Structural Determinants of Gender Inequality: Examining Belonging in Educational Settings for Marginalized Girls in India

• In Event: Interrogating Absence and Belonging in Educational Spaces: Intersectionality as a Research Tool and Practice

Abstract

Sense of belonging is a feeling of relatedness to a social group in which a person feels she is a valued member (Hill, 2006). Using an intersectional approach between psychology and sociology, this paper examines, ‘what does sense of belonging to education mean to historically underrepresented adolescent girls in rural India?’
Focus group discussions were conducted in January 2020, in five KGBV schools of Mewat, a district in north India, with 60 girls from grades 6 to 9. KGBVs are special schools attended by girls from the “most underprivileged sections” of the country. Findings show a case of belonging dissonance experienced by the girls that evokes a sense of inclusion and marks out their exclusion, at the same time.

Author

• Ananya Tiwari, Texas A&M University
  Presenting Author