A book is most definitely a product of an author’s labor, but importantly it bears witness to the immense generosity of people near and far, making things possible in a way the author never really imagined. I hope that this acknowledgment makes visible the efforts of numerous people who have believed in me, inspired me, contributed to my growth as a scholar and as a human being, and filled my world with laughter, food, and happy thoughts!
My deepest gratitude is to all my interlocutors in Darjeeling who over a dozen years have shared their stories and their creative vision for social change and educated me about the value of hard work, entrepreneurialism, humility, and creativity despite all odds. I am indebted to them for their trust in me and their insistence on writing their stories. In writing this book I am deeply aware of the uneven field of power that our relationships are embedded in; I hope I have been able to do justice to their spirit of camaraderie and their rich lives.
This book would not have been possible without the friendships that have sustained my many long and short visits to Darjeeling since 2003. Navin Tamang, Sailesh Sharma, Ashesh Rai, and Roshan Rai at DLR Prerana deserve special mention. Others who opened their homes and workplaces to my constant presence with a smile are Binita Rai, Mr. and Mrs. Sunirmal Chakravarty, Rajah Bannerjee, PC Tamang, Shantanu and Aditi Biswas, Shashi Rai, Sushma and Shantanu Ghosh. Mashqura Fareedi, Pasang Lepcha. Chaitali Ghosh and her husband Late Dey-Bapi Ghosh, also extended their hospitality and perspective on many occasions. My fellow travelers in the Darjeeling journey, Sarah Besky, Townsend Middleton, and Sara Shneiderman, continue to inspire me with their work.
At my alma mater (Rutgers University) I have enjoyed the support and encouragement of a fabulous dissertation committee. I thank my chair, Dorothy Hodgson. Do, thanks for being such a positive role model for an aspiring feminist anthropologist. I am grateful to David Hughes for making me think beyond the dissertation and keeping in mind deep questions about power, resource use, representation, and questions of labor and development. Laura Ahearn—my fellow traveler in Himalayan studies—inspired me to think deeply about women and questions of agency as it pertains to Nepali women and women all over the world. I would like to thank Leela Fernandes for pushing me to think about broader feminist political economic questions that pertain to labor, gender, and transnational social justice in South Asia.
Apart from my committee, I would like to acknowledge the support and friendship of many others at Rutgers, most notably Rick Schroeder, Ana Ramos, Indrani Chatterjee, Ethel Brooks, Nikol Alexander Floyd, and Teresa Delcorso. I would also like to thank Penny Burness and Ginny Caputo for helping me navigate Rutgers bureaucracy and life in the United States. A cohort of students who also graduated from Rutgers deserve special thanks for their time and friendship, most notably Bradley Wilson, Cynthia Gorman, Ariella Rotramel, Chelsea Booth, Chaunetta Jones, Fatimah Williams, Drew Gerkey, Dillon Mahoney, Sharon Baskind, Noelle Mole, Rebecca Etz, Ben Neimark, Madhvi Zutshi, N. Jacob, and Edgar Rivera Colon. Mona Bhan and Mushtaque Ahangar deserve special mention for the marathon discussions, magical meals, and providing the space to relive the Delhi University days in the middle of New Jersey.
I have had the good fortune of finding great feminist mentors who have educated me about everything in academe that is not written in the “books.” My deepest gratitude to Srimati Basu for work-shopping my book proposal and many of its ideas over amazing food and drinks. Priti Ramamurthy deserves special thanks for reading my work innumerable times and providing generous comments. Piya Chatterjee deserves a big “thank you” for being there when the book seemed impossible and sharing her amazing vision for social justice, especially as it pertains to chā-bāgān ladies. Geraldine Forbes has been a great champion of my book project right from the time of the AIIS book workshop; she has continued to enquire about “the book” over the years and has provided great feedback. I also want to thank Michelle T. Berger, Subhra Gururani, Lamia Karim, Katherine March, Megan Moodie, Shirin Rai, Raka Ray, Srila Roy, Aradhana Sharma, Ashwini Tambe, and Paige West for their valuable engagement with my work. My thinking benefitted from engagements in panels that Susan Andretta, Pallavi Bannerjee, Jessica Johnson, Omotayo Jolaosho, Andrew Flachs, Shaila Galvin, Lipika Kamra, Sarah Lyon, Carl Maida, Tad Mutersbaugh, and Mallarika Sinha Roy invited me to participate in.
My friends at American University, where I taught between 2009 and 2011, were a source of great inspiration. Loubna Skalli Hanna—thanks for all that you did in those two years. Thank you Gretchen Schafft for opening your heart and home to me. I am grateful also to Geoff Burkhart and Sabiyha Prince for their wisdom and generosity. Thanks also to my dear colleagues Susan Shepler, Carolyn Gallaher, Sue Taylor, Brett Williams, Dolores Koeing, and Nina Shapiro Perl.
I am also lucky to have lifelong friends who are also accomplished editors. Poulomi Chatterjee deserves special mention for the gift of her friendship and her keen editorial attention to book contract jargon. My friend Srirupa Prasad has stood by me in the toughest of times and I thank her and Amit Prasad for providing me with my first home in in the United States. Rachel Watkins, my sister, my friend and mentor, thank you for being there—I am forever indebted to you. I would like to thank Anne Richards for some serious hand-holding and a steady supply of food, wisdom, and laughter. My friends Iraj Omidvar, Heidi Schrer, Jim McCaferty, Catherine Odera, Amanda Richey, and Matthew Mitchelson have cheered me along to the finish line. I would also like to thank Mallarika Sinha Roy, Basantarani Haobam, Rukmini Sen, Pritha DasGupta, and Faizan Ahmed for enquiring about the book over the years.
A book project spanning years is also sustained by resources and I am grateful to the following agencies and programs for their support: Wenner Gren Foundation Individual Research Grant (no. 7495) and NSF DDIG Grant (no. 0612860), for supporting long stretches of ethnographic fieldwork. Princeton University’s office of Population Research, the Taraknath Das Foundation of Columbia University’s Marion Jemmott grant, and Rutgers University’s Seed Grants sponsored shorter stays in Darjeeling. The Kennesaw State CHSS Summer Research Grant and the Manuscript Completion Program made possible some of the unhindered writing time. I would like to thank the American Institute of Indian Studies “Dissertation to Book” workshop for providing initial feedback on my dissertation. I would like to thank my department chairs, Joe Bock and Susan Smith, and the Dean of the College of Humanities and Social Sciences at Kennesaw State University, Robin Dorff, for their support of a jointly appointed junior faculty to complete the colossal task of writing the first single authored book.
Thanks also to Rafael Chaiken, Michael Campochairo, Dan Flynn, Eileen Nizer, and David Prout for everything they did to ensure that my book was on schedule.
Thanks to Nancy Naples at SUNY Press for her enthusiasm and support for this book. Special thanks to Beth Bouloukos for all the support and help along the way. The suggestions from the two anonymous reviewers have made this a much better book, I am grateful to them. Any shortcoming in the book is the author’s responsibility.
I am grateful to Feminist Studies and Anthropology in Action (Berghan Publishing) for granting me permission to reproduce my work from their journal. The same goes for Zed Books for allowing me to use my work published with them. I would like to thank Dustin Gibson, Kirsteen Anderson, and Paola Garcia for editorial assistance at various early stages of the book.
Losing my only parent at twenty-three was life altering in so many ways. My chotomama (Arijit Sen) has always been a source of strength ever since my childhood and I thank him for being there at critical moments in my life. My baromama (Surojit Sen) helped open many doors in Darjeeling, for which I am grateful. Both my uncles have also shared their love for Darjeeling—their childhood place. My parents-in-law, Manasij and Samita Majumder, deserve my gratitude for taking care of so many loose ends in Kolkata. Panna and Krishanu Chatterjee and Supriyo and Shika Biswas may not share blood ties with me, but they have looked out for me over the years.
My soulmate and partner-in-crime, Jijo/Sarasij Majumder, has seen this project through since its inception, sharing the pleasure and pain that accompany any book project. I am grateful for his love, patience, humor, and constant assurance that I should strive higher than I thought possible.
My two parents, my ma (Suvasree Sen) and my dida (Ratna Sen), are not alive to see this book come to fruition. For both of them Darjeeling was the best place on earth and I so regret not having the chance to share it with them. Ma, a single parent in India since the 1970s with all its complications, instilled in me a deep respect for learning and being independent and never taking no for an answer just because I am a woman. I thank her for my foundational lessons in feminism, and I dedicate this book to her.