I can only speak with respect to what I’m familiar with, but in the organizations I’ve worked with, and in the regions where I’ve worked, women tend to provide the “people power” — organizationally and otherwise — to power community-based programs and issues (I am, in this case, speaking generally, not exclusively about the Sikh community). Within Sikh organizations, look at the Boards of most “mainstream” groups; oftentimes there are very few women, and rarely does the representation reach parity. This is of course true of other NPO/CBO Boards, as well, but the imbalance is often limited to one “token Kaur.”

Within my own subsection of the Sikh community, I have very rarely seen women honored for their contributions, unless it is in the context of being someone’s mother or someone’s wife or unless she has chosen to wear a dastaar (and I have seen women honored for only that choice!). There are Sikh women doing tremendous work, both within and outside of the Sikh community, but I do think there has been less support, both from men and women, for their endeavors, leadership, and vision. It is one thing to say “no one is stopping you,” but it’s another thing to actively promote gender equality.

I can think of a thousand (if not more) incidents in which women were actively shut out from public (Sikh) spaces. I don’t think this is always because of animus, but rather, in some regions and sangats, there are still norms and beliefs around the role of women, their capacity, and even the physical image/representation of Sikh women. Sometimes these assumptions are positive, and sometimes negative, but either way they are often limiting.

but seriously folks…i’m just waiting for valerie kaur’s next piece of brilliance on sikhchic.com. maybe score can give her an award for her use of overbearing emotional hyperbole and constant self promotion.

too funny.

i keeeeed. i couldn’t help myself. but seriously folks…i’m just waiting for valerie kaur’s next piece of brilliance on sikhchic.com. maybe score can give her an award for her use of overbearing emotional hyperbole and constant self promotion.

i keeeeed. i couldn’t help myself. but seriously folks…it is interesting that the majority of sikhs at sikh organizations are women (as mewa singh points out). i wonder if this is just how the cookie recently crumbled and the demographics of the orgs is fluid, if women just tend to care more and are more involved, or if our still patriarchal society lends itself well to women taking on lower paying, non-profit jobs. that said, it is curious that there are so few women honored by score, but again,i just can’t help but question the actual organization. irrespective of some commenter’s defense of score and its leadership, it is primarily concerned with publicity and PR. and if you look at that list of recipients, it reflects accessible accomplishments (for white people), american values (capitalism, sports, fashion), and includes some social activists whose merits i can’t really judge from my ikea armchair. perhaps it was all for the benefit of some politicos who were in attendance.

anyways – what is the kaur foundation? their website is anemic and i’d never heard about it. spiffy mission statement, and slick “signature piece” (even if i can’t figure out why it’s SIX MINUTES long). do they make roti’s?

i keeeed. i couldn’t help myself. but seriously folks…let’s all work together.

I can agree with your point that Sikh women may not be getting their ‘due’ from some organizations.

Most Sikh organizations being staffed by women is not something that I dispute (I don’t have the facts one way or the other on that).

I am glad we agree on the point Gurdit made and I emphasized regarding Akal Takht and leadership by example being required on the part of all Sikh institutions.

Best regards,
Kaptaan

Call it ridiculous, but the point remains most Sikh organizations (including the Sikh Coalition) are staffed by a higher proportion of women. In almost all Sikh organizations, I find this to be the case.

Yet, when it comes time to ‘award’ people, as Reema’s post suggests, then rarely are those women given their due.

Regardless, we find a point of agreement with the role of the Akal Takht. So I will leave it at that. We are both on the same page there.