Missed blog: Week 4: Humsafar- The notion of 'work'

We talked in class about how the women don’t seem to ‘work’. The women in the Urdu drama are primarily caretakers of the house- their professional life is always secondary. This is very different from the dramas of the eighties such as Dhoop Kinarey in which most of the drama revolves around the lead actress’s workplace or even Tanhaiyan in which the heroine is an independent businesswoman. In the contemporary Urdu drama, the upper class woman especially is portrayed as not being actively engaged in a vocation. Though the woman is shown to be employed, she still doesn't take it as seriously as the men do, or rather her work is not comparably on the same standing as the ‘serious’ stuff that the men engage in. This is made apparent in the case of Sara and Farida. Farida, though she apparently runs an NGO, never talks about her work, never once brings up an issue about her professional life that might be bothering her. Sara too is shown as taking work very lightly. The rules of a corporate office don’t seem to apply to her because she leaves whenever she wants to. She is always shown as going to Asher’s office convincing him to leave his work and go out with her. And of course, this is all in stark contrast to the diligent Ashar who is always busy with ‘office ke kaam’. In fact, at one point Farida even says, “Ye larkay bhi na, kaam ko sar pe sawaar karlete hain” By saying this, she excludes her entire gender from the notion of hard work, while unintentionally (or intentionally) championing the male’s ethic of work. Her dialogue seems to be emphasizing that hard work is only the man’s domain and somehow their time spent at work is more valuable or meaningful that her own.