School of Social and Political Science

Description

This article will ethnographically explore the dynamics of moral surveillance on digitally literate, young women entering traditionally ‘respectful’ gendered professions (e.g. teaching, nursing, care-work) in peri-urban India. As professional women acquire smart phones and internet services, local shaming practices morph to challenge their secret on-screen lives and sociotechnical freedoms. I will unpack a ‘scandal’ leading up to the dismissal of a female teacher, Parama, in a school located in the fringes of Kolkata, a city in eastern India. When school authorities uncovered Parama’s activities on an adult sex site, it precipitated extended real-life ‘cancel’ campaigns (including staff, family members, and neighbours) against her inappropriate behaviour as a working woman and role model for children. I will analyse how such collective mechanisms of moral outrage are designed to expose socially decent women with hidden/covert online identities. I argue that these practices gain vitality by advocating a language of caution against the dangers of digital modernity encroaching upon marginal urban districts in India.