TEACHING THE OTHER MOTHER TONGUES: HINDI EDUCATION AS GENDERED LABOUR

Abstract

An ethnographic study of transnational Indian communities in Singapore, this thesis explores the policies, cultural and national politics, and lived experiences of Hindi language education in Singapore. Focusing on the labour of the Indian immigrant women who predominantly produce Hindi education, this thesis sheds light on the conflict between policy objectives and practical realities. Drawing on eight in-depth interviews and a study of yearbook archives, this thesis finds that where policy dictates that mother tongue education is supposed to impart an essential cultural identity, this is subordinated to schools' prioritisation of administrative legibility, and communities’ use of Hindi for its utilitarian rather than cultural value. Meanwhile, the work of Hindi language teaching done by Indian immigrant women is deeply devalued in material and socio-cultural terms. The thesis illuminates these forms of devaluation, arguing that it is both a consequence of both their structural exclusion from Singapore’s formal labour force, as well as the gendered nature of the reproductive labour that Hindi language education implies. While being employed as a Hindi teacher promises flexibility, in practice it enables overwork and poor social status in relation to students, parents, and administrators. Despite this, Hindi teachers revitalise language education through their own discretion, outside of the confines of an inflexible and narrow curriculum. This study thus calls for reimagining mother tongue education in Singapore, through redesigning the curriculum to reflect a grounded sense of Hindi as a semiotic resource, and most importantly to improve the gendered, structural conditions of work for Hindi teachers.