Household Roles
Roles of the family members within households ideally—and under the constraints of the ideal, as far as we can tell, to a considerable degree in fact—exemplify very general South Asian Hindu patterns.[3] In the Newars' own perspective there is, however, one major difference: the status of Newar wives compared to that of wives in the non-Newar Indo-Nepalese Hindu society, the Brahmans and Chetris, the Newar's most salient comparative model of Hindu family and social structure.
A summary report on family ideals resembles, not surprisingly, the domestic pole of fairy tales, the state that other forces threaten to derange, or that, if already deranged, is the yearned-for absent safe harbor. We can summarize briefly the norms that are shared with other Hindus. The father, most particularly when he is head of the household, is to be offered maximum respect and deference. As household head (a position that he will keep until he reaches old age and is moved off in a series of rites of passage [app. 6] into a semidivine role where he prepares for death and heaven or a good rebirth), he settles internal family problems and ultimately makes decisions for the household that affect the relations between the household and the outside world, particularly economic relations. There is a certain restraint between him and his children (in an emphasized contrast with the mother's brother) because, it is said, he has the difficult responsibility for making sure that his children behave properly in relation to the larger society, and any sentimental affection might weaken his authority and resolve.
Often the father is even cooler toward his daughters than toward his
sons, and often withdraws still further from his daughters after they marry and leave the house. His sons, or some of them—the elder or eldest, at least—tend to stay with the household to help "support the lineage" through their work and their progeny. The respect due to the father is also due from younger sons and daughters to older sons, particularly the first-born, and very often that oldest son acts as the surrogate father, particularly as the father ages and the oldest son may begin to "act in the father's name."
In comparison with an interrelated variety of ways in which the Newar woman is less disadvantaged than the "northern Hindu" and Indo-Nepalese woman (below) a daughter's situation in the household is "high." Michael Allen (1982, 200) has summed this up in an essay on Newar girls' prepuberty rites:
The high status of Newar women, at least as compared with that found in more orthodox Hindu communities elsewhere ,n the Himalayas and north India, is evident not only in the context of marriage and divorce, but in a wide range of other areas of social and religious life. Sons, though perhaps slightly preferred to daughters, especially in the case of the first born child, are not accorded the exaggerated importance found in most Hindu communities. There is no evidence of female infanticide,[4] either now or ,n the past, and the birth of a daughter is not in any way regretted.
The senior women in the household, particularly the naki (n ) or female leader of the household, has the responsibility of supervising the general housekeeping and, especially in lower-level families, for a great deal of important economic activities—farming, weaving, basket making, and many specialized thar occupations. She is assisted by her daughters, and in particular by the wives of her sons. The naki (n ) of the household has many ritual responsibilities in household worship and in rites of passage for family members. As wife, she is supposed to defer to her husband, treating him with public respect, particularly in upper status families, where she may bow to his feet at the start of the day. As a mother she is ideally, and to a large extent it would seem in actuality, indulgent and affectionate to her children.
The relationship between brothers and sisters is supposed to be intimate and warm.[5] After the sister marries, her brothers, usually represented by the eldest, will represent her natal household to her new family. The brother becomes her children's maternal uncle, their paju , and his warm relationship with them will complement their own father's relative austerity.