Page 307 - Communication Processes Volume 3 Communication Culture and Confrontation

282 Hema Rairkar

The common reactions can be summarized in the following phrases,
which are regularly heard from women who have had no other
experience of life than the routine:

l ‘You have shown that in the public place, in front of everyone,
that’s good. It deserved to be said once and for all.’
l ‘We had to listen to sermons these last seven evenings. But your
play had a lot of effect.’
l ‘Come to perform in our place one day; it is necessary that
everybody sees this. There are many similar cases in our village.
An intervention coming from outside like that can have an effect.’
l ‘You show the reality exactly as it is. But what to do?’
l ‘You show actual everyday life. I thought that you wanted to
entertain us. But why is it that we have to see again what we are
putting up with everyday?’
l ‘You have opened our eyes.’

More personalized reactions are noted. Young girls of 15 or 16 years
of age, about to be married off by their parents, say: ‘You show how a
husband brings a second wife. Why not rather show that he looks for
one but he does not find anyone?’ Undoubtedly, these young girls fear
a situation which threatens them and causes them anguish.
A frequent retort is: ‘You have shown how it is; it is always women
who are punished. There is never any punishment for men. Why only
women? Men must also be punished. Do a play to show this.’ Women
do not expect only a punishment in the strict sense of the term, but
the defeat of men, for example, by adding their (women’s) names in
titles of landed property of the husband, or securing an alimony in
case they are sent back to their parents. This is a demand for recogni-
tion and dignity.
Women of small Marwari traders are strictly confined to their shops
and homes, solely submerged in religious rituals, going out only to go
to a temple in the village or to pilgrimages. No social communication
of any sort is allowed. One of them came to a temple where the group
was preparing itself, and under the pretext of devotion lingered at her
ease around the group. The play was performed in front of her house
in the street. She came out and served water to the actresses in order
to whisper in their ears on the sly: ‘I do not have a child. My in-laws