Women's Empowerment and Value Education

R. Indira

Professor

Department of Studies in Sociology

University of Mysore, Manasa Gangotri, Mysore - 570 006

It is at the most appropriate time that this dialogue on Women's Empowerment and Value Education is being organized, for, in a few days from now the curtain falls on the 'Year of Women's Empowerment'. However, the goal of empowering women still remains elusive and will require sustained efforts if we are to reach anywhere closer to achieving it. Among these efforts the most elementary as well as the most effective is education. However, when we say education it is very important to explicitly state what kind of education we are referring to. We must recognize the fact that education can function both as an 'empowering' and 'disempowering' instrument and hence when we engage in a dialogue on the role of education vis-a-vis women's empowerment we have to be careful about drawing sweeping conclusions. It is in this context that the subject of women's empowerment through value education has to be discussed.

At the outset it is very important to define the two key concepts used in this paper, viz., Women's Empowerment and Value Education. Let us begin with women's empowerment.

Empowerment is not something which could be made available in the form of a capsule to those whom we think are in need of it. It is not just a concept that could be defined with the help of some universally accepted parameters. Empowerment is a process and includes the following components:

(i) Equal access to opportunities for using society's resources.

(ii) Prohibition of gender discrimination in thought and practice.

(iii) Freedom from violence.

(iv) Economic independence.

(v) Participation in all decision-making bodies.

(vi) Freedom of choice in matters relating to one's life.

There is, however, one caution we have to exercise when we talk of women's empowerment. Women do not constitute a homogeneous category and hence empowerment priorities of different groups of women are different. For a large number of women in India who have to wage a grim battle for survival the provision of basic necessities such as nutritious food, clean drinking water, primary education, primary health care and opportunities for skill acquisition or skill development, as the case may be, and access to income generation activities are the immediate necessities. For women who have been able to get access to life sustaining services empowerment priorities are different.

Just as there cannot be a universally accepted empowerment model, it is not really

possible to give a universally acceptable orientation to the term value. Values may be perceived as standards that one considers important in one's social set up. But values may differ from one society to another as also from time to time. Values are not static entities that do not lend themselves to change. It is true that certain values have universal applicability and stand the test of time. Such values as truth, honesty, empathy, and dedication to one's calling that foster human good and progress need to be preserved and transferred from one generation to the other. But there are also values that have no contemporary relevance and need to be not only questioned but also thoroughly modified. Since such values act as major blocks to women's empowerment it is very important that education must take cognizance of this factor.

In any society education has two basic functions to perform. While one relates to preserving and transferring the values of that society, the other relates to creating new values or changing existing ones to keep in tune with times. Both these functions have a special bearing on efforts to empower women. On the face of it, the two functions look as if they are diametrically opposed to one another, but in reality they should be complimentary to each other and a balance between the two should be brought about in a manner that fosters human progress. Since education is the most powerful instrument for value preservation as well as value transformation, it can play the most effective role in empowering women.

Negative values that have posed severe challenges to women's development have been operating in this society for too long. In fact our society has a history of denying opportunities for women to seek knowledge. The denial of access to education kept women in a state of perpetual ignorance and prevented them from seeking or utilizing opportunities for empowerment. The values which were in vogue were that women do not deserve freedom; their primary goals in life are marriage and motherhood; they should be educated to perform these roles to the satisfaction of all other members of the family and that a woman should sacrifice all her aspirations for the sake of her family. Self-sacrifice, tolerance and subservience are among the values that have been handed over to women from one generation to another as 'ideal'. Even though educational policies and programmes have been emphasizing on the need for promoting such values as 'equality', 'self-respect' and 'freedom', in reality education continues to perpetuate gender prejudices. It is needless to say that both formal and informal streams of education are guilty of this tendency.

Let us first look at the system of formal education. The National Educational Policy of 1986 clearly laid out that education must strive towards empowering women. But even to this day one finds in many school textbooks such statements as father is the head of the family, mother works in the kitchen, some mothers also work, daughter helps mother in the kitchen and son accompanies father to the market and brother reads the newspaper and sister hangs clothes in the backyard. One may argue that feminists are being over-sensitive to such issues. But such lessons send wrong messages and reinforce gender prejudices. For the creation of a social order committed to gender equality such values as co-operation, participation, equal recognition for all types of work, be it at home or outside must be fostered. The message that women and men are equal partners in the survival and sustenance of a society must be conveyed through textbooks, classroom teaching and outdoor activities. Gender biases operate either in an 'overt' or 'covert' form at different levels of education and it is this vicious circle that value education must break if it has to work towards the goal of women's empowerment.

While the proportion of India's population that is covered by formal institutions of education is still small, almost every one in the country is exposed to one agency of informal education or the other. The process of socialization begins in the family long before the child enters the school and throughout his or her life an individual is exposed to the influences of religion, media, economic and political institutions, among others. All these institutions have the power to create, transform or perpetuate values. Attitudes and practices that actually hinder rather than promote women's empowerment are found in all these institutions, which also have a powerful educating influence. Media programmes that continue to show women in negative role models and glorify violence and subordination are doing the greatest damage to the efforts at promoting women's empowerment. Sadly the media seems to be the most authoritative 'teacher'.

The need of the hour is a strong system of value based education that upholds principles such as equity, ethics and empowerment. As of now, there is neither adequate 'quantitative' nor 'qualitative' representation to women in education. Women not only need to occupy more spaces in education but also more meaningful spaces. If we are really committed to creating an environment that is conducive to women's empowerment we have to build into the system of education those values which build respect for women's roles and responsibilities and recognize their contribution to society.