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"Everything in India Happens by Jugaad": Dai-mas in Institutions in Rural Rajasthan.

Lukšaitė, E

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Abstract

Since the introduction of a scheme promoting institutional deliveries in India, dai-mas (traditional midwives) have not become obsolete, but remain integral to institutional caregiving in rural areas in ways that are not always recognized. Based on ethnographic fieldwork in rural Rajasthan, I discuss two institutional contexts in which dai-mas were encountered - traditional midwife training event and hospital births. By examining how dai-mas' authoritative knowledge is reconfigured within institutions, I suggest that the polysemic Hindi term jugaad - a phrase describing the kinds of improvisation required in resource-poor settings - captures different aspects of dai-mas' relationships with and within institutions and the state of maternal caregiving in rural India.

Journal Article Type Article
Acceptance Date Jul 27, 2021
Publication Date Jul 27, 2021
Publicly Available Date Mar 28, 2024
Journal Medical Anthropology
Print ISSN 0145-9740
Publisher Routledge
Pages 1 - 15
DOI https://doi.org/10.1080/01459740.2021.1952575
Keywords India; authoritative knowledge; dai-ma; institutional childbirth; maternal health; traditional birth attendants
Publisher URL https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/01459740.2021.1952575