Steph K. Pre-departure Post

Hi everyone..

I'm Steph Krzyzewski, and I'm a junior at Emmanuel majoring in Global Studies with minors in Spanish and Management. Although I'm nervous about the flight, I'm really excited to be going to India -- I actually only decided to start a Management minor when I saw this class offered. I became interested in Indian culture during my World Religions class last semester. When we studied Hinduism, my professor could never give us any one belief system or cultural trait that was true for all Hindus, and this was really intriguing to me. During this trip I also want to work on being able to study other cultures without judging them directly. I want to be able study the history of Indian women and draw critical conclusions rather than make ignorant assumptions and judgements.

In my predeparture paper, I wanted to show a way in which Indian women have manipulated globalization and exploitation to their benefit, so here is my conclusion:

The idiosyncrasies of a culture dictate the ways in which women choose to become active in leadership endeavors. Because of India’s history of patriarchy, elitist concentration of power, and gender inequalities, women are making slow advances, unique to their situation. Indian women could benefit greatly from the adoption of western feminist ideologies, but their situation can also help guide the western movements. The women working in call centers provide insight, although they may not know it. The call center industry was new in India, although it was specifically outsourced to exploit cheap female labor. However, women took hold of the industry and it developed into a seemingly gender-neutral environment in which women could show their equal capabilities. If western women desire high-level management positions, entrepreneurship and new industries should be investigated, which could ultimately become jumping-off points for women to rise into upper-management levels.

It was hard to pick just one section that would make sense on its own, so there's the best one...

See you all soon :o)