humans are so diverse and their needs and capabilities or inclinations are so variegated. To try to funnel the human experience is to thwart our own nature. We need structures that accommodate these vast differences.  

As a woman in India, I have grown up in a family where the women however young or old are expected to predominantly worry about the men’s well-being. From simple things like whether they have eaten or not to whether they are living out their dreams or not. From being a daughter to a sister, to even a girlfriend, there is always a man to have to take care of. And there is reciprocity of course but there is more disparity overall.  

A lot of the image of women as “the weaker sex”, perhaps stems from the gender training we receive. Women are socialized to be polite, obedient, peaceful, learn only softer skills, use and conduct our bodies in a tender fragile fashion, so much so that when someone attacks us, as they often do, physically, verbally or even emotionally, we are completely lacking resources to respond. Our gender has denied us access to parts of our own being, which if were explored and nurtured could have developed us in a way that we too could be the stronger sex. 

Men too, on the other hand, face the brutality of a gender structure that demands them to be so strong that they have to cut off parts of themselves that are soft and sentimental.  From a young age, they are told not to cry, which takes away their right to have needs and to be children.  

Either way, both men and women, and all other genders lose touch with several parts of themselves. Makes me wonder if there are parts of me that I perhaps can’t even picture and which will never see the light of day because its image doesn’t even exist in the collective consciousness. 

The main issue for me is the lack of agency in gender. How, when on getting married, the girl is expected to leave her life as she knows it behind, only to merge with that for her husband. She must stop being who she has been and just fit into the new wife/daughter in law role that is expected out of her, and any deviance from that is not tolerated. In this way, marriage itself is not begun on an equal footing. What happens to all the years I  spent working on who I am and who I want to be whether personally or professionally. Of course, any kind of coming together would require some sort of adjustment and accommodating this marriage, but the problem lies in the one-sidedness of this change.  The men’s lives are only added to or supplemented positively after marriage where the girl moves in with you and your family and you don’t have to move anything except some space in your messy cupboard. This is where all my anxieties about marriage and how the gender discourse in it has existed, lie where I feel like I have to annihilate my old self and my old life to fit into this new one.  

In conclusion, the structures of family or gender will continue to exist as important structures of human society, my only hope and wish are for it to move away from normative adherence to a kind of flexibility and openness that leaves space for personal agency.

References:

1. Mandelbaum D., 1948, The Family in India, University of New Mexico
2. Kakar S.,2007, Family Matters, Vol. 33, India International centre
3. Engels F.,1884, The origin of the Family, Private Property, and the State, New York:  Pathfinder Press. 
4. Collier J, Rosaldo M., Yanagisako S., 1992, Is there a Family? : New anthological  views, Gender/sexuality reader

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About The Author

Tanisha Singh
M.A. Psychology (Ambedkar University, Delhi), B.A. Psychology (Lady Shri Ram College for Women, University of Delhi).
Tanisha is a psycho-dynamic psychotherapist from Delhi, India.