Violence Against Women in the Militarized Indian Frontier

Abstract

Violence against women (VAW) in India is commonly attributed to an overarching metacultural patriarchal framework. Focusing on this national culture of violence obscures the experiences of VAW among ethnic minority women. This article focuses on VAW in Northeast India, a region populated by large numbers of Scheduled Tribes with different cultural norms, and where society has become militarized by ongoing insurgency and counterinsurgency. Though tempting, militarization alone is not a sufficient explanation for VAW; instead, this article focuses on the interplay between nonfamilial and familial contexts in creating a “frontier culture of violence” in which VAW is experienced and contested.