Retracing the History of Women Thinkers in Colonial Bengal: A Critical Study of Bamasundari Devi and Her Works in the Nineteenth Century

Abstract When women thinkers present their critical worldview, how do they conceive their social and cultural spaces? What alternative ideas came up when women writers began to question gender relations and social discrimination? Can critical thinking by women intellectuals from marginalised locations offer us a different understanding of intellectual and cultural history? This article attempts to reread the forgotten pages of the intellectual history of women thinkers in the nineteenth century in colonial Bengal through a critical study of the essays of Bamasundari Devi. In the late nineteenth century, Bamasundari reclaimed the intellectual space which was conventionally denied to women. Through her argumentative prose, she proposes non-discriminatory social practices and challenges the dominant norms of Hindu brahminic patriarchy. This article will explore the contribution of Bamasundari Devi and her works in order to retrace the intellectual tradition of women thinkers in colonial Bengal.