Roles, Status and Development Potentials of Santal Women A Study on Santal Women in Rajshahi

Abstract

This study is an exploratory study that attempts to identify the roles and responsibilities of Santal women in their family life, explore the Santal women’s status in social life, assess the Santal women’s access to financial resources, analyze the Santal women’s scopes of education and employment and finally examine the potentials of socio-economic developments for the Santal women. The study takes mixed method as its methodological approach. The theoretical approach to explain the findings were cultural hegemony and assimilation. Sample survey, FGD and case study were implemented in this study. This study ends with some recommendations like sanctioning economic help, omitting the wage difference and revising the property inheritance system. Finally it reveals that cultural hegemony was the reason behind their religious conversion from Sanatan Dharma to Christianity. This also revealed that the level of assimilation is still low among the Santal women.