"In Pursuit of 'Good Life': Gender, Caste and Class in India's Shadow Economy" – This ethnographic inquiry investigates how class, caste and gender intersect in urban slums of Hyderabad, South India, to shape aspirations for “good life” for lower caste (Dalit, historically categorized as untouchables) women engaged in the informal labor sector which constitutes a whopping 80 percent of the Indian workforce. Responding to the critical need for an intersectional analysis of the structural inequalities Dalit women face, I examine how the precarity of labor informality renders them multiply vulnerable. In this talk, CSWS research fellow Malvya Chintakindi centers the voices of Dalit women informal workers—long invisible in policy discourse—highlighting local labor regimes in the global south. Engaging with anthropology, anthropology of labor, subaltern and public policy studies, she investigates the role of urban employers, state and non-state actors, and urban living standards in creating Dalit women’s aspirations for “good life.” Through multimodal research methodologies, she illuminates and re-conceptualize the complex interlinkages of class, caste, gender, and informal labor in urban India.

Malvya Chintakindi is a fifth year PhD candidate in cultural anthropology, an applied anthropologist, and an international development practitioner with a background in public policy, development studies, and journalism. Her dissertation focuses on how marginalized women navigate aspirations for a "good life" within the constraints of caste, class, and informal labor in Hyderabad's urban settlements.  

12–1 p.m. Wednesday, Mar. 12  |  330 Hendricks Hall |  1408 University Street, Eugene